Write Away! news

 

Issue 22 of Write Away! magazine is now available to read: https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/writeaway.htm

Take a look at the writing that primary children have been doing in their language lessons.

The deadline for the Easter term issue is Thursday 27th March 2025.  All info is on the webpage.

EXCITING NEWS!

Next term we will also be bringing you a Key Stage 3 Special Edition.  If you would like to submit some of your students' work from KS3, please go to the webpage to see what you need to do.

It will be great for the primary children to see the sorts of things they might be able to create in KS3!

32 new resources today

 I've just finished uploading 32 new resources to the website.

7 of them are for primary French - use today's date 22.11.24 to find the new ones.

The rest are for primary Spanish, mostly for Cycle B of the mixed-aged scheme, which I am teaching in KS1 and KS2 this year.  As some of the units are duplicated from the original scheme, some of the resources appear there too.  Again, use today's date 22.11.24 to find the new resources.

A lot of the primary resources, especially those for UKS2, will also suit lower KS3.

If you like Light Bulb Languages, please consider buying me a coffee.  All donations are welcome, to keep the website free.  

Write Away! news

 

Write Away! magazine has been a huge success since I first launched it in 2019.  The magazine showcases and celebrates the writing that primary children do in their language lessons as part of their curriculum at school.  French, Spanish, German, Italian and Latin have all been featured over the existing 21 issues.

Write Away! was launched as a half-termly, six issues a year magazine.  However, during the last school year (2023-24) there were a couple of occasions where I didn't receive any submissions for the planned issues.

Therefore, from this point, it will be a termly magazine.  This will give teachers and children more time to get submissions together, and hopefully will encourage more schools to submit their work.

The deadline for the next issue, issue 22, is Thursday 5th December 2024, with the magazine set to publish before we all break up for Christmas.  I look forward to receiving your submissions!

Interested in submitting your students' work?  Please read the rules and regs here.

97 new resources today

 I've just finished uploading 97 new resources to the website.

They are mostly for the new KS2 Spanish mixed age scheme: the scheme of work documents and the knowledge organisers are now complete, and there are the first resources for the new units (A1 and B2).

There are also some for: 

• Primary French
• KS3 French Grammar
• KS3 French worksheets
• KS4 French worksheets
• KS3 Spanish grammar

And a few others dotted around.  As always, if you want to find the new ones, do CTRL+F on your keyboard and type in today's date - 08.08.24 - to find them.  Alternatively on your handheld device do "Find in page" and enter the date.

If you like Light Bulb Languages, please consider buying me a coffee.  All donations are welcome, to keep the website free.  

Spanish Mixed Age scheme for KS2

If you're a regular user of Light Bulb Languages, you'll notice a few changes to the Primary pages, mainly because of the arrival of the Spanish Mixed Age scheme for Key Stage 2.

Most of it is usable, but you will notice that the documentation not there yet, as well as the knowledge organisers and resources for the only two new units (LKS2 A1 and B2). I will be writing and adding those over the course of the summer holiday so that it will be all systems go for September.

If you like Light Bulb Languages, please consider buying me a coffee.  My web-hosting fees have shot up this year.  All donations are welcome, to keep the website free.  

56 new resources today

 Over the last couple of days I have uploaded 56 new resources:

• Olympics 2024 resources
• Primary Spanish, mainly for KS1
• Primary French, mainly for opinions of food

If you like these resources, please consider buying me a coffee.  My web-hosting fees have shot up this year.  All donations are welcome, to keep the website free.  

28 new resources today

 I've just finished uploading 28 new resources to the website.  They are mostly for KS1 French and Spanish, for the Pirates unit that I have been creating this term for my mixed Y1/2 class.

• Key Stage 1 Spanish pirate resources 
• Key Stage 1 French pirate resources 

These include some Listening Chest listening activities, and I have also uploaded some Spanish grids for Sentence Builder Bingo.

If you like these resources, please consider buying me a coffee.  My web-hosting fees have shot up this year.  All donations are welcome, to keep the website free.  

75 new resources today!

 I have just finished uploading 75 new resources to the website:

• Some resources for the 2023 Rugby World Cup (English, French, Spanish, German, Italian)
  
  
• A number of primary French resources, including some, for opinions of fruits and weather, which are the first for which I have used ChatGPT to try to speed up the process.  Read more about my experiments with ChatGPT here.
  
  
• Some more primary Spanish resources, including the first for my forthcoming 2-year rolling scheme for Key Stage 1.  I am going to be starting with Pirates to teach greetings, numbers and colours.  These resources are also available in French.
  
  
• Some KS4 Spanish high-frequency verb revision resources

You'll know which are the new resources as they will have today's date - 19.08.23.

You may remember from the last blogpost that the site had 7929 resources, meaning I needed another 71 to get to 8000.  Well these 75 mean that I can legitimately say that the site now has over 8000 resources - 8004 to be precise!

If you like these resources, please consider buying me a coffee.  In addition, my web-hosting fees, which I have just paid, have shot up this year.  All donations are welcome, to keep the website free.  

53 new resources today!

I've just finished uploading 53 new resources, things that I had been saving up over the last couple of terms.  It's mostly for Primary French, with a bit also of Primary Spanish, French Display and Spanish Display.

If you want to locate new resources on a certain page easily, try CTRL+F on your computer and enter the date 08.08.23.  You can also use "Find in page" on your mobile device using the same date.

Light Bulb Languages now has a total of 7929 resources - nearly 8000!

If you like these resources, please consider buying me a coffee. 

Don't forget also to have a look at the Etsy shop - plenty of goodies there for the language lover!

Write Away! issue 15

Issue 15 of Write Away! magazine is now available to read on Light Bulb Languages.

I hope that reading this issue or previous issues has inspired you to submit your own students' writing.  As the editor, I aim to include as many pieces of work as possible.  Here are some tips to help ensure that your students' work is among those selected for inclusion:

1. Please send the work as scanned .jpg or .png files. This is by far the easiest format to edit if necessary and to drop onto the page.  Photographed work is not ideal.  The resolution is often too low for effective enlargement, and it is very difficult to edit it to get a pure white background.

2. Make sure once the work is scanned that it's legible.  Work written in faint pencil or light coloured pen like yellow can't be used.  Sometimes colouring-in makes the writing hard to read.  Work that has pencil obviously overwritten with pen will not be used.  The background of the piece of work should be pure white all over (unless there are illustrations or colouring!)

3. Make sure once the work is scanned that there aren't any parts chopped off.  If bits are missing the work can't be used.

4. Please ensure that the work will fit in a portrait page space 15cm x 26cm. This might mean that children have to rewrite the work on a sheet that you have specially prepared.

5. The work needs to be as correct and as neat as possible.  Write Away! is aspirational, a showcase and a celebration.

6. Work including illustrations is great - it saves me from having to find appropriate images!

7. Make sure that the permission letter has been signed by both the children and their parents/carers.  If they haven't given permission, I can't use their work.

8. Make sure that all the necessary paperwork is completed and sent.

9. Don't send too many pieces of work.  To avoid the magazine being too "samey", the largest number of pieces of work I will use from one school is 6.  If you send more than 6 pieces of work on the same theme and in the same format, there will be some that are not used.

I look forward to receiving your submissions!  The deadline for issue 16 is 24th March 2023.