Languages

The Languages Department is a highly successful department with a large number of students opting to study French, German and Spanish at KS4 and in the Sixth Form.

The Lead Teacher in Languages works to develop the curriculum and enrich students’ experience across the school. The Languages department takes a strong lead in cross-curricular projects with other departments such as ICT and Art and is currently teaching CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) in collaboration with History to Year 7. The Department is also leading developments in vocational learning in Key Stage 3 and 4.

The Department takes a lead in developing Cockermouth as an International School, with residential visits regularly taking over a hundred students to France and Germany in Year 8. There are also well-established exchange programmes at all key stages to Brake (Germany) and Cockermouth’s twin town Marvejols (France).

The School acts as a regional centre to share good practice with partner schools in the area. Working closely with Routes in Languages, the school is a hub for language enrichment opportunities for students at Key Stage 3 http://www.routesintolanguages.ac.uk/northwest/events/1849. Cockermouth is also a Links into Languages regional centre providing quality professional development for primary and secondary colleagues http://www.linksintolanguages.ac.uk/centres/index.html.

The Department’s outreach teacher works alongside primary colleagues on a weekly basis to develop the teaching and learning of languages in our partner schools.