RESEARCH | MFL Student Mentoring Project

The project has been subject to external evaluation since it began in 2015. This has helped the project to grow and improve. Increasingly, these evaluations have helped us to understand the nuances of the diverse challenges facing languages across Wales and has supported the project to diversify to support our language communities.

The project has been subject to four external evaluations to date:

1

Evaluation of the first 2 years of the project (2015-2017), conducted by Teresa Tinsley of Alcantara Communications.

2

Evaluation of Digi-Languages (2017-2018), conducted by Teresa Tinsley of Alcantara Communications.

3

Evaluation of the impact of the project on schools and mentors engaged in the project over 2 or more years (2018-2019), conducted by Teresa Tinsley of Alcantara Communications.

4

5 year evaluation 2015-2020, conducted by OnData Research.

The project also publishes internal evaluations. Please find these below:

1

Evaluation of the Post-16 Languages Recovery Project delivered during Lockdown 2020, by Lucy Jenkins.

Key findings to date are:

Mentors provided a positive role model and were directly able to demonstrate the benefits of studying a modern foreign language, for example the opportunity to travel and work abroad.

The training and experience provided to mentors will be carried forward into their future careers and was appreciated beyond expectation by mentors.

Teachers reported that the project built learner confidence and resilience around their MFL studies; that impact on learners increased over time; that the project supported learner aspiration for university study and that participation in the project had raised the profile of languages in the school.

Through participation in the project, schools were given the opportunity to build a partnership with a university and as a result the profile of MFL was raised in the school.

The experience of mentoring positively impacted on the mentees’ GCSE choices, with increases seen within each cycle. For example, in cycle 2 there was a 51% increase in the stated intention to take an MFL GCSE by mentees.

The “Digi-mentoring” approach was just as effective as the face to face sessions. There were additional logistical IT challenges to be overcome but the mentee experience was still of a high level, with over 90% reporting their experience as “Excellent” or “Good”. Of those who participated and weren’t sure whether or not to take an MFL GCSE, following participation, an additional 28% opted to take an MFL GCSE taking the overall percentage of the cohort to 43%.

Innovation and Impact Award, Cardiff University (2019)

The project was highlighted as 1 of 6 projects from Cardiff University, due recognition for its contribution to innovation.
“The Consortium empowers schools to improve outcomes for all learners. The Modern Foreign Language Student Mentoring Project has played a key role in broadening the horizons and aspirations of learners. The mentoring scheme has highlighted the skills, mobility opportunities and wellbeing advantages available to those with language skills. It is helping to raise expectations, improve motivation and create sustainable links between Higher Education modern languages departments and partner secondary schools.”
Clara Seery, Managing Director, Central South Consortium

The Threlford Memorial Cup, Charted Institute of Linguists (2017)

In November 2017, the chartered Institute of Linguists (CIOL) and its awarding body the IoL Educational Trust (IoLET), awarded the MFL Student Mentoring Project the Threlford Memorial Cup, given for fostering the study of languages.
“CIOL is delighted to make the award of the Threlford Memorial Cup to the Student Mentoring Project, which places undergraduates from Cardiff, Swansea, Bangor and Aberystwyth Universities in local schools as ambassadors for the study of foreign languages at GCSE level. The decline in the numbers of secondary school pupils studying languages is a matter of urgent national concern across the UK, and has been particularly acute in Wales. This Project is having a demonstrable effect on the take-up of languages in Welsh schools, as well as being beneficial to the personal development of the students involved, and is exactly the kind of initiative the award seeks to recognise."
Professor Chris Pountain, Chair IoLET Board

The project has increased its research presence significantly over the last 5 years. Below, you will find a summary of small grants and research pieces undertaken by the project.

Title of research: Evaluating the effectiveness of e-mentoring and a digital languages resource for FLL in Wales

Summary of research: An evaluation of Digi-Languages, an online experience which encourages its users, Year 8 or 9 school pupils, to engage in questions which challenge mono-lingual and mono-cultural perceptions. This experience takes a blended approach to mentoring, as an online and face-to-face activity and was developed by the MFL Student Mentoring Project.

Funder: AHRC Open World Research Initiative - Multilingualism: Empowering Individuals, Transforming Societies (MEITS) – January 2018

Summary of outcomes:

1. 3 minute film for OWRI pop-up museum which was launched at the end of 2019.Read more

2. Policy report by Gorrara, Jenkins and Mosley: ‘Modern Languages and Mentoring: Supporting Digital Learning across Language Communities in Wales’. This was published on the MEITS website and offered to Welsh Government to consult.Read more

3. Policy paper by Gorrara, Jenkins and Mosley: ‘Modern languages and mentoring: Lessons from digital learning in Wales’, published in the Languages, Society & Policy Journal.Read more

4. Stakeholder workshop on outcomes of first iteration of Digi-Languages in May 2018 with Welsh Government and Department for Education (England) in attendance. This began discussions about how the Department for Education may look to fund a similar project in England to support their ambition to have 75% of students studying an MFL at GCSE by 2022 and 90% by 2025. The project later successfully won a contract of £100k to deliver a pilot of this in November 2018. Read more

Title of research: Language Learning Opens Doors to Other Worlds: Memory Acts through Digital Technologies

Summary of research: To understand the applicability of the Digi-Languages and mentoring methodologies implemented by the MFL Student Mentoring Project in Wales to wider languages communities, above all, in European partner countries.

Funder: AHRC Languages Acts and Worldmaking - November 2018

Summary of outcomes:

1. Presentation of outreach projects at APPG for Modern Languages in October 2018. This event involved mentors, previous mentees and teachers involved in the project from across Wales.

2. Meetings with European colleagues at the Welsh Higher Education Bureau (WHEB) in November 2018 which resulted in a partnership between MLANG and the Castilla y Leon Regional Government. This resulted in 8 final-year UGs being recruited and trained to mentor in Spain as part of a final-year module, the Student Teaching Module, resulting in innovation of the student teaching and learning experience. Read more

3. Invitation to attend the Welsh Government St. David’s Day celebration event in Brussels (February 2019) with the First Minister of Wales. Representatives from the MFL Student Mentoring Project, the Physics Mentoring Project (a sister project), students engaged in the Castilla y Leon Project and students engaged in Language Horizons, the DfE funded iteration of Digi-Languages, all attended.

Title of research: Rethinking the Languages pipeline in the age of Brexit (September 2019)

Summary of research: To investigate the factors impacting on the decline of language learning in the UK and champion new partnership models for the promotion of linguistic and cultural diversity. The event aims to challenge the assumptions underpinning populist denigrations of multiculturalism in the UK, magnified by Brexit, and contributes to debates on the future of (Modern) Languages as a discipline and field.

Funder: AHRC Languages Acts and Worldmaking

Summary of outcomes:

1. Languages summit hosted in Cardiff on September 27th. Funded by a small grant from ‘Languages Acts and World-making’, GW4 Consortium and Routes into Languages Cymru, this event discussed the challenges facing languages from primary school to University and across England and Wales. Increasingly, students are opting out of studying a language, often unaware of what they will lose (or never encounter) as a result of such a decision. Multilingualism is an integral part of our everyday lives and allows us to communicate, interact and learn from others beyond our linguistic community. The openness that this promotes is needed more so than ever in an era of Brexit. The event aimed to bring together key language stakeholders involved in a student’s language journey to reflect and consider how we might reconfigure the language landscape in the UK to make language learning more appealing to young people.

2. A graphic illustration of the outcomes from the Languages Summit.

3. Article for British Educational Research Association written by Gorrara, Jenkins, (Eira) Jepson and Tallulah Llewellyn Machin. Gorrara, C, Jenkins, L, Jepson, E and Machin, T. (2020) ‘Multilingual perspectives: preparing for language learning in the new curriculum for Wales’, The Curriculum Journal, special issue, ‘Re-educating the nation: the development of the new curriculum in Wales’ (April 2020). Read more

Title of research: Body Languages: Drawing Your Multilingual Self (June 2019)

Summary of research: This event builds on work by the MFL Student Mentoring Project in Wales to explore the theme of the multilingual self. It included a pupil workshop with activities focused on exploring the relationship between identity and language. Creative research methods were used to research how pupils view their multilingual selves. The event concluded with a roundtable discussion involving teachers who have participated in the project for 2 mor more years to examine the wider impact that the project has had on the school body and culture.

Funder: Economic and Social Research Council, Impact Acceleration Accounts

Summary of outcomes:

1. Workshop with Willows High School. The findings from this workshop about how pupils conceive themselves as linguists have been fed into the BERA article (see above).

2. Workshop with teachers from secondary schools involved in the MFL Student Mentoring Project for 2 or more years. The outcomes from this workshop were used as evidence for the external evaluation of the MFL Student Mentoring Project conducted in 2019, to evaluate the impact of the project on wider school cultures and approaches to languages, when a school has engaged over an extended period of time. Find out more

Title of research: Digital Languages Writing Sprint (July 2019)

Summary of research: The Digital Modern Languages tutorial writing sprint is a physical and virtual event designed to create a variety of open educational resources demonstrating the critical and applied use of digital tools and methods for teachers, learners and researchers interested in modern languages and cultures.
This initiative is led by the ‘Digital Mediations’ strand on the Language Acts & Worldmaking project, which explores interactions and tensions between digital culture and Modern Languages (ML) research. The project is funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) under its Open World Research Initiative (OWRI). Our National Coordinator sat on the advisory board.

Funder: AHRC Open World Research Initiative - Multilingualism: Empowering Individuals, Transforming Societies (MEITS) – January 2018

Summary of outcomes:

1. Preface written by Lucy Jenkins to, ‘Special Collection Critical Digital Pedagogies in Modern Languages - a Tutorial’, following her work as a consultant at the 2-day workshop. Jenkins, L 2020 Preface. Modern Languages Open. Access

The project has published on matters relating to languages education, mentoring, the curriculum for Wales and on multilingual methodologies. See the current publications relating to the project below.