Foreign Languages conference held to guide CXC/CSEC students

Students who attended a fifth form one day foreign languages conference on Tuesday, February 7, are asking that the conference be held on a more regular basis.{{more}}

Held at the Girl Guide Headquarters, Tuesday’s event was attended by 129 students, under the theme “The recipe for success at the examination.”

Flavia Haynes Howard, mastermind of the conference, which is in its third year, told SEARCHLIGHT that the objectives of the conference were to review and sensitize the students about the components of foreign languages at the CSEC level.

Between the hours of 8:30 am and 2:30 pm, the students were engaged in a number of oral and written activities related to the Spanish and French languages.

The day’s proceedings consisted of three specific sessions. During session one, the students were informed about the components of the CXC/CSEC examinations, while session two was a written exam, and session three, an oral examination.

Student of the St. Joseph’s Convent Kingstown Brianah Mc Kie told SEARCHLIGHT that initiatives such as Tuesday’s conference should be done more often because they help students to improve their standard of writing and speaking foreign languages and to get a better knowledge as to why foreign language is important.

McKie also described the one day forum and educational and very interesting.

“We learnt a lot of things that will help us in our examinations. We learnt about the different phrases as well as improving our foreign language vocabulary.”

Kasaini Culzac, a student of the St. Vincent Grammar School, was also of the view that more sessions such as Tuesday’s need to be done.

He explained that the conference was quite interesting, as it highlighted a number of issues related to the foreign languages.

“It touched on a number of things that I was not aware of. For example in French, how the essay exams are formatted.

“I like how they gave us some guidelines on how we can better approach the exam,” Culzac said, adding that Tuesday’s session will help him to do a lot better in his French exams.

“Now I know that it is not as complicated as it was before. It takes a lot more studying, and all in all, it is work and preparation.”

Meanwhile, Howard, Foreign Languages, Officer in the Ministry of Education, said the reception from the students was overwhelming, and though she is in agreement with the students’ request for more sessions, time constraints constitutes a major factor.

She explained that because of the schools’ time table and the number of sessions that are required for each conference, it will be difficult to host the conference more than once a year.

Howard was, however, thrilled to know the students were interested in having more foreign language sessions.

Tuesday’s conference was facilitated by foreign language teachers from the various secondary schools around the island, with assistance from Vanessa Demirciyan and the staff of the Alliance Française.(AA)