Languages (Pages 10-11)
KS2/ KS3
- Learn to say ‘hello’ in the eight languages most widely spoken around the world: Chinese (Mandarin) ‘ni hao’, English ‘hello’, Hindi ‘namaste’, Spanish ‘hola’, Arabic ‘al salaam’, Bengali ‘ei je’, Portuguese ‘bom dia’, Russian ‘Zdravstvuite’. Many other examples (including pronunciation guidance) are available on the following website: www.ipl.org/div/kidspace/hello/. Try to find out in which language ‘selamat pagi’ is ‘hello’.
KS3
- Using a dictionary, or a website such as www.wordsmith.org (go to the ‘A Word A Day’ section to find archives of words and their origins) or www.encarta.com (go to the reference section and then the English World Dictionary to search for words), ask the pupils to create a list of words which have become part of the English language, but whose origins are found in other languages. For example, ‘tea’ comes from the Chinese word ‘te’. As a follow on activity, encourage them to write the words on a large map of the world, to show the countries or regions from which they came. This activity will help to improve the pupils’ dictionary skills. They may; however; need help at first in interpreting the relevant parts of the grammatical labelling in the dictionary
Previous activity
