European Day of Languages poster competition 2013

Calling all linguists and budding artists!

Help celebrate the European Day of Languages on 26th September by taking part in our poster competition!

To mark the European Day of Languages and following the success of the competition last year, we invite schools in the region to participate in our poster competition. With the number of UK language learners reducing whilst international commerce and travel increase, our aim is spread the message of the importance of learning languages, promoting intercultural awaresness and encourage uptake, particularly at GCSE and beyond. By taking part in our competition, your pupils can help us out and learn a thing or two themselves!

Following on from our "Why Study Languages?" theme last year, pupils are invited to produce a poster on the theme of “Countries”. Pupils will need to choose a country where the language they choose is spoken, research it and design a poster to tell us about it. The twist? Pupils MUST choose a country outside of the "mother country" of the language (so if they choose French, they must choose a country other than France, if they choose Spanish it must be a country other than Spain and so on).

Entries can be submitted in any foreign language or languages and may include some English if desired (for example, pupils may like to provide a translation of the facts they provide). Each poster should be no larger than a sheet of A4 paper and must be completed by hand but any form of materials can be used – felt tips, paint, fabric, etc. Judges will be looking for originality of illustration as well as accuracy of language and content.

The competition is open to pupils in Year 7, 8 and 9 with one winner and one runner up in each year group. Each entry MUST be clearly marked on the back with the pupil’s name, age, class, teacher and school, as well as any necessary information about the language(s) chosen (i.e. if it is a less widely learned language) to facilitate judging. When sending school entries, teachers should provide a covering note with their contact details for ease of notifying winners.

Please note that entries cannot be returned, we advise making a scanned copy for pupils who wish to retain their work. In the event of insufficient entries of good quality no prize will be awarded; the judges’ decision is final.

The prizes are £20 vouchers for the winners and £10 vouchers for the runners up, plus a framed certificate. The winning entries will be displayed around the School of Languages and Social Sciences at Aston University and will feature on our website. They may also be used in publicity materials in future. Prizes will be presented in school by a member of Routes into Languages staff who will also deliver a “Why Study Languages?” presentation to your pupils.

We hope that you will enter this competition as part of your in-school European Day of Languages celebrations and so the deadline for submission of entries will be Monday 7th October.

Please send your entries to: EDL Competition, Routes into Languages West Midlands, MB741, Aston University, Birmingham B4 7ET. If you have any queries please email us at routes@aston.ac.uk or call 0121 204 3872.

Need some inspiration?

• Encourage pupils to use home languages – they could even teach a few words or phrases to other pupils

• Take the opportunity to do some cross curricular work with your Art department

• Visit https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/