With
increased numbers of Polish workers in the UK, schools in
some areas now have a very high proportion of Polish
children. THRASS UK has therefore just launched its new
Polish Calendar Charts to help local children in such
schools to interact with their new Polish peers. It’s all so
easy for teachers, parents and children to use the charts
and below we tell you how.
The THRASS (Teaching Handwriting Reading And Spelling
Skills) phonics programme is used in thousands of schools
and colleges in many countries and is widely acknowledged as
having the potential to more than double the rate of
progress for reading and spelling in English. THRASS UK has
already produced Calendar Charts in many languages and now
it has enlisted the help of Polish speakers in Cumbria to
translate its English Calendar Chart for early language
learning to produce a Polish Calendar Chart.
There are A4 and A3 printable versions of the chart and also
a live interactive version recorded by Polish-speaking
children from St. Joseph's Junior Catholic School and the
Polish Saturday School in Luton that you can use on-line in
school or at home.
Children of any age (and of course teachers and parents too)
can use the chart
to learn the Polish words for the 7 days, the 31 dates, the
12 months, the numbers from 1 to 20, the 10 main colours and
the names of the 32 lower-case letters (and their capitals).
And it’s all so easy. With the interactive chart all you
have to do is to click on the word or the number to hear the
children’s voices pronounce it and then just practice the
word as many times as you need to.
Teachers, parents and older children can also use the
Calendar Charts to play 'Questions & Answers' with young
children, in order to develop essential speaking and
listening skills, encouraging them to discuss birthdays and
events by locating the days, dates and/or months and also
encouraging them to become familiar with the numbers,
colours and letters.
Bozena Briggs, who supports English and bilingual
development for pupils for whom English is an additional
language at St. Joseph's Junior Catholic School in Luton and
also teaches Polish in the Polish School there, really likes
the THRASS Calendar Charts. “The interactive charts are fun
and easy to use at school and at home. Children’s voices,
bright colours and fun pictures get kids' attention straight
away, they are an excellent introduction to the sounds of
various languages and they make learning so easy. The charts
are very handy for the language days that many schools
organise to encourage children to learn foreign languages
and to promote inter-culturalism.”
So, if you are a teacher in a school with a large number of
Polish children or a parent who has children there, why not
use the new THRASS Polish Calendar Charts to help local
children interact with their new Polish peers by learning
some key Polish words?
You can download the printable versions of the THRASS Polish
Calendar Chart from the THRASS UK website at
www.thrass.co.uk/cart/cc.htm or the interactive version
from
www.thrass-downloads.com/ccdemo/Polish.swf.
To download and install the THRASS Polish Calendar Chart on
all computers in a university or school, you will need to
download and register the THRASS Phoneme Machine (Version 5)
from
www.phonememachine.com.
The THRASS extensive picture-based training website for
schools and parents with easy access to a wide range of
resources and support materials and extensive evidence of
the widespread success of THRASS is at
www.thrass.co.uk/teaching.htm
This Press Release in Polish
Issued by: THRASS UK News Media Centre
www.thrass.co.uk/nm.htm
Mike Meade, Media Director, +44 1829 741413 Mob: +44 7970
151 738
mikemeade@thrass.co.uk
Chris Griffiths, International Development, +30 266 203 1207
chrisgriffiths@thrass.co.uk
