GLENALMOND PUPILS EXPRESS THEMSELVES BRILLIANTLY

Our Head of Modern Languages, Dr Caroline Murie, describes the excellent response of young Glenalmond Linguists to the #ExpressYourselfInLockdown challenge.

For the #ExpressYourselfInLockdown initiative launched on social media by the British Council, we invited our linguists to create a video or audio file in which they had to perform in French or Spanish.

They could write their own poems, plays or songs or perform pieces written by someone else.

In order to help us judge the best entries for junior French, senior French and Spanish, we asked two former pupils (pictured below) to be our guest judges.

They were Lucy Fitzpatrick (2011-2016), who graduated in 2020 from Exeter University with a BA in History and International Relations with advanced proficiency in French, and is currently working at Pembroke House School in Kenya as a gappy and Annie Porter who, after studying French and Spanish A-level at Coll, is currently working for Elle International in Paris.

This is what the judges had to say: “Thank you so much for allowing us to judge this competition.

It was an honour and all of the entries were fantastic in their own way. Some were very entertaining while some gave some very powerful messages. It was actually really hard to judge as they were all so great! Also for the most part, everyone’s accents were impressive!”

Here are the results: 

Sixth Form French competition:

In 3rd place, Amy M, Amelia A and Grace C with their video of ‘Cendrillon’ which was very entertaining as they really got into character with costume and make up and the works! Their French was complex and their pronunciation excellent.

In 2nd place, Freyha K. Her content was very powerful and her repetition of ‘Nous avions perdu notre chemin’ was very poignant. Her clear pronunciation and excellent language really stood out.

Our winner is Scarlett M, guest starring her dad (pictured here) in their own version of La Mer. It was very entertaining and the content was very apt! Scarlett and her father really got into character and it certainly shed light on some home truths for us all.  

For the junior French competition:

 In the 3rd place is Brooke B. Her recital of ‘Trois allumettes’ was upbeat and her intonation was good. 

In 2nd place is Reene C with her piece about lockdown and a difficult year which had a good message and was something we could all relate to. 

The winner is Jamie CM. His recital of ‘Les feuilles mortes’ had great intonation and expression in his voice. His pronunciation was also good and clear to understand.

For the Spanish competition:

In joint 2nd place are Delilah D and Sasha M with their beautiful renditions of Spanish poems. Their pronunciation was very authentic and clear and, given that they have only been studying Spanish for a few months, very impressive. Listening to them is like listening to some fluent Spanish speakers!

And our overall Spanish winner is Freya F. Annie judged her entry to be the most original and thought-provoking given that she used profound sensual imagery and it felt as though it was from the heart! Her pronunciation was also excellent.

Freya F and Freyha K’s entries were chosen by the British Council and the girls will be performing their entries to a live virtual and global audience on the 31st of March.

We are incredibly proud of all our entries and give our congratulations to our winners and our thanks to our brilliant judges for all their great feedback. We look forward to awarding the prizes to our runners-up and winners at the start of next term.