It’s all go on the Express Yourself: North East Festival of Languages!
We launched the Festival in February with our partners across the region and UK, providing a range of fun, free, interactive activities for people of all ages and backgrounds and celebrating languages and cultures in the region and our connections to the world.
We’ve had a great response from schools and communities across the region to the activities on offer in February and March and as Festival Week approaches, we’re encouraging more people to get involved.
What’s on offer?
The Festival has a whole range of free, fun, interactive activities, which can be accessed now, as well as live events during Festival Week (22-26 March).
There are activities and events for Schools (Early Years to University) and Communities (community schools, groups and the general public) – including competitions and participatory activities, interactive workshops, apps that make language learning fun and a range of cultural offerings, including drama, poetry, music and dance.
We’ve extended the range of activities in our programme for the Festival and updated our 4-page What’s On guide, download the programme and follow the links to find out more information about each activity, as well as the booking or joining details.
Your language stories
We are gathering stories of people who are from the North East or who have come to live, study or work here. In a series called ‘How languages changed my life’ we are sharing their stories to inspire and to show the diversity of people’s language and cultural journeys and where languages can take you.
If you have a tale to tell about how languages changed your life – get in touch and we will share it here. Whether you were born here, moved here or live, study or work here, whatever age you are and whatever background you come from, we’d love to hear from you. Email: info@expressyourselfne.com
Activities for schools
From Early Years to University, there is something for all levels of school education and all the activities and resources are available free of charge.
- Go to the Schools page on the Festival website and click on the relevant tab to show all the activities for your level of school education, or
- Click here to download the latest version of the What’s On 4-page guide with links to individual activities and events.
The emphasis of all activities is that they should be fun and entertaining and inspire young people to explore and value languages and cultures. We have put together a range of free activities and events and highlight the age range for each. This includes activities which can be done in school or in a home learning setting, as a group, individually and with families.
Some activities have to be booked by schools through lead contacts and safeguarding measures are in place, where required, e.g. for the live events involving schools, but also for some of the prerecorded activities. There is something for everyone: writing poetry, listening to stories, learning about other cultures and traditions around the world through dance, music, drama and talks, language app challenges and even keep fit! These are in the form of:
- pre-recorded online activities and events, that schools and communities can access when it suits them, from late February to the end of March
- participatory activities online and offline that schools, communities and individuals can get involved in up to and during the Festival
- online resources and apps which can be accessed anytime and exist beyond the festival
In Festival Week there are also live events online 22-26 March 2021. For schools the activities need to be booked in advance and include Language Tasters (now fully booked), Lingotot sessions in French and Spanish (3-11), a live puppet show in French and a session for KS3-4 pupils with businesses about where languages can take you. There are also workshops on making an origami boat in Japanese and pancakes in French which both demonstrate free apps which promote language learning through cultural activities and cooking (which can be done with schools or families).
Further information and links
- Click here to find out more about International Newcastle’s role and the background to the Festival.
- Keep up to date with what’s happening in the festival, stories and and any new events: on the Festival website, News webpage, on twitter @EYFOLNE, on facebook or on instagram /eyfolne.