Eurpean Day of Languages 2013 - Poem-Poster Competition

The 26th of September is the European Day of Languages!

People all over Europe -and in Tomlinscote - celebrate our cultural and linguistic diversity: If we all spoke the same language and had the same culture, it would be very boring! Imagine life and your language without pizza, croissant, hamburger, cafeteria, restaurant, kindergarten, and so on. It's wonderful we are all different and can give new ideas and words to one another.

To learn a language is to be able to communicate with more people, to open up the world for travel and multiply your career opportunities. It is to find out about other cultures and learn from them, and to broaden your horizon. You become cleverer as you train your brain in coping with another grammar and feed it with more vocabulary! And of course, it's lots of fun!

Competition 

We would like you to write 

a poem (rhyming, acrostic, a sonnet, a two-liner)

about languages  (why are they important? what is great about them?)

 and create a poster with it! (make it visually stunning!)

You can see some fabulous examples below (winners from a previous competition).

You can work on your own, with a partner or even get help from home!

Hand in your word to the MFL office or your language teacher (make sure your name is on the back)!

The deadline is the 4th of October 2013! 

Great prizes to be won!

Good luck! Viel Glück! Bonne Chance! Buona suerte!

if you fancy testing your knowledge of languages click here for a language quiz!

MFL Songs: German: Rammstein: Sonne

The Year 12 German class voted for Rammstein's song Sonne to be published next on this blog - although Frau Mahler didn't want to be seen to condone their official video...

Rammstein is one of the few German bands with international success. They sing in an unusual intonation reminiscent of some Nazi leaders, which is why opinions are very divided about them in their home country. The band distance themselves from any right-wing ideology, but clearly like to provoke...
Rammstein are also renown for their magnificent live shows! Check them out on youtube....

Listen and read/sing along - you can even learn the numbers up to nine!

Bundestagswahl - Elections in Germany 2013 - Final result

Angela Merkel will remain chancellor for another four years, but she will have to share the power with another party. Her CDU narrowly missed out on the absolute majority by 5 seats, and with the former coalition partner FDP not managing to get over the 5% hurdle, Merkel now has to form a coalition with another party. Will it be a grand coalition with the SPD, or will there be the first conservative-green coalition for a German government?

go to www.zdf.de (or click on the diagrammes above) for more info, videos, interviews (in German)

Bundestagswahl 2013 - elections in Germany - update

It looks like Angela Merkel has done it again - her Christian Democratic Union is the strongest party with 42%. The Social Democrats only managed to gain a quarter of overall votes. With neither the FDP nor the Alternative for Germany making it past the 5% hurdle, the CDU might have a high enough percentage to govern without forming a coalition...

In this very tight and exciting election everything is still possible.

Follow this link for live updates..

http://www.n24.de/n24/Nachrichten/Politik/Bundestagswahl-2013/#/live

Angela Merkel is grateful after her convincing victory..

Bundestagswahl - Elections in Germany 2013

The thousands of people frolicking at the Oktoberfest probably made a detour on the way to their local 'Wahllokal' to cast their vote in the general elections today, the Bundestagswahl.
Angela Merkel, who became the first female chancellor of Germany in 2005 and has been in power ever since, is hoping to win the most votes with her conservative party, the CDU, and remain leader of Germany for another four years.
Unlikely to achieve an absolute majority, she will probably have to form a coalition with the liberal FPD like in the last four years, or sharing power with the second strongest party the SPD in a 'grand coalition'. But who knows, maybe the SPD with their leader Peer Steinbrück can still be victorious.
Germany has an election system where each party gets the amounts of seats in the parliament according to the percentage of the votes they get (provided it's more than 5 percent to start with). Like this, there are lots of smaller partys, which by becoming part of a coalition could make it into government.
Apart from the FDP, there is the Green party (Bündnis 90/die Grünen) which started from protests for more environmental politics in the eighties and from grass roots movement against the East German socialist regime in the 90s. It has become an established party which has governed for years in coaliton with the SPD.
There is 'die Linke' a far left party with roots socialist regime, and the 'Piratenpartei' who are against regulations of the internet, as well as the Alternative für Deutschland, which would like Germany to leave the Euro and be less restricted by European regulations.

Who will win?