Here you will be able to find a number of updates about what we are up to as well as some useful resources to immerse your children in Italian at home.

Italian at SJB

At SJB we aim to go beyond giving students an introduction to the Italian language and rather to inspire in them a love of language learning.

In the junior years, there is a focus on language immersion through songs, stories, games and role play. From Years 3-6, the expectation shifts to students using the language effectively in conversations. The ALL (Autonomous Language Learners) approach encourages students to use Italian in purposeful and shared experiences to interact enthusiastically and confidently in class.

Throughout all year levels students will be exposed to:

Intentional Gesture Teaching:

Children will learn to use gestures to depict meaning which aids comprehension, retention and vocabulary recall.

Grammatical Rules:

Through an organic process, grammatical rules and sentence structure will be taught in context to the learning experiences.

Italian Culture and Traditions:

In the future, we hope to give students the opportunity to participate in special cultural experiences such as Italian cooking days and a biannual Italian Day. Students are given an insight into the Italian culture by exploring famous Italian landmarks, traditions and foods, including a focus each year on Easter and Christmas.

Using the Language:

Students are encouraged to interact in class using everyday expressions and greetings in Italian. They will engage in various activities in Italian such as games, songs and discussions. They will have the opportunity to compose and perform small role-plays in Italian. This encourages their confidence in writing and speaking in Italian. We encourage students to 'translanguage', which put simply, refers to a process whereby multilingual speakers use all of their languages to communicate.

Italian Teacher- Signora Sandra Fazio

Sandra Fazio sfazio@sjbniddrie.catholic.edu.au

Days at school - Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday (LOTE) and Friday (School Magazine)

Each week there will be one 40 minute Italian session for Prep to Year 6.