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OER 1 Attitudes to languages and gender

5.1 Facilitators – Activity 1

My language picture


You will need to prepare:

  • materials for drawing
  • space for drawing (table or floor)
  • a template or a few examples for the language pictures
  • an example of your own personal language picture.

1. Ask learners to describe the languages they speak, understand, listen to, read and write.

2. Ask learners when, where and why they use these different languages. This can include family, school, social media, books, advertising, etc.

3. Ask them which languages they are more and less confident to use, and why.

4. Show learners your own language picture and describe it to them.

5. Give learners drawing materials. Invite them to make a picture of themselves and their languages. They can do this in any way they like, such as:

A drawing of a person with different colours for different parts of the body to represent languages: English, Mathily, Bhojpu
An outline of a person filled with two different colours. Each colour represents a different language: Arabic and English
6. Have everyone share and appreciate their pictures.

7. Compare the similarities and differences amongst learners.