To kick-off World Language Week, BSM’s world language department put on a film festival on Monday during all class periods to participate in.

This film festival was a combination of commercials, movies, and short films in Chinese, Spanish, and French, but all with subtitles in English. The idea was to present movies that were made somewhere outside the United States and experience the different cultures.  “Movies are a great way to learn a new language; they are something new and different, allowing students to better retain information,” French teacher Madame Toft said.

After the films, the students participated in a 12 question Kahoot about the films. The top three winners received a prize of candy.

On Tuesday, the Spanish and French classes participated in different activities. French classes celebrated Mardi Gras with some crepes. Each student brought in an ingredient or two to contribute.

Spanish classes celebrated by participating in Flamenco dancing taught by senior high Spanish teacher Ms. Katy O’Brein. O’Brien is the Spanish 4 teacher at BSM and has a background as a professional dancer. She came in and taught the classes how to flamenco dance and then performed it herself at the end. “It was a really fun way to relate to the language I am studying and have something I am able to participate in,” senior Brooke Ferrer said.

On the Wednesday and Thursday block days, students participated different language stations led by teachers in the west wing of the school. The stations included Zumba dancing with Spanish teacher Ms. Megan Hansen, French disco and Chinese dancing with French teacher Ms. Amy Jo Hyde, sun salutations and sanskrit with French teacher Ms. Frederique Toft, Spanish slang with Spanish teacher Mr. Eric Luna Martin, and paper crafts such as origami with Spanish teacher O’Brein and Chinese teacher Ms. Li Sun.

The stations were approximately 13 minutes each, with the students getting a wide variety of different cultural activities. “The goal of the stations is to engage the students in different cultural activities and have a lot of fun,” Hyde said.