Languages are for talking to people, and the technology that matters most in a languages classroom is the kind that brings real speakers and real places into the room.
Year 9 co-write a photo essay on the school day with a partner class in Seville. Year 8 test a textbook list of Austrian German words with a class in Vienna. Year 9 survey shop signs on the streets of Montreal and Paris in Street View. Each of those is a task the textbook cannot set.
Closer to home, recording changes speaking practice. Year 9 record Spanish holiday answers to a private Padlet for pronunciation feedback, so the teacher hears everyone and not only the confident few.
AI translation is treated here as something to check, not something to trust. Year 9 test Copilot's French translations of idioms and false friends, and Year 13 critique an AI translation of the opening of L'Étranger. Plain listening and reading lessons are here too, such as a slow-speech German podcast about the school day.
Creative Amplify
Students write a practice 90-word answer about a past holiday, ask Copilot to flag up to five errors without correcting them, fix each one themselves and hand in the redraft with changes highlighted.
Students build a 3D exhibit on a festival from the Spanish-speaking world in CoSpaces Edu, with recorded Spanish commentary, and Grade 8 visitors view each one in AR at a marked spot in the grounds.
Pairs script and record four short French podcast episodes on A-level themes, pitched for Grade 8 learners, with two-voice dialogue, a music bed and a glossary for each.
Creative Transform
Over five lessons, a Grade 8 Spanish class and a partner class in Seville learning English build a photo essay on the school day, rewriting each caption in response to the other class's replies.
Grade 11 and a partner Gymnasium class in Leipzig answer the same anonymous survey on digital life, and the UK students write a German analysis of the differences that the Leipzig class then challenges and corrects.
Students translate the opening of Camus's L'Étranger themselves, generate a set of Gemini translations under briefs they design, and write a commentary on which choices the machine makes every time and which shift.
Students work with the census population of all 183 municipalities in the province of Soria since 1900, sort and chart the losses, and write a data-led article in Spanish around what they find.
Interactive Amplify
A Grade 8 German class argues in German and a partner Gymnasium class argues in English on whether schools should have uniforms, with every student in a role and judges scoring each speech live.
Students ask Copilot Chat to translate twelve French sentences built around idioms and false friends, test every translation against a bilingual dictionary and their own version, and question Copilot on the choices that disagree.
Students record short spoken answers to five Spanish prompts on a private class Padlet, give each other feedback on pronunciation, and re-record one answer.
Students translate a 60-word French passage, post it to a Padlet, then defend their choices on the two phrases where the class split.
Pairs record GCSE-style photo-card descriptions in Spanish, post them to a class-only Padlet, and check three classmates' recordings against a short checklist.
Students post one note after each of three listens to a German clip, and the teacher uses the wall to change how the next listen is run.
Interactive Transform
Students test six textbook claims about French school life against anonymous survey answers from a real partner class in France, then question that class live in French.
In a staff-hosted Teams call, Grade 7 ask a partner class in Vienna whether they really say the Austrian words their textbook lists, such as Jänner, Paradeiser and Sackerl, and tally the answers.
Pairs walk assigned shopping streets in Montreal and Paris on Google Earth Street View, logging every shop sign into a shared sheet to test whether French speakers really borrow English words everywhere.
Passive Replace
The teacher plays a five-minute section of a slow-speech podcast for German learners twice through the classroom speakers, and Grade 7 answer six questions in their books.
Grade 7 read a 250-word French text on a Lyon teenager's daily routine on their iPads, then answer comprehension questions and find the reflexive verbs in their books.
The teacher plays a five-minute vlog made for Spanish learners, in which a teenager in Madrid describes her weekend, twice on the board while Grade 8 complete a listening worksheet.
Lessons that look like one cell but sit in another
Useful counter-examples when you are checking your own lesson placement on the PICRAT grid.
This page is one of a growing set of PICRAT examples by cell, subject and grade. Page maintained by Andy Perryer.