This weekend seven members of the Rayburn Education team eagerly headed down to the capital to attend Europe’s leading annual event for people who are passionate about languages – the Language Show Live 2015.
The three day event, held at the impressive Olympia London, was a key event in the diary for language learners, teachers, linguists, professionals and enthusiasts, all coming together to find out more about opportunities in the language world, experience a taste of different cultures and learn about the latest resources. With 10,000 attendees over the weekend, 160 exhibitors from across the globe, 60 classes, seminars, talks and demonstrations, it certainly was a hive of activity!
On Friday, the show kicked off with the Grand Final of the Eurotalk Junior Language Challenge – a language learning competition for young, budding linguists from across the country to showcase their semantic prowess and become the Junior Challenge Champion 2015. Competition was fierce, with each of the astute contestants confidently answering questions in Arabic. Congratulations to all finalists, in particular proud winner, Tudor Mendel-Idowu!
Throughout the weekend, we were delighted to meet with so many compelling individuals coming to chat with us about international language tour opportunities. Some were new to international school travel, planning to embark on a first language trip abroad, while others had run numerous language tours across the globe for their students, but were yearning for new destinations and trip options.
It was also wonderful to see some friendly faces and catch up with language teachers who had travelled with us previously, such as Steve Davies of Beal High School, who was full of praise for the team and has “used Rayburn for 15 years – exceptional service! Recommend you to all”. We even spoke to some excited students who were keen to give us their take on why school language trips are so important to them:
“Meeting new people, visiting new places and developing language skills”
“Immerse yourself in a language”
“Learn a new culture”
There were also opportunities for us as a team to learn about how the language industry is developing, such as the changes coming into place for the GCSE curriculum.
During the weekend we ran a fantastic competition to win £100 worth of Amazon vouchers. Thank you to everyone who entered! We will shortly be announcing the lucky winner on our Facebook and Twitter pages, so keep your eyes peeled!