My visit to the Language Show Live 2016

On Saturday I went to London again for my annual visit to the Language Show.

My first impressions were not very positive. There weren’t as many exhibitors as before and it seemed there weren’t as many visitors either.  Also, exhibitors had fewer German resources again. “German? No, we haven’t got our … in German.”

And yet, multilingualvacancies.com told me that in comparison to other languages there is a huge demand for German speakers . A quick look on their website confirmed it:

The demand for German speakers is there but primary and secondary schools – and therefore publishers –  don’t seem to be interested. It doesn’t add up!

But it wasn’t all doom and gloom. I attended some great workshops again, met up with old friends and exhibitors and met new ones.

I met up again with Sarah Barrett of Lingotastic and her family, and now have their “Mostly German” CD which I’m looking forward to play when I teach my group of primary school children next. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had a chat with Francesco and Veejay from FlashSticks, whose apps and Post-It notes include, of course, German.

 

 

 

 

I also attended an interesting workshop by the Goethe-Institiut (followed by a glass of German beer and ‘proper’ Brezel).

 

 

 

 

I bought a new German game from the European Bookshop and some German pencils from SuperStickers

 

 

 

 

 

AND, I met two new companies:

Alex and his team from One Third Stories, who used a kickstarter campaign to turn their ideas of storybooks that start in English and end in a foreign language into reality. They also have a German version of the book and I’m very much looking forward to receive mine.
And also Lisa Sadleir of Cooking With Languages, who will soon be launching her Kickstarter campaign for her lovely books, apps and whatever else she and her children will come up with. At the moment there is only one book with Arthur Apple and Nerea Naranja, but other versions, including a  German one, are planned.

I can’t wait to see Klaus Kartoffel! I’m sure he’ll be at the Language Show 2017 – just as I will be 😉