Janet Lloyd

Founder and Managing Director

I established PLN (formerly Janet Lloyd Network) in May 2011 after working first as an MFL AST and from 2004 as a Primary Strategy Education Consultant (Literacy/ Languages/EAL, Better Talking Partners and the Primary Intensive Support Programme) for Warrington Local Authority. What a brilliant opportunity this was to really develop my understanding of how to support teachers and schools as they establish, develop and review effective primary learning for all young children in schools. 

Since I started teaching in 1985 my passion has always been to enable learners to explore effective and creative communication and to support teachers and learners to achieve their maximum potential and explore beyond the boundaries, they may have set for themselves. I believe in the power of learning to skills to enable learners whatever their age to build strong foundations upon which to develop their own communication skills in more than one language.  

I read German and English Literature at Sheffield University between 1980 and 1984 and spent a year at the University of Stuttgart plus two Summers working in a hotel on the Rhine. After completing my PGCE in MFL and English in 1985 I taught German, French, English/Drama at an inner-city comprehensive school in Nottingham and then became HOD for German at Sale Girls Grammar School in Trafford in 1987.

From 1992 onwards I worked with nursery and primary children. We organised language explorer weeks and cultural celebration performances with the children and contributed to a BBC children’s edition of the “Playbus” magazine, sharing our EYFS language explorer adventures.  

In 1997, I began to teach Primary Languages as a peripatetic teacher at Oughtrington Primary School in Warrington. It was here that I created the simple SOW “Los! Allez! Let’s Go!” (French/German primary units of work) and from 1997 to 2003 created annual Year 6 language shows, with the help of a wonderful class TA. 

From 1997 onwards, I worked with the National Centre for Languages (CILT), delivering Drama, Creativity and Primary Languages CPD at both local and national conferences. From 1997 onwards I worked on the QCA and QCDA KS2 Primary Languages Schemes of Work and later contributed to the KS2 MFL Framework.

In 1998, whilst working as a French and German teacher at Bridgewater High School I developed a successful Performing Arts and Languages’ transition project between the high school and its feeder schools. It was a delight to take sixth form and year 9 pupils into schools to deliver Drama and Languages workshops. This became the platform on which we began our Warrington and area local support group meetings in 1999. I won a European Languages Award for this transition project in 2001. One of the sixth formers in the outreach team, went on to lead the workshops and later to become an advisory teacher in languages. 

In 2002, I became the one of the first Primary Languages ASTs in the country and contributed to the writing of the TDA 30 hours teacher training programme for primary languages, the TDA Primary Languages SOW and the Training of the Trainers Programme. I was a Regional Trainer for the Training the Trainers Programme. From 2002 I managed the British Council Language Assistant programme and delivered induction training for both primary and secondary in local schools.

I became a Primary Strategy Consultant in 2004 and created the Primary Foreign Languages Warrington Grid for Learning, accessed by schools from across the country. I oversaw the roll out of Primary Languages across the authority and ran the teacher to teacher/ school to school programmes between Warrington and Malaga and Warrington and Dijon. From 2004, I managed and trained the British council Language Assistants in primary and secondary schools in our local area.

In 2006, I established the local authority language assistant programme, training and deploying local fluent and native speaker language assistants to work alongside class teachers. Many of the assistants in this team went on to become primary teachers themselves. This programme ran successfully until 2011 and has now become a corner stone of the Primary Languages Network services. It’s a real pleasure that several members of the original team continue to work with me in the network today.

As a North West Regional KS2 PFL Consultant in the DCSF MFL RSG team, I mentored and supported Halton, Wigan, Knowsley and St Helens as they rolled out their own primary language learning programmes. 

In 2011, as a freelance languages ‘education consultant, I worked on projects for CfBT and One Education, from CPD, and training to a bilingual education start up for a German- English school. 

As a PGCE Primary MFL tutor at the University of Manchester (2011-205) I delivered ITT CPD and was a member of the PGCE MFL primary ITT observation team. Since 2011 I have designed and delivered NQT CPD for several TSAs and delivered primary MFL ITT CPD sessions for the University of Chester.

From 2013- 2015, working in partnership with WTSA, PLN rolled out a two-year DFE funded programme of CPD and in-school support focusing on KS2 MFL development  

Since 1997 I have delivered presentations and workshops at national, regional and local conferences on language learning and drama, cross curricular primary language learning, transition between KS2 and KS3 and how to support teachers and schools to deliver primary languages. I am the author of “Practising Primary Languages through Drama and Performance”, and co-author of KS3 MFL text books for Harper Collins, have written for LCP and was a contributor to the CiLT Young Pathfinder series of books offering guidance and support with practical ideas for the primary languages classroom. On a freelance consultancy basis, I support the BBC with primary languages projects.

My greatest joy is Primary Languages Network. Since its establishment as Janet Lloyd Network in 2011, it has grown and thrived. Thanks to the team around me and the wider network we have become an educational support and CPD service of which I am truly proud. I do hope that you, your school and staff thrive as part of the network and benefit from the passion and incredibly hard work of the whole Primary Languages Network team.    

Janet Lloyd

Founder and Managing Director

Janet established Primary Languages Network (formerly Janet Lloyd Network) in May 2011 after working as an Education Consultant for the Primary Strategy Team at Warrington LA.

Janet leads the team at PLN with her passion for language teaching and learning, together with her experience as a trainer, publisher, national speaker and her ability to engage and work directly with schools.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Why choose premium membership?

In this post we will explain why premium membership is the best option for your school in developing the language learning in your school and making the most out of all the great things on offer with your memebrship. Click on the link and read through the key points!

Teach languages in the primary way!

In this post we begin to address the frequently asked question above. Just what does primary language teaching look like? Firstly, you may like to spend 10 minutes listening to the podcast within the post. An informal discussion between two practicing primary languages’ teachers and myself. Emilie is a native speaker,primary French specialist and Joanne is a primary teacher with an MFL specialism.

Ofsted overdue? Ofsted ready for primary languages!

It’s a frequently asked and highly relevant question. Firstly don’t panic, we’ve created a guide and checklist to help you create a well constructed scheme of work and have in place the resources and tools to plot and plan the learning journey across KS2 in primary languages.

Practical solutions to OFSTED in primary languages. A podcast with Catherine Simms

This podcast is all about being Ofsted ready. Listen along with Catherine and Will as they talk about how to prepare for an Ofsted visit, what Ofsted would be looking for and how the resources on the VLE can help you to be ready.

Impact and primary foreign languages learning

This is rapidly becoming one of our frequently asked questions and so here is our FAQs blog post to share ideas on how to address the questions around impact. Primary languages teachers and coordinators want to know more about “impact”. What should schools track ,assess and capture and how to keep,show and share this?