Super-Curricular Activities for Modern Languages: Reading, Competitions and Projects

Admissions tutors for Modern Languages look first for evidence that an applicant reads, watches and listens in the target language beyond what A-level requires, since fluency at interview and in any written admissions test tends to separate candidates who have practised independently from those who have not. They also want signs of genuine curiosity about how languages work: a willingness to compare grammar across languages, to notice how translation changes meaning, or to follow debates in literature and linguistics. Grades alone rarely distinguish between strong candidates, so super-curricular work becomes the clearest signal of sustained interest.

Most competitive Modern Languages courses, including Oxford's Modern Languages and Cambridge's MML, combine a written admissions test with an interview conducted at least partly in the applicant's chosen languages, so tutors are assessing spoken and written competence alongside academic potential. Super-curricular activity that builds vocabulary, comprehension and cultural knowledge therefore serves two purposes at once: it strengthens the application and it prepares the candidate for the assessment itself. Reading a novel in French or German does more for an applicant's chances than a generic extracurricular certificate.

The activities that carry most weight for Modern Languages fall into a few overlapping categories: independent reading in the target language, national competitions and essay prizes, lectures and free university courses, and small independent projects such as an Extended Project Qualification. None is compulsory and no single activity makes an application, but a candidate who can discuss two or three of these with genuine depth tends to interview more confidently than one who lists many activities lightly touched.

What super-curricular means for Modern Languages, and why it matters

Super-curricular activity refers to work directly connected to the subject applied for, distinct from extracurricular pursuits such as sport or music. For Modern Languages, this usually means reading novels, newspapers or poetry in the target language, following debates in linguistics or translation studies, or exploring the history and culture of a country whose language the applicant studies. Admissions tutors read it as evidence that the subject holds an applicant's attention outside the classroom, valued above any list of achievements.

Modern Languages degrees move quickly from A-level competence to close reading of literature, film and theory in the original language, often within tutorials or seminars of only a handful of students. Tutors need confidence that an applicant can sustain that pace, so they look for candidates who already read and think in the language for pleasure, not only for coursework. Admissions tests at universities such as Oxford and Cambridge, together with an interview partly conducted in the applicant's chosen languages, give tutors a direct way to check this.

Reading, watching and listening beyond the syllabus

Reading in the target language sits at the centre of super-curricular work for Modern Languages, and the habit of doing it regularly counts for more than the level chosen. Graded readers and short stories suit a candidate still building vocabulary, while a confident linguist might move on to a novel by a set author or a contemporary writer discussed in the press. Newspapers and magazines, read regularly in the target language, build the vocabulary range that admissions tests and interviews draw on.

Reading about language itself, in English where necessary, deepens the intellectual case an applicant makes for studying it at degree level. Popular linguistics books such as Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct introduce ideas about how languages are structured and acquired that go well beyond A-level grammar teaching. Literary journals that publish fiction and poetry in translation, such as Asymptote, let an applicant compare how the same text reads in different languages, close to the comparative thinking a Modern Languages tutorial expects.

Listening and watching build the oral comprehension that written reading alone does not, and interviews conducted partly in the target language reward candidates used to following natural speech. Films and television in the original language, radio broadcasts and podcasts aimed at native speakers all serve this purpose, as do English-language podcasts about linguistics, such as Lingthusiasm and The Allusionist, for candidates who want to think more widely about how language works. A short weekly habit, kept up over a year, tends to matter more than occasional binge-watching.

Competitions and essay prizes

National competitions give Modern Languages applicants a way to test their thinking against a wider field and to produce a piece of work an admissions tutor can discuss at interview. The UK Linguistics Olympiad sets logic-based problems about unfamiliar languages, rewarding analytical thinking without requiring prior knowledge of any particular language, which suits candidates who enjoy the structural side of Modern Languages alongside literature. The Stephen Spender Prize, a national poetry translation competition, asks entrants to translate a poem into English and explain their choices, a task close to the close textual work a Modern Languages degree involves.

Translation competitions such as the John Dryden Translation Competition, run by the British Comparative Literature Association, are open to a wide range of ability and give entrants a concrete piece of translated work to discuss in a personal statement or at interview. The process of researching, drafting and revising a translation, and explaining specific decisions about tone or register, demonstrates exactly the kind of close reading tutors want to see, whether or not the entry is shortlisted. Entering one well-chosen competition tends to serve an application better than entering several superficially.

• UK Linguistics Olympiad: logic puzzles in unfamiliar languages, no prior knowledge required
• Stephen Spender Prize: poetry translation into English with a written commentary
• John Dryden Translation Competition: open translation competition run by the British Comparative Literature Association

Lectures, courses, work exposure and societies

Public lectures let an applicant hear how academics discuss literature, linguistics or translation at degree level, and give material worth reflecting on in a personal statement. Gresham College has offered free public lectures across the humanities, including language and literature, for centuries, and its recordings remain online. Oxford's Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages publishes recorded lectures and talks through Oxford Podcasts, covering authors and topics closer to undergraduate study than anything on the A-level syllabus.

Cultural institutes attached to embassies, such as the Institut français and the Goethe-Institut, run talks, film screenings and short courses in the UK that are open to school-age applicants and often free or low-cost. Attending even a handful of these events over two years gives a candidate specific cultural reference points to draw on, and the conversation classes some institutes run offer useful practice for an interview conducted partly in the target language.

Work experience carries limited weight for Modern Languages compared with vocational subjects such as medicine or law, since the course primarily assesses linguistic ability and academic curiosity. Where it is available, work or volunteering that uses the language directly, such as helping at a community language school, translating for a local organisation, or working abroad, gives an applicant something concrete to discuss. Tutors listen for what the candidate noticed about how the language works or how a culture differs from their own, well beyond the setting itself.

School language societies, debating or reading groups conducted partly in the target language, and events run through Routes into Languages, the national outreach programme linking universities with schools, all offer low-cost ways to practise and to meet others with the same interest. Where a school has no existing society, starting one, even informally with a few peers, is itself a piece of super-curricular evidence worth mentioning.

• Gresham College: free public lectures across the humanities
• Institut français and Goethe-Institut: talks, film screenings and short courses in French and German
• Routes into Languages: outreach events and competitions run with universities

Projects and the EPQ

An Extended Project Qualification gives a Modern Languages applicant the chance to research a question in depth and produce a substantial piece of independent work, which tutors can ask about at length in interview. Strong topics tend to be narrow and comparative: how a particular poem has been translated differently across decades, how a dialect or regional language is treated in national policy, or how a theme is handled differently by authors writing in two of the applicant's languages. A topic this specific is easier to defend under questioning than a broad survey of a country's literature.

Not every school offers the EPQ, and a smaller independent project can do similar work. Keeping a reading journal that tracks vocabulary and reactions to what has been read, translating short passages and comparing the results with a published translation, or writing short analytical pieces about a film or novel all produce material an applicant can bring to a personal statement without requiring formal qualification credit. The habit of finishing and reflecting on the work matters more than its scale.

A Year 12 to Year 13 timeline

Super-curricular work for Modern Languages benefits from starting early and narrowing over time, since admissions tutors read depth in one or two areas as a stronger signal than breadth across many. The autumn and spring of Year 12 suit exploration, while the summer before Year 13 is the point at which most applicants settle on the two or three activities that will anchor their personal statement.

• Year 12, autumn and spring: build a regular reading and listening habit; research and enter one or two suitable competitions
• Year 12, summer: attend a summer course, exchange or cultural institute programme where possible; start an EPQ or independent project
• Year 13, from September: draw the personal statement together around two or three activities; keep reading and listening going as interview preparation

Writing about it in the personal statement and at interview

A personal statement for Modern Languages reads best when it explains what an applicant noticed while reading, translating or watching. A sentence describing a specific moment of comparison, such as a word that resists direct translation or a stylistic choice an author makes differently across two languages, shows the kind of thinking a tutor wants to develop in tutorials. Two or three activities explored in this depth carry more weight than five mentioned in passing.

At interview, tutors return to whatever the personal statement mentions and ask the applicant to go further: to give another example, to defend a claim, or to discuss the same text in the target language. Preparation means re-reading anything cited in the statement closely enough to discuss a scene or an argument in detail, not memorising a rehearsed answer. Tutors are testing how a candidate thinks on the spot, so continuing to read and listen regularly in the weeks before interview matters more than last-minute revision of the personal statement itself.

The most frequent mistake is breadth without depth, since a list of six activities each explored for an afternoon reads as compliance more than curiosity. Reading only in English about a country's culture, without ever reading in the language itself, undermines the purpose of the exercise, and choosing a competition or project mainly because it looks impressive tends to show at interview. Starting everything in the autumn of Year 13 leaves too little time to develop real depth in any one area.

Recommended resources for Modern Languages

• Stephen Spender Prize: National poetry translation competition asking entrants to translate a poem and explain their choices.
• John Dryden Translation Competition (British Comparative Literature Association): Long-running open translation competition giving entrants a concrete piece of translated work to discuss at interview.
• Routes into Languages: University-run outreach programme offering competitions, events and taster sessions for school linguists.
• Gresham College: Free public lectures across the humanities, including language, literature and translation.
• Oxford Podcasts: Recorded lectures from Oxford's Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, closer to degree-level study than school material.
• Lingthusiasm: A podcast exploring how language works, aimed at a general audience curious about linguistics.
• The Allusionist: A podcast on the history and quirks of language, useful for developing comparative thinking.
• Asymptote Journal: An international journal of literature in translation, good for comparing a text across languages.

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