Top 2! En espanol. C4 Wednesday, May 22, 4-5am

Top! is a gameshow for learners of Spanish, hosted by Diana Perez, in which teams including a native speaker compete in a variety of contests: filling in missing words, finding objects hidden in a room, dressing members of a family in the correct clothes, and so on.

The concept has developed a little by Top 2!, where the language is more advanced and each of the five 20-minute shows is structured around a theme:

“Vacaciones”, “Cocina”, “Moda”, “Deportes” and “Cine”. Both series are being broadcast for recording overnight.

As well as being fun to watch and useful for language practice, the programmes are full of ideas for games to play in the classroom with the television switched off.

Both series are also now available on video in French and German (at pound;19.99 each) and there are learners’ books for each series and language (at pound;4.95 each).

GCSE Bitesize Revision: English

BBC2 Monday, May 20, 2-4am

“Poetry from Other Cultures” is a moving anthology of work in English by poets from around the world, with information on the background to each poem, analysis of its technique and, in most cases, comments by the poet on how it was written.

This is followed by questions for GCSE students. The theme of the collection might be summed up by Sujata Bhatt in her poem “Search for My Tongue”, written in both English and Gujurati, where she explores the difficulty of living between cultures. But the poems are wide in range and subject matter, including such diverse pieces as the New Zealander Fiona Farrell’s maid’s song from her play “Passengers”, Tatamkhulu Afrika’s autobiographical poem about Cape Town, “Nothing’s Changed”, and Imtiaz Dharker’s touching Bombay poem, “Blessing”.

All these and more are to be found in the NEAB anthology and also on the BBC website. Too good to be left for GCSE students alone.

Stop, Look, Listen: Tales from Wales

C4 Tuesday, May 21, 9.45-10am

A series for five- to seven-year-olds that ends this week introduces us to Lady Llanover, as the focus for a story about the Welsh language and the survival of Welsh traditions.

All five programmes, each of which highlight the people and events that have shaped Welsh history during the 18th and 19th centuries, are also available on one video (for pound;14).

Introduced by David Petersen and carefully designed to link historical events with the viewers’ own experiences, the series of programmes covers key historical events such as the Rebecca riots, the Welsh Bible and child labour on a 19th-century farm.

Robin Buss

A complete list of educational programme schedules can be located on the internet at: www.bbc.co.ukeducationlzone guide.shtml and www.channel4.comlearningmainprogrammessummer2002.cfm