A.2 Coping with linguistic and social diversity

Whole School Language Profiles and Policies

ENSEMBLE

14-17 December 2005

European Centre for Modern Languages

Antoinette Camilleri Grima

Andrea Young

Elisabeth Fleischmann

Madlena Norberg

Why “ensemble”?

A school is a community of students, teachers, parents, administrators … others

A community…

requires the development of respect towards common values, conceptions, ideas…

Context

Council of Europe language education policies aim to promote:

Plurilingualism

All are entitled to

develop a degree of communicative ability

in a number of languages over their lifetime

in accordance with their needs

Linguistic diversity

Europe is multilingual and all its languages are equally valuable modes of communication and expressions of identity

Mutual understanding

The opportunity to learn other languages is an essential condition for intercultural communication and acceptance of cultural differences

Democratic citizenship

Participation in democratic and social processes in multilingual societies is facilitated by the plurilingual competence of individuals

Social cohesion

Equality of opportunity for personal development, education, employment, mobility, access to information and cultural enrichment depends on access to language learning throughout life

The Guide

• Looks at the larger context

• Addresses States and national policy making level

What is the message for the

school?

Our Project

Head teachers and language policy co-ordinators at school

to establish goals and identify some technical means of implementing them

Points of departure

Plurilingualism

• Is a democratic value to be promoted

• Is a competence to be developed

Principle

Native-like competence is NOT the only acceptable goal when learning a language

A plurilingual person has:

• A repertoire of languages and language varieties

• Competences of different kinds and levels within the repertoire

Plurilingual educationpromotes:

• An awareness of why and how one learns languages

• An ability to use transferable skills

• A respect for the plurilingualism of others

• Respect for all language varieties

• A respect for all cultures

• A global, integrated approach to language education in the curriculum

Project Aims

• To understand existing school profiles fostering plurilingualism

• To formulate and implement policies that support plurilingualism

Pre-Workshop

• Identify a number of relevant issues to plurilingualism at school

• Illustrate them via a small number of grounded case studies

Workshop

• Raise awareness about language issues in education

• Stimulate reflection about own attitudes and role

• Provoke discussion about the decision-making processes

• Initiate the development of tools

• Focus on practical approaches

• Aim for tangible results

Post-Workshop

Case studies provided by participants – school profiles

• Fine-tuning of tools intended for school development

• Examples of ‘research and development’

Case Studies

• Ascertaining continuity between home and school

• Valuing all languages

• Taking stock of all the assets

• Establishing a climate of collaboration

• Implementing change in favour of linguistic diversity

Dissemination

• School profiles – to encourage others

• Tools – to support the implementation of policies favouring plurilingualism

To stimulate action by head teachers – sensitize head teachers toward their responsibility in this area

Quoting…Education Bradford

There is a need for governors and senior managers in school to be committed to valuing the linguistic diversity of the school and its community

School leaders are in a strong position to take a lead on plurilingualism and linguistic diversity through relevant policies

They can also ensure that staff who wish to develop their skills in community languages, have access to appropriate professional development

Schools should ensure they give appropriate value to the languages of the community…and that these are celebrated within school

The most important single factor in the

success of the school is the

quality of leadership of the

head(Harris, Day, Hadfield, 2003)

One person with courage makes a

majority

Andrew Jackson