Personal Statements on MFL

http://www.studential.com/personalstatements/getpscourse.asp?type=27

Useful for blog on learning foreign languages

http://www.kent.ac.uk/careers/cv/pgcestatements.htm
Univ Kent website gives lots of ideas

Sources of PDFs and e-books

http://findpdf.net/
(over 250 million pdf articles and e-books)

http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/view/iau/
(theses university of Leeds)

The conventional wisdom is that, under Norman rule, Sicily became a social and linguistic 'melting pot'. My thesis challenges this idea by showing how the extant linguistic data does not always present an accurate picture of the wider language situation and by arguing that Norman Sicilian society was often highly fragmented and characterised by a good deal of local variation.

ASSETT - based on can do statements

Use of Asset in Primary School


On googling ASSET_CASE_STUDY


Bournemouth
Local Authority
Hundreds of pupils in Bournemouth are
being given the opportunity to have their
languages skills recognised. All 10 secondary
schools in Bournemouth have registered for
Asset Languages and Bournemouth Local
Authority plans to introduce the scheme into
primary schools later this year.
Proud of its ethnic diversity and
multiculturalism,
Bournemouth is already
considered a popular
destination for language
students. The local
authority has ensured all secondary school pupils have
access to a diverse range of languages; as well as being
taught French, Spanish and German, they can also learn
Mandarin, Cantonese, Turkish, Polish, Persian,
Arabic, Panjabi, Urdu, Russian and
Gujarati, through either their
curriculum based languages
lessons or after-school
and lunchtime clubs.
Asset Languages
gives pupils the
opportunity to
have these skills
and achievements
recognised.
Bournemouth
local authority’s
modern foreign
languages advisor
Judith O’Hare says:
"Pupils have a broader
perspective of the world, and they
appreciate why we should celebrate
the multicultural, multilingual society we live in. Language
learning also promotes the ‘inclusion’ and
understanding of minority, community groups living in
the town. Speakers of
community languages
living in
Bournemouth,
for example,
are keen to
help their
friends
and peers
to learn
about
their
language,
country of
origin and
culture."
Students at Leicester
Adult Education College
Swanlea Secondary
School
Swanlea School is a co-educational school for 11 – 16
year olds set in the heart of Whitechapel, East London.
Attended by 1,050 students, the multi-cultural centre
was recently called "a smashing school" by Tony Blair.
As an East London based centre, Swanlea School is
already looking forward to welcoming the 2012
Olympics as a great opportunity to increase student
awareness of the need to learn languages. The school
wants to help pupils understand how they are part of a
larger community and how through working together
and communicating, they can make changes for the
better. The school,which is also a dedicated centre for
Business and Enterprise, believes that language
learning gives students the opportunity to look
further a field for employment and leisure, and
encourages awareness of different cultures.
In 2005, 55 Swanlea students from Years 8
and 9 took part in Asset Languages’ French
pilot scheme with impressive results.
Aldjia Touati, head of languages at
Swanlea School, introduced the scheme.
"At Swanlea School,we value the fact that
our students are from a diverse range of
backgrounds where many speak English as
a second language and converse in a
different language at home. The school
supports the languages department as
students perform well in
the subject and it is
seen as an
opportunity to
build self esteem.
"In 2005,Asset
Languages was
introduced to two mixed
ability groups at Swanlea
School, one class in Year 8,
one class in Year 9. At the
time, the Year 8 group were
studying French twice a week
whereas the Year 9 class were taught
French four times a week. For me, this meant that there
was a diverse range of abilities
to assess.
Swanlea School already
operates a policy to assess
learners every term for units completed, so introducing Asset
tests was also very straightforward – in fact student
feedback about the Asset assessments was very positive.
Students like the idea of being able to study and be assessed
at their own pace as well as receiving a formal certificate for
what they have achieved."
West
Berkshire
Primary
Consortium
Thomas,Year 6 – “I was so proud of myself
when I got my certificate.”
Benjamin,Year 6 – “I'm
really enjoying French since we've been doing the tests. I can
see that I'm getting better.”
Rosie,Year 6 – “I really want to do well in the tests because I
will feel proud of myself.”
Jonathan,Year 6 – “I think the tests are a great idea. They
show us how good we are at French!”
Andrew,Year 6 – “I think the tests are great because
they challenge you in all areas of French.”
From the parents…
Lisa - mother of Alex Yr 6 – "I think that the
scheme is excellent because it encourages
children to learn French well at an early age. The
children are very eager to do well in the tests
and are not frightened of them which will
obviously boost their confidence."
And from the languages teacher, Siân…
"The Asset Language assessment scheme is a great
motivational tool for all pupils. The children feel that
they have real proof of their achievements. The teacher
assessments provide for regular and fairly instantaneous
feedback to which all children respond
positively. For primary children it
helps with the transfer to
secondary school as they feel
more confident in their
ability in the subject area."
"My
first impression of Asset
was how easy it was to implement
into my existing lesson plans. I didn’t
need to teach anything new as the Asset
Language topics matched our schemes of
work very well.“
Aldjia Touati,head of languages,
Swanlea School
"We are proud to
be one of the first centres to
award Asset Language
qualifications. Being involved in the
pilot scheme has been an exciting
experience for us."
Cecilia Rojas,Tutor Organiser,
Leicester Adult Education
College
"The
Asset Languages scheme
has certainly helped my children.
They have responded positively to the
tests and to the certificates. A welcome
addition to the school timetable."
Karen,mother of Thomas Yr 6
and Kathryn Yr 4
Cedars School Students
"Teenagers
in the town have a real
aptitude for languages; they find
learning fun and interesting and want to
discover more about the different languages,
cultures,groups and communities that co-exist in
today’s multicultural Bournemouth – we’d
estimate that over 20 languages are actually
spoken in the town.”
Judith O’Hare,modern foreign languages
advisor, Bournemouth
Local Authority

Getting kids to grow up learning Arabic

Stumbled upon this Wordpress blog by American(?)  married to professor of Arabic.

http://uaehomeschool.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/teaching-arabic/#comment-346

She seems to think that children should learn fisHa at home!!

http://www.amazon.com/Guidelines-Barefoot-Language-Learning-Independence/dp/0932311008/ref=cm_cr_pr_sims_t

Barefoot-Language-Learning-Independence

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A treasure trove of help for learning a second language, June 6, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Guidelines for Barefoot Language Learning: An Approach Through Involvement and Independence (Paperback)

Do you want to learn and use a foreign language? Or, in Larson's words, are you someone who "lives or is preparing to live in a community where residents use a language that is different from your own?" Consider this a must-have book. The first third of the book lays out a bare-bones description of what it takes to learn a new language, what helps and hinders the process, and how to go about doing it as effectively as possible. The last two-thirds of the book is composed of daily guidelines designed to move the learner down the road toward fluency.Larson's book is a treasure-trove for language learners. He covers the spectrum from learning language basics to dealing with interpersonal difficulties and workplace challenges. Those familiar with Brewster and Brewster's "Language Acquisition Made Practical" (LAMP) will be delighted with the practicality of Larson's detailed descriptions of 200 day-to-day learning situations.
While the book describes how to learn a language while living in a community, it is also a helpful resource for classroom learning. The principles described can be a help in evaluating and learning whatever may be missing from the classroom curriculum.
Anyone who finds this book helpful should also check out Larson's "Becoming Bilingual" as well as "Language Acquisition Made Practical," by E. Thomas Brewster and Elizabeth S. Brewster.

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Comment Comment

5.0 out of 5 stars An Invaluable guide for going from one culture to another, October 26, 2009

By 

J. Westlund (Sheboygan, WI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Guidelines for Barefoot Language Learning: An Approach Through Involvement and Independence (Paperback)

Dr. Larson is a former professor who I had the privilege to interact with directly. His forte is his ability to deal with the issues of going from one culture to another culture and how to best make yourself one with the culture you are entering. He does this in the context of language, but his principles can be applied more broadly as well.

Peatrick Hall (Connection with Lamp)

Patrick Hall Whole World Guide

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

A useful first guide to language learning, August 18, 2010

By 

Patrick Hall

This review is from: Whole World Guide to Language Learning (Paperback)

Despite its age (it was published in 1989), I found this book to be a useful addition to my collection on language learning. I like the fact that it's brief, and easily readable. The tone is inforaml (and at times even humorous), but the information conveyed is clearly based on the author's hard-earned experience.

The book is primarily aimed at those who are immersed in a culture where a language is spoken, where opportunities to hear and use a language are not limited. Nonetheless, the advice is applicable to anyone who has at least some interaction with a language. If you want to make progress learning Mandarin in Beijing, or English in Cincinnati, or Spanish in Madrid, you're *still* going to have to make the effort to get out there and talk to people. This book can't make you do that, but it can give you tips about how to plan ahead so that when you work up the courage, you'll be ready to make some real progress.

The primary learning technique that Marshall advocates is called "The Daily Learning Cycle." This is a set of repeatable steps:

1) Decide what you want to learn. How to introduce yourself? How to buy milk? How to ask directions?

2) Prepare a script. Try to ask a native speaker to help you come up with a good dialog for a particular situation you have decided to work on. You'll acquire vocabulary through this process, and also a sense of what is correct language for a given situation -- should you speak formally or informally?

3) Practice. You should practice the script until you have it down pat. Marshall gives various approaches to creating helpful drills here. There is some great advice here.

4) Communicate what you've learned. Take your script out into the world, and use it. Marshall's portraits of what might actually happen when you try to pull off this scary step are entertaining and a bit humbling, but from my own experience, quite realistic! You have to grow a thick skin if you really want to become a competent language learner.

5) Evaluate. This is a great idea, and one that I have tried to start implementing myself. Once you're done trying out your newly acquired phrases in the real world, you should analyze your progress. Which words did you find difficult to pronounce? Which words did you forget? Were the reactions I got what I was expecting?

Next Marshall addresses proficiency, and how to measure it. He gives tips on goal setting, and a graded proficiency scale that you can use to see how far you've come, and how far you have to go. This is something that I think a lot of autodidact language learners (myself included) fail to do, and they end up losing motivation. Setting and achieving clear goals is a great way to feel like you're making progress.

Chapter four addresses the human relationships in language learning: between the learner and community members, and especially between the learner and a mentor. He discusses how to find a good mentor, and the issue of compensation.

Chapter five gives a selection of sample lesson plans. These have whimsical titles like "Quickly sir, what do you have for diarrhea? Or, How to Plan for Sudden Distress." Very practical, and worth studying.

The sixth chapter, "Techniques and Tricks" is, as its title suggests, a bit of a grab-bag: time management, using visual aids, memory tricks, and so on. Any of these topics could be expanded, but it will get your ideas going.

The final chapters cover learning at home before you leave, and suggests that you do things like visit ethnic restaurants related to wherever you're going. There's also advice on the long-term view: what do you do if you exhaust all the opportunities for formal training in your target language? Then you *must* become a self-directed learner.

Finally comes an annotated bibliography, which is itself a very useful resource. For whatever reason, the literature on self-directed language learning is rather on the outskirts of mainstream linguistics, and even other language-related fields like language acquisition and second-language instruction. There were several titles in here that I plan to track down.

So, all in all I would say this is a great guide for anyone who hopes to learn a language on their own. It's also a nice antidote to the fact that most literature on this topic is burdened with missionary terminology promoting a specific religious viewpoint. Language learning is not, in and of itself, religious in nature. So secular texts like this one, although they are far and few between, are very valuable indeed. My only complaint is that this text could be longer.

Highly recommended.

Guy Deutscher - discovered 2 Apr 2011

Guy Deutscher - Mankind's Greatest Invention
Guy Deutscher - Why The World Looks Different in Other Languages