This month, we will talk about bilingual children’s understanding of self and the role of learning heritage languages in this process. Our first guest, Nadja Hernker, an educator, coach and therapist with many years of experience in working with multilingual children and families, will present about “A child’s language(s): understanding others and being understood in who you are, where you come from and who you can become in the future”.⠀
Annie Asgard will present about the relationship between HL schools and mainstream. She currently works part-time as an English as an Additional Language (EAL) Teacher at Claddagh National School in Galway City that has students speaking 30 different languages attending. Annie is a part-time PhD student in the School of Education in University College Dublin. Her area of interest is identity formation in children from linguistically and culturally diverse backgrounds in primary schools in Ireland. She also works very closely with children, families who live in Direct Provision in the international protection system.
Every meeting is an opportunity to get together, learn, share experiences and develop new skills!
The meeting is free and open only to Mother Tongues members. To become a member, please visit https://mothertongues.ie/for-heritage-language-schools/
More details coming soon.
To register to the event, check the link below.
How can community language schools connect with mainstream schools?
In this teach-meet, we will discuss ways for mainstream teachers and community language teachers to connect and be aware of each others’ work, to best understand the full experience of bilingual and multilingual children who attend both mainstream school and weekend/complementary/heritage language classes.
Invited speakers include Eddie Fox, principal of Griffith Barracks Multi-denominational School, Ivana Rocca Kovářová, Česká škola Dublin (Czech School Dublin) and Dr Francesca La Morgia, Director of Mother Tongues.
Every meeting is an opportunity to get together, learn, share experiences and develop new skills!
The meeting is free and open only to Mother Tongues members. To become a member, please visit https://mothertongues.ie/for-heritage-language-schools/
To register for the event check the link below
Join us for another interesting exploration of techniques, tips and resources for teaching heritage languages. Every meeting is an opportunity to get together, learn, share experiences and develop new skills!
The meeting is free and open only to Mother Tongues members. To become a member, please visit https://mothertongues.ie/for-heritage-language-schools/
This month we are discussing tips and ideas to teach heritage languages online. The focus will be on preschoolers and primary school children. The speakers are Aga Pedrak, Polish language teacher, and Maia Deluca, Spanish language teacher and preschool teacher.
This monthly Virtual Meet Up is designed for heritage and community language teachers based in Ireland. It is an opportunity to meet other teachers, share experiences and discuss current challenges as well as new methodologies, innovative practice and projects.
This monthly Virtual Meet Up is designed for heritage and community language teachers based in Ireland. It is an opportunity to meet other teachers, share experiences and discuss current challenges as well as new methodologies, innovative practice and projects.
The meeting is free and open only to Mother Tongues members. Find out more about memberships here: mothertongues.ie/for-heritage-language-schools/
Our speaker Anna Yashchenko will discuss teaching and learning challenges and opportunities during the pandemic.
The Heritage Language Teach meets organised by Mother Tongues bring together community-based heritage language teachers who work in Ireland. The goal of the meetings is to share experiences and learn from one another. Teachers of more than 10 different languages have been attending from every part of Ireland, so now it is your turn to join this friendly network of passionate professionals!
The event is free for Teachers and Heritage Language Schools registered as Mother Tongues Members. To register and become a member visit:
mothertongues.ie/teaching-heritage-languages-during-the-pandemic.
Anna Yashchenko, director of the Dublin Russian School
Anna is a paediatrician by her first career and an IT professional by the second.
Moved to Dublin with Google six years ago, she fell in love with the country and its people, especially with one of them 🙂
After realizing all the challenges of raising bilingual children she decided to open her own Russian school of additional education to support the language of her own child and many other children in Dublin.
Russian Gymnasium values the full immersion to the language with the live use of it in different subjects and aspects.
There are a variety of subjects taught by native Russian speakers, who are also passionate about their professions: a biologist, a math PhD, an art-historian, etc.
Facing the challenges of Covid, the school was transferred to an online model in two weeks’ time frame.
Anna will talk about the changes, techniques, successes and failures she faced during the last 4 month.
News and updates from the Dublin School of Mandarin Chinese.
Read this blog by school director Evan Furlong to find out more about how her school transformed during the pandemic.
.
Looking back to the last two and a half unprecedented months, if your jobs are not affected or living alone, to most people, it’s a blessing in disguise. We spent more time with family whether it’s a good or bad thing (ie it’s a bad thing with my teenager but a good thing for me), we have a greener earth and we all learned a thing or two with taking up tasks virtually or differently. Personally I feel great to get out and walk everywhere within the restriction limit with the family. We actually talk to family and friends more than ever in this technology age.
Likewise in running the Dublin School of Mandarin Chinese, our classes carried on with thanks to technology so that learning can take place at home. Many families spend their Saturdays on heritage language education and some of them would spend an equal amount of time in commuting to and from the limited services across the country. It’s much easier for families like these to access such services remotely which we will be launching for September 2020. Watch this space. As part of the learning of our culture, we challenge our students to take part in paper cutting, traditional arts, brush painting, culinary skills, trying out food, and learn about our traditional festivals etc.
This remains a huge challenge to deliver online.
Thanks to many organisations such as Mother Tongues, the Overseas Community and Council Affair and Hua Hsia Chinese school in the UK, we’ve learnt & shared new tricks on teaching online.
We regret to inform you that the #TOCFL and #CCCC tests will be postponed until September due to the outbreaks of #Covid19. The good news is that you’ll have time to prepare! Check out our website for more information.
Evan Furlong
Dublin School of Mandarin Chinese is one of the Schools Member of Mother Tongues. Would you like your school to become a member too? Visit this page to find out more.
Join this online meeting organised by Mother Tongues to discuss challenges for heritage language schools during school closure. Participants will be able to share their tools and tips for distance learning with heritage language learners of any language.
You must be logged in to post a comment.