Languages, Diversity and teaching our children
Pluralism is something we don’t think about too often but WE SHOULD, especially as language teachers, especially English language teachers.
Part of our role, wherever we are, is to educate our students about the incredible diversity of this planet, cultural/linguistic. Educate our students to embrace “the other” and love the other (if I may be so old fashioned). Part of doing this, is to be informed of the diversity that exists out there – for teachers to do that age old calling and magice trick of “making the unknown, known – making the invisible, visible”. This is where, how, change starts.
The European Day of Languages is on Sept. 26th this year. They have made a great presentation that teachers can use with their students. An excellent resource. See this lesson also, with a nice quiz. Language Diversity. Linguistic diversity in the world.pdf
I’ll end with this photo essay I put together to celebrate diversity and other ways of speaking and thinking. It is this very diversity which is our only hope for our children’s children. I firmly believe that and hope you’ll help in some way to teach your students to respect and celebrate the “life” and “gift” of the other.
Here’s the full screen slideshow. The woman in the first picture died recently, the last speaker of Eyak, Marie Smith Jones. Read about it here…
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