30 Britishisms used by Americans

The BBC Magazine's recent article about the Britishisation of American English prompted readers to respond with examples of their own - here are 30 British words and phrases that you've noticed being used in the US and Canada.

Full story on BBC news website

The West must start learning Chinese, says economist

China's growing importance on the world stage means that the West needs to start speaking its language, says economist Martin Jacques.

BBC News

Brazilian government uses indigenous language for the first time in anti-AIDS campaign

Brazil is using an indigenous language for the first in a campaign aimed at curbing violence against women and the spread of HIV.

The program includes folders warning that “violence or fear of violence increase women’s vulnerability to HIV infection and other sexually transmitted diseases” because women who fear violence can be forced to have unprotected sex.

Full article in Washington Post

Baroness Coussins speaks about MFL and Erasmus scheme in House of Lords

My Lords, I shall focus on what the report says about student mobility in relation to the Erasmus scheme and the teaching and learning of modern foreign languages. I declare an interest as chair of the All-Party Group on Modern Languages and vice-president of the Chartered Institute of Linguists.

Read full speech on Hansard

Seven-year-olds 'should learn Chinese'

 The British Council calls for primary school children to learn non-European languages.

The Independent

The British Council: friend or foe?

Educators working overseas complain that the venerable quango's business interests have turned it into a rival.

A few years ago, when the CfBT Education Trust, a non-profit organisation that runs schools and education services, was looking to expand its operations in Malaysia, its chief executive, Neil McIntosh, arranged a meeting with the local high commissioner. When he got there, though, he was disappointed to see that the commissioner had brought along a representative of one of CfBT's main competitors. "He was a bit put out that I should see the British Council in that light," says McIntosh.

Read the rest at The Guardian

New open resources published as part of FAVOR project

The LLAS-led FAVOR project is drawing to a close this month and is celebrating the publication of over 340 new open educational resources for language teaching and transition on www.languagebox.ac.uk

The JISC-funded project worked with part-time and hourly-paid language tutors to get them to publish a selection of their teaching resources as open, adaptable content. It also got them to create *NEW* resources to help explain and describe how languages are taught at HE, and give prospective students a ‘taste of’ language-learning at university.

There were about 25 tutors working on the project and materials cover at least 17 different languages: English, Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Slovak, Latvian, Ukrainian, Estonian, Arabic, Swahili, Tigrinyan, Amharic, Finnish, Hungarian.

• Check out the online activities shared by University of Southampton tutors: Katy Heady for German and Bianca Belgiorno for Italian.

• Admire the beautiful kanga fabrics and proverbs for Swahili shared by Wambui from the School of Oriental and African Studies

• Study the examples of effective student feedback from Richard Galletly at Aston University

• Get into learning Finnish from Riitta-Liisa Valijarvi at UCL – I’ve already wiled away an enjoyable half hour on the loanwords quiz!

• Admire these beautiful and fascinating pictures of a Chinese market in Beijing from Dan Li at Newcastle University – they make me want to fill my house with giant calligraphy brushes and statues! Or learn some a Chinese song from Linda Cheng, also at Newcastle.

Tutors report that they have really enjoyed creating resources and making them available to the world. They will continue with open practice in their work and if you are keen to find out more, the project blog is at: www.thefavorproject.wordpress.com

There are still new FAVOR resources appearing on LanguageBox every day and all of them give a fascinating taste of language study in Higher Education. Have a browse and see what grabs your interest…

Kate Borthwick

Academic Coordinator, LLAS

New Zealand teachers visit Wales for Maori class tips

Four teachers from New Zealand have arrived in Wales to learn more about bilingual education in a two-week tour.

The visitors will take tips on how to boost Maori language lessons in their home country's schools.

BBC website