Cultures and Languages Across the Curriculum (CLAC)

Register now for the Sixth Annual CLAC Conference!

HURRY–EARLY BIRD REGISTRATION DEADLINE IS JANUARY 19! 

Exploring Approaches to
Cultures & Languages Across the Curriculum

March 9-10, 2012
Radisson University Hotel
Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

This conference provides an opportunity for faculty, graduate instructors, and administrators to share expertise in building and managing CLAC programs. The conference will address the practical issues related to developing successful pedagogical models for the use of world language and culture learning across the post-secondary curriculum.

Conference Focus

A specific focus of the 6th annual conference on Cultures and Languages Across the Curriculum (CLAC) will be on presenting and discussing a variety of models and aspects of post-secondary programs implementing world languages and cultures across the curriculum. Seasoned CLAC practitioners, those in the process of implementing programs, as well as prospective CLAC program developers will come together to share ideas and best practices in our evolving and unique field of education for global citizens.  Attendees at the CLAC conference will learn how CLAC programs are implemented at other institutions and will have a rare opportunity for extended discussions examining design and delivery of a CLAC curriculum.

Plenary Topics and Speakers

• CLAC in a Nutshell
  Tanya Kinsella, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• From First- and Second-Year Foreign Language Instruction to CLAC: A Quantum Leap or a Well-Trodden Path
  Gwendolyn Barnes-Karol, St. Olaf College

• Modeling Collaboration between Foreign Languages and Sustainability Studies
  Frances Matos-Schultz, University of Minnesota
  Charlotte Melin, University of Minnesota
  Patricia Mougel, University of Minnesota

In addition to an exciting line up of sessions, panels and posters, the CLAC conference is also offering three pre-conference workshops for an additional fee:

• Fostering Critical Thinking and Academic Language through Visual Images: A Hands-On Approach
• How to Design and Implement a CLAC Program that Works for Your Campus
• Preparing Graduate Students to Teach CLAC

Register now—Early bird registration deadline—January 19, 2012!

More information about the conference program and registration can be found at:
www.carla.umn.edu/conferences/clac/

Carla Summer Institutes 2012

The Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA) at the University of Minnesota has sponsored a summer institute program for second language teachers since 1996. This internationally known program reflects CARLA's commitment to link research and theory with practical applications for the classroom. Each institute is highly interactive and includes discussion, theory-building, hands-on activities, and plenty of networking opportunities.

CARLA summer institute participants—more than 3,700 to date—have come from all over the world. They have included foreign language and ESL teachers at all levels of instruction, as well as program administrators, curriculum specialists, and language teacher educators.

Online registration is now open for the CARLA summer institutes for immersion teachers and for language teachers.

*** Don't delay—many of the institutes will fill up fast! ***

Summer Institutes for Immersion Teachers

• Immersion 101: An Introduction to Immersion Teaching for Character-Based Languages
  June 25-29, 2012
• Immersion 101: An Introduction to Immersion Teaching 

  July 23-27, 2012
• Meeting the Challenges of Immersion Education: Counterbalanced Instruction in the Immersion Classroom
  July 30-August 3, 2012
  

Summer Institutes for Language Teachers

• Using Social Networking Technology: Collaborative Language Learning—online course
  July 9-August 12, 2012
• Culture as the Core in the Second Language Classroom

  July 16-20, 2012
  
• Developing Assessments for the Second Language Classroom

  July 16-20, 2012
  
• Developing Materials for Less Commonly Taught Languages (LCTLs)

  July 16-20, 2012
  
• Content-Based Language Instruction and Curriculum Development 

  July 23-27, 2012
  
• Using Technology in the Second Language Teaching
  July 23-27, 2012
  
• Focusing on Learner Language: 
Second Language Acquisition Basics for Teachers

  July 30-August 3, 2012
  
• Improving Language Learning: 
Styles- and Strategies-Based Instruction

  July 30-August 3, 2012

More Information
Detailed information is available on the CARLA website at: www.carla.umn.edu/institutes

The institutes have been developed and are offered with the support, in part, of the U.S. Department of Education’s Title VI Language Resource Center program. The summer institutes are co-sponsored by the University of Minnesota’s College of Education and Human Development and College of Liberal Arts.

Check out the Advanced Practices in Second Language Teaching Certificate!

This certificate offered by the University of Minnesota’s College of Education and Human Development provides an exciting opportunity for teachers of foreign languages and English as a second/foreign language to showcase their professional development work through the CARLA summer institute program by taking the institutes for graduate level credit.

More information about the courses needed to obtain the certificate, admission criteria, and application materials can be found on the web at: www.cehd.umn.edu/CI/Programs/college/Certificates/Advanced-SLT.html

CARLA Seeks Teachers to Pilot Online Rater Training Modules

The CARLA Assessment Project is recruiting teachers to use and provide feedback on the new online Rater Training for Proficiency Modules. The modules, developed to provide teachers online access to professional development on rating for proficiency, are in the second phase of piloting and will be available to all teachers once the piloting has been completed.

Teachers of French, German, and Spanish are invited to:

• participate in rater training using the online rater training modules;
• provide feedback on the modules for the FAQ page; and
• participate in a short pre- and post use survey.

Special bonus!!  Each participating teacher will have free use of all components of the online Minnesota Language Proficiency Assessments to assess their students’ proficiency.  Detailed information about the MLPA can be found at: www.carla.umn.edu/assessment/MLPA.html

To sign up, please email Ursula Lentz at lentz003@umn.edu

Teaching Languages Online Survey

Do you teach a language online?

If you have experience teaching a language completely online, please take our survey!
www.carla.umn.edu/technology/TLO/survey.html

Many language teachers are being asked to teach online, K-12 and post-secondary, but there is little known on what preparation these teachers need - or receive - in order to teach effectively online. We would like to know about the preparation you received to teach online in order to better prepare future online language teachers.

You will have the opportunity to enter a drawing for a free CARLA summer institute (take the survey by March 15!), and join our community of practice for online language teachers!

Learner Language: Tools for Teachers Website

Background Information

While more and more materials are being developed to teach important critical languages, there has been little investment in the skills and knowledge of those who teach these critical languages.

Video clip from the Learner Languages: Tools for Teachers website: Using Persian in an engaging interpersonal communication task

Without appropriate preparation of and support for critical languages instructors, even the most brilliant materials will be underutilized or even misused. One problem that can hinder language learning in the classroom occurs when a teacher overemphasizes accuracy at the expense of communicative ability.

Research shows that implicit proficiency in a second language only develops when learners are given opportunities to use the language in unrehearsed communication. The Learner Language: Tools for Teachers project uses the theoretical framework of Exploratory Practice and a set of multimedia materials to show teachers of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Persian how to encourage and focus on learner language development through unrehearsed communication activities in their own classrooms.
An annotated bibliography supplies research findings on second language acquisition and learner language development specific to each of the four languages.

Why Focus on Learner Language?

Second language acquisition research has shown that adult learners have a “built-in syllabus” that guides the sequence of development of a second language when those learners use the language in unrehearsed communication. Just as the growth of a plant is guided by its DNA, so the growth of the second language grammar is guided by the learner’s innate syllabus; the process is similar to what happens when children acquire their first language.

How can teachers support this process of second language acquisition? They can assign engaging puzzle-solving communicative tasks requiring that learners use their second language in innovative ways—without prior practice. In carrying out such activities, learners surprise their teachers and themselves with what they can do with the language and how their proficiency grows through this organic process.

Learner Language Website Development

Under the direction of CARLA Director Elaine Tarone, beginning/intermediate students of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Persian were video recorded as they worked in pairs on unrehearsed interactive puzzle-solving speaking tasks with stimulating visual images as prompts. The video clips were professionally edited, transcribed and translated into English. Project staff developed and field tested activities to help teachers of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Persian learn six different methods of analyzing learner language:

1. Learner Characteristics—teachers learn to identify individual differences among second language learners that may affect their success in second language acquisition.
2. Error Analysis—teachers learn how to document and analyze learners’ systematic errors.
3. Interlanguage—teachers identify stages of development of certain grammatical forms in learner language.
4. Learning in Interaction—teachers see how learners co-construct language and respond to correction in pairwork.
5. Referential Communication—teachers identify ways the learners effectively identify things, actions and locations.
6. Complexity—teachers learn simple measures of syntactic complexity and lexical variety, and how to use these to measure learners’ development of academic language.

With these materials, teachers will develop the hands-on skills they need to monitor the growth of learner language in their own classrooms so they can more effectively tailor their instruction to meet the learning needs of their students. The web-based materials are designed to be useful for self-study as well as in teacher development and second language acquisition courses.

The learner language website provides a wealth of information for teachers of all languages on learner language, error analysis, interlanguage, referential communication, and complexity.  Another section gives practical information on designing interactive communication tasks that invite learners to use their second language in meaningful, unrehearsed communication. 

The Learner Language: Tools for Teachers website and multi-media materials for Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Persian are available on the CARLA website at: www.carla.umn.edu/learnerlanguage

CARLA Working Papers Online

CARLA continues to add to the treasure trove of free resources by making more of its working papers available online.

Research and Practice in Immersion Education: Looking Back and Looking Ahead - Selected Conference Proceedings
Carol A. Klee, Andrew Lynch, and Elaine Tarone (Eds.)

These selected conference proceedings highlight the presentations and discussions held at the conference on immersion education held at the University of Minnesota in October 1995. The papers report on the challenges related to policy and planning and pedagogical and assessment issues.

To access this and other free CARLA working papers go to:
www.carla.umn.edu/resources/working-papers/

American Association for Applied Linguistics (AAAL) Annual Conference
March 24–27, 2012
Boston, MA

CARLA wishes to congratulate Elaine Tarone who will receive the 2012 AAAL Distinguished Scholarship and Service Award at the upcoming American Association for Applied Linguistics conference in Boston. This prestigious award “recognizes and honors a distinguished scholar for her/his scholarship and service to the profession in general and to the American Association for Applied Linguistics in particular.”

TESOL International Convention 2012
March 28–31, 2012
Philadelphia, PA

Promoting Excellence: Perspectives on ELLs With Limited or Interrupted Schooling
            March 29, 2012
            10–11:45 a.m.
            Marriott Liberty Ballroom A

This session brings together instructors and researchers working with adolescent and adult ELLs with limited, interrupted, or no formal education. The presenters each provide a distinct perspective on this population and discuss important considerations and innovative pedagogical approaches.
Presenters: Helaine Marshall; Martha Bigelow; Elaine Tarone; and Jeffra Flaitz

The Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA) at the University of Minnesota houses one of several Title VI Language Resource Centers funded by the U.S. Department of Education to improve the nation's capacity to teach and learn foreign languages effectively. CARLA supports a number of coordinated programs of research, training, development and dissemination of information relating to second language teaching and learning.

The CARLA Update is an electronic newsletter designed to give second language teachers and researchers current information on the programs and projects currently operating under the auspices of CARLA. You are also invited to visit the CARLA website at http://www.carla.umn.edu/. For more information about all the Title VI Language Resource Centers, visit our joint site at http://nflrc.msu.edu/.

We hope that you enjoy receiving the CARLA Update on a quarterly basis. We encourage you to share this issue of the CARLA Update with colleagues who may be interested. Anyone can sign up to receive the newsletter at http://www.carla.umn.edu/about/mlist.html. If you would like us to take you off the list, please e-mail the center at carla@umn.edu.

Elaine Tarone, CARLA Director
Karin Larson, Coordinator