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ACAMIS ELL Conference 2019 took place in Shenzhen last week. Our MYP Coordinator Mr. Robert Young and Head of ELL and World Languages Ms. Kim Peters attended the conference on behalf of Boston International School.
Here we would like to share what they had observed in the conference:
Mr. Robert Young and Ms. Kim Peters attended ACAMIS ELL Conference 2019.
About ACAMIS: The Association of China and Mongolian International Schools (ACAMIS) is a non-profit membership organization formed to facilitate interactions and development among international schools in China and Mongolia, assisting member schools to grow and achieve the very best standards in international education. The focus of the ACAMIS English Language Learners conference was on the concept of Translanguaging Pedagogy, an approach in English instruction that involves building on students’ bilingualism by using their mother-tongue strategically during instruction to support their language learning.
Teacher collaborative workshop on Translanguaging strategies.
“The most coveted language ability in the 21st century will not be to speak English natively, since English is spoken by more bilinguals than ever. It will also not simply be bilingualism and biliteracy in two languages, since two whole languages are no longer sufficient. The most coveted language ability will be to be comfortable translanguaging in order to make sense of multilingual encounters, an ability that schools would be well poised to develop for all their children (Garcia, 2010).
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Kim Peters shared that the ACAMIS Conference sessions provided her with strategies to bring back to Boston International School.
• Creating language profiles of staff/students and identifying gaps in our language support opportunities.
• Identifying students who can serve as language ambassadors and utilized when support is needed.
• Using mother tongue to unravel a unit’s statement of inquiry (Key and related concepts, global contexts/understandings) as well as the IB command terms.
• Using the strengths of home languages to scaffold learning in and out of the classroom.
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Kate’s primary message was that schools need to work to create what she referred to as “Multilingual Ecologies” which are environments that are designed for multilingual students and their families. School publications and websites, hallways and classrooms and even office spaces need to represent the languages and cultures of the schools’ greater community. Tatyana’s primary message was that schools need to work to disrupt practices that hinder multilingual language development. According to Kate and Tatyana, English may very well be the dominant language in international schools, but multilingualism is what students need for 21st century college and career readiness.
With both talents
As an IB consecutive school, Boston International School sticks to IB concept of respecting students’ native language and culture while teaching in English. We emphasis on students’ native language study and encourage them to learn more about multi-culture, which better prepares students for future challenges.
By far, we are providing native language curriculum of Mandarin, Korean and Japanese and World Language curriculum of Mandarin, Korean, Japanese, German and French. Our strong language teachers team supports students’ language learning in an all-round way.
