Registration Deadline: 12PM, Oct. 19, 2018
Theme: Local and Global Diversity: Classroom and Community Collaborations
9:30-9:50AM Breakfast (Open to Public, Nau Hall First Floor Lobby)
9:50-10:00AM Opening Remarks by Dr. Christian McMillen, Associate Dean for the Social Sciences
10:00-10:50AM Reconceptualizing Language Teaching in the Age of Super-diversity: Lessons from the Field of Heritage Languages—Maria M. Carreira, Ph.D. Professor of Spanish, California State University, Long Beach
Abstract:
Effectively responding to learner diversity is one of the most challenging aspects of heritage language (HL) teaching. It is also one of the most important tasks facing the language teaching profession as a whole, in our culturally and linguistically diverse society. A microcosm of this society, today’s foreign language classes are characterized by student diversity with regard to needs, strengths, and goals vis-à-vis the target language. In this context, longstanding constructs of language teaching – in particular, one-size-fits-all instruction, the primacy of the native speaker, autonomous national languages, and fixed norms (Carreira and Chik, 2018; Canagarajah, 2007) - fall short of responding to today’s linguistic realities. Drawing on work on heritage languages and other related fields, I will outline other constructs, principles, and practices that are better suited to today’s age of super-diversity and that are more responsive to all students: second language learners, heritage language learners, and native speakers. Characterized as involving “diversification of diversity”, the phenomenon of “super-diversity” entails diversity between, as well as within minority groups (Budach and de Saint Georges, 2017; Vertovec, 2007; Hollinger, 1995). With this phenomenon becoming increasingly common in educational contexts, there is a pressing need to reconceptualize language education.
Keynote Speaker's Bio:
Maria Carreira is a professor of Spanish at California State University, Long Beach and Co- director of the National Heritage Language Resource Center at UCLA. Her recent book-length publications include a co-edited Routledge Handbook on heritage language education around the world, five co-authored college-level Spanish textbooks, and Voces: Latino Students on Life in the United States(Praeger, 2014). She has also published numerous articles and book chapters on US Spanish and on HL pedagogy. With her colleagues at UCLA, she has recently created a comprehensive online course for training heritage language teachers. Dr. Carreira as been a keynote speaker at conferences and has lectured extensively on HL teaching at many venues.
11:00-11:50AM UVA Faculty Panel: Classroom Practices: Building Communities
Moderator: Paula Sprague (Department of Spanish, Italian & Portuguese)
Panelists:
Andrew Kaufman (Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures)
Bilal Maanaki (Department of Middle Eastern & South Asian Languages & Cultures)
Esther Poveda-Moreno (Department of Spanish, Italian & Portuguese)
Abstract:
The existence of community is implicit in language learning, both on the level of the learners in the classroom and on that of the collectives of native-speakers of the languages being learned. The three educators on this panel have added innovative dimensions to the pedagogical implementation of community formation, principally by changing the definition of the classroom. They will speak about specific activities with students, service-learning courses, and nontraditional collaborations that all work to build meaningful connections among people of diverse backgrounds, thus motivating and strengthening language learning and cultural understanding.
12:00-1:00PM Lunch (Invitation Only)
1:00-1:50PM The Key to Using Languages: Relationships in Our Local and Global Community —Mary Curran, Ph.D., Director of Local-Global Partnerships, Rutgers University
Abstract:
We learn languages in order to use them, and this means we need meaningful relationships and contexts in which we can engage in conversation and language-rich activities. At Rutgers Graduate School of Education, we create learning experiences that connect our students with target language speakers in the local community. This talk will expose you to many ways you can build language proficiency while developing relationships with speakers of the target language and culture. Examples come from our award-winning Conversation Tree Program, and other activities that promote the affirmation of multilingualism and community language use. Importantly, we work to create programs grounded in a sociocultural and funds of knowledge approach. Research on these programs has revealed opportunities to connect with local community members impacts students’ identities in many ways. Some students are exposed to new diverse perspectives and the experiences of immigrant community members, other students begin to understand the experiences of their own families in new ways, and others may choose new career paths or directions focused on linguistic and cultural diversity (Curtis, 2018). This talk will highlight ways to build relationships with linguistically diverse community members in order to push your and your students’ linguistic, cultural and global competence.
Keynote Speaker's Bio:
Dr. Mary Curran is Director of Local-Global Partnerships and Professor of Practice at Rutgers, Graduate School of Education, where she directs The Conversation Tree: Language-Based Partnership Program. The Conversation Tree Program won the 2018 American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education Global and International Best Practices Award. She coordinates the EdM in Language Education Program, which offers teaching certification for ESL and world language teachers. Her research focus is on service learning, languages and teacher education, and her work has been published in journals such as TESOL Quarterly, Foreign Languages Annals, The Language Educator, and Theory into Practice.
2:00-2:50PM UVA Student Panel: Student Perspectives: Learning through Experience
Moderator: Sarah Rabke (Graduate Student of Spanish)
Panelists:
Ellen Beahm (Persian learner)
Gabriela Corredor Romero (Chinese learner)
Jenny Zhang (Chinese learner)
Vicki Reyes Hernandez (Spanish & Portuguese learner)
Abstract:
Diverse forms of experience are an integral part of students’ learning, not to mention of university life. The student panelists will speak of an array of experiences, including internships, research projects, and their learning experience in the classroom, that have formed and informed their academic work and will contribute to the professional paths they ultimately decide to pursue. The study of Chinese, Persian, Spanish, and Portuguese by the panelists has opened promising doors and led to potentially life-changing opportunities.