International Mother Language Day Statement
As much as these divisive times concern advocates of multiculturalism and human rights, so too do they concern linguists and educators. With the rise of populist nationalism, the threat of walls between sovereign neighbours, religious profiling, and suspicion of regional integration, we worry what this political milieu means for migrant and Indigenous languages. Language is, after all, a salient index of culture. An assault on cultural diversity and celebrations of differenc
International mindedness and global citizenship: what about language?
I attend quite a few conferences, both academic and practice-related, for the purposes of sharing knowledge and continuing my own learning. In 2018 I had the opportunity to speak at four international-school industry conferences, on various topics pertaining to languages in international schools. During that year, the academic and practice sides of my world collided in a way which has required some deep-thinking, and that process came to a head at the AAIE Leadership conferen
Building better bilingual programmes
There is a rising interest in bilingual education in both international education and national education, in a variety of forms. For the most part, this means introducing English earlier in non-English speaking areas, but this is (thankfully) not the only new iteration of bilingual programmes. While this is a positive step forward in recognising that education does not need to be monolingual, it is important to consider what the desired outcomes are for any programme calling
