Multilingual Education and India

It is not often that a webinar about MLE attracts a large group of participants, but if you have a relevant topic and good speakers  it can be done! The recent webinar on multilingual pedagogies dealt with a reality that we often face in Indian classrooms that multiple languages are spoken by the learners. The webinar speakers had a good mix of theory and practice. No wonder it attracted a broad audience! A Webinar: ‘Multilingual pedagogies for all: Language-inclusive teaching and learning’ was hosted by The Asia-Pacific Multilingual Education Working Group, UNESCO Bangkok and UNICEF East Asia and Pacific on the 9th of July 2024. The presentations were aimed at discussing practical solutions for preparing teachers to lead multilingual classrooms through best practice models in various countries such as India, the Philippines, Thailand and Australia. The speakers were Kathleen Heugh from the University of South Australia, Sangsok Son from SIL Intl, Dhir Jhingran of the Language...

It was a tremendous privilege to give a SAMVAD lecture at NCERT on Multilingual Education. Thank you Dr Sandhya Singh and Rama Meganathan for the invitation and warm welcome. It was good seeing some old friends like Binay Pattanayak there ! The SAMVAD Lecture Series was hosted by NCERT(National Council of Education Research and Training) and is available on their official YouTube channel for public viewing on the 10th of January, 2024.  The presentation  was titled “ MLE developments across the world and the current India policies and National Education Policy 2020 and the National Curriculum Framework 2023.” Some of the main sections of the presentation looked at the Global picture, the Indian scenario in the development of Multilingual Education(MLE), and the current initiatives/resources that are available.  The lecture began by introducing the definition of MLE and the rationale behind using MLE in education. Recent research studies were described which support ...

It was quite energising to participate last week in the Asia-Pacific MLE conference in Bangkok. Having so many educationalists come together to learn about how multilingual education is implemented in different settings was inspiring. There were several presenters from India, but  the presentations from other countries were also quite relevant for the Indian context. The 7th International Conference on Language and Education was hosted by UNESCO in Bangkok from 4 to 6 October, 2023. The conference had 475 participants from civil society, academic institutions, and governments. High-level policymakers from over twenty governments in Asia and the Pacific also attended. The Indian government was represented by Ms. Archana Sharma Awasthi, Joint Secretary in the Department of School Education and Literacy, MHRD. India was quite prominently represented at  the conference. Prof. Tsimpli Ianthi shared on the first day about her research on the value of using multiple languages and exp...

World Book Day gives us a nice excuse to promote the production of books in the local languages. Particularly since this year there was a special emphasis on indigenous languages! In line with the theme of the International Decade of Indigenous Languages (2022-32), f or this year, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has chosen the theme  “Indigenous Languages”! According to their official statement , “Indigenous and local languages feature as part of the World Book Capital Network Charter, and the Charter recognizes a less rigid concept of ‘the book'; it also acknowledges all  forms of literature (including oral traditions).” The statement also mentions that, “ Of the almost 7,000 existing languages – many of which are fast disappearing – the majority are spoken by indigenous peoples who represent the greater part of the world's cultural diversity.” Therefore, they are stressing the importance of safeguarding these languages, the mot...

  Photo credit: https://asiapacificmle.net/conference/2023/   The Multilingual Education Conference in Thailand has always been a great place to meet with fellow-educationalists with a passion (or at least interest!) for Multilingual Education. Because of Covid it was a bit delayed, but I was glad to learn there will be one this year in October. I hope there will be many presentations from India. There are only a few weeks left to get abstracts submitted.  See the announcement copied below. _________________________________________________________________________________ The Asia Pacific Multilingual Education Working Group (MLE WG) is pleased to announce the 7th International Conference on Language and Education to be held in Bangkok, Thailand, this 4 - 6 October 2023, and the first Call for Abstracts . The seventh edition will address multilingual education for transformative education systems and resilient futures. UNESCO Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education...