Multilingual Education and India

Dear MLE friends, “ The medium of instruction had statistically significant effects: if at least half of schools offer the opportunity to learn in a home language, attendance rises by approximately 10% (Smits et al., 2008).”  And some more interesting statements below.

Dear MLE friends, Orissa Primary Education Programme Authority ( OPEPA) in collaboration with UNICEF, Orissa organised last October a National Conference on Tribal Education with Special Focus on Multilingual Education . Attached is a report which gives a summary of all the papers presented. These presentations are very relevant as several of the people who presented are well aware of the grass-roots situation. 55 pages of experiences, reflections and suggestions!

Dear MLE friends, Some of you might be interested in the below announcement.

Dear MLE friends, May the below mentioned sponsor can fund some research on MLE? Check it out!

Dear MLE friends, This morning I read in The Hindu about an attempt by the   Adivasi Academy (Prof Ganesh Devy) to document the language and culture of 5 tribal groups in Gujarat . Good to note that this is getting newspaper coverage.

Dear MLE friends, The National Multilingual Education Resource Consortium (NMRC) from JNU is producing a newsletter with quality articles on MLE. The latest newsletter is no exception on that. It does focus on the "as far as possible" phrase tagged to the mother tongue reference in the Right to Education act.  Some topics: Prof Anvita Abbi : "Don't kill my Mother (tongue)" Sara Poehlman: "Mother Tongue Instruction 'as far as practicable' as Child's' right" Sara Poehlman: "Story telling for effective language transition in Assam Tea Gardens" Sikshi Manocha: "Witnessing the change" (a powerful testimony on the impact of MLE in the Saora community in Orissa) Check it out yourself at http://www.nmrc-jnu.org/nmrc_img/NMRC%20Newsletter%204th%20Issue.pdf (Note: 4.5MB!)

Dear MLE friends, UNESCO Bangkok released last week their latest publication on L1-based education. The book includes case studies from about 19 initiatives in Asia, Africa and Latin America . There is also a study on India written by Dr Barkataki of the  State Resource Centre in Assam . The book can be downloaded from the net. See details below.