The Multilingual Turn in Language Education: An Essential Skill for the 21st Century

‘The Multilingual Turn in Language Education: An Essential Skill for the 21st Century’, by Dr Nayr Ibrahim (Head of Young Learners and Bilingual Education, British Council, Paris)
The plenary session at our Teaching for Success conference 2017, this talk explores multilingualism as a holistic phenomenon. It looks at how children develop and manage multiple languages, what teachers can do to build on children’s linguistic repertoires, and why a multilingual approach is imperative for educational systems.
Don’t forget to check out overviews of other speakers’ conference talks on:
learner autonomy ( • Promoting learner auto... );
combating bullying ( • Combating Bullying and... );
getting teenagers talking ( • '8 Ways to Help your T... );
and integrating speaking into CLIL lessons ( • Integrating Speaking i... ).
#teachingforsuccess

[@rethikar6191]

Thank you Dr Nyre Ibrahim for your speeches on multilingualism.

[@valentinam6472]

Dr Nayr Ibrahim

[@kiyoaki1985]

I'm a multilingual teacher but i always think there's something that gets lost in this stuff: the speaker mentions she speaks Portuguese, Afrikaans etc but these are all indo-european languages, the only other language she mentions is Arabic, which is a semitic language which still has relatively many things in common with these other languages. It's a completely different story to learn a "truly" foreign language from an entirely different language family, with totally different syntax and rules and no common etymological roots. Learning two or three European languages really isn't a big deal for most people, but when a Chinese student learns English the effort that this requires is usually not appreciated by western teachers and the way code switching works between these languages is different

[@neno02009]

You mention Arabic is to be a Semitic language but you do not realize that it is 100% foreign from the European languages.

[@lilith4651]

As a Chinese. I literally think the differences between English and other European languages are as the same as the varies between dialects from different locations in China.lol no offense . Maybe that’s my ignorance caused by the limited knowledge of European countries’ languages

[@kiyoaki1985]

@@lilith4651 No, that sounds about right

[@navenchang]

Yes, environment, and life are important for language learning...

[@oleksandrastoliar1542]

Super interesting!!!

[@caoeason9102]

If you spend half an hour or one hour a day to be immersed in one language, in several years of time, say 6 years, you would have solid foundation of a particular language.

[@thato596]

14:58 then i guess knowing english as home language or 2nd language is enough for many people around the world

[@melissasueferrin3409]

Native Speaking Teacher should be bilingual teachers too. I don't trust a foreign language teacher who has not learned a foreign language themselves.

[@user-wd6wf2ds1f]

Yup! This is about pedagogical education.

[@arabbitcallsbonnie-j1927]

i am a chinese and i can speak french，english，germany and japanese，but i dont think it‘s a big advancement for my career developpement

[@yeyenthamrie6761]

Well, it’s like a weapon in your arms. You are ready anytime you need to use it. So, this comment was 9 months ago, and I believe you are at the top right now.

[@ros27han]

I am sorry to say, but researches as represented in this presentation who are using elite histories, families as their subjects, and claim those stories to have empowering consequence is simply problematic!!