December 2011 e-bulletin

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Dear colleague,  

Welcome to the LLAS e-bulletin for December 2011. Click here to see this email on the LLAS website.

Message from the Director

The launch of the REAL Network in Paris earlier this month was a big step forward for language teacher associations in Europe. The network they have established is enormously varied, but carries the promise of more concerted action by teachers on policy issues. LLAS is very pleased to be an associate member of the network since we believe very strongly that the future of language teaching lies with the professionals who carry it out. Britain’s ALL has a leading role in the network and the challenge will be to find ways of working which are not solely dependent on central funding, from the European Commission or from member states. Bon courage.

Mike Kelly (follow Mike on Twitter at @ProfMikeKelly)
Director, LLAS Centre for languages, linguistics and area studies

This month's e-bulletin in brief

In the news

The Higher Education Academy
The latest funding opportunities from the Higher Education Academy can be found at www.heacademy.ac.uk/funding


A UK Survey for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies
As demonstrated in the recent LLAS report (www.llas.ac.uk/resources/paper/6481) , the National Student Survey (NSS) is taking on more importance at the institutional level. However, in discussions with lecturers and students it is apparent that many of the NSS questions are ambiguous and it is difficult to derive data which can truly provide information about the disciplinary experience. Moreover, there are no specific questions for joint honours students so students are unable to report on different experiences with language and non-language subjects or different experiences of learning different languages.
LLAS is proposing to develop a UK-wide survey of students of languages and related subjects. The survey would include discipline-specific questions on year abroad experiences (where applicable), L2 teaching, progress, and confidence, resources and technology, curriculum content. Data collection policies and the publication of results from would be under the same terms as the National Student Survey.

There will be a small charge for institutions wishing to take part in the survey. If you are interested in participating, please contact John Canning j.canning@soton.ac.uk


News from the University Council of Modern Languages :

- Year Abroad Graduate Project
UCML is working with the British Academy and ThirdYearAbroad.com on a project to demonstrate the value of the year abroad to UK graduates. We are seeking to gather short reports from recent graduates on the importance that the year abroad has had for them. Please forward the following link to your graduates, asking them to filling in the online survey by the deadline of 9th December www.thirdyearabroad.com/graduates

- UCML Plenary 13 January 2012
The next plenary meeting of UCML will take place at LSE London on 13th January.  The morning meeting will provide key updates on UCML activity as well as the Speak to the Future campaign and the work of LLAS.  In the afternoon, there will be presentations on Language Graduates and employability followed by discussion.

- Elections to the UCML Steering Group and Executive
Ballot papers have now been sent out to all representatives.  Please ensure that the ballot paper reaches the UCML secretariat at LLAS by 8 December 2011. 

For more details about UCML, go to the website www.ucml.ac.uk


British Association for Applied Linguistics - BAAL
45th Annual Meeting - Multingual Theory and Practice in Applied Linguistics
6 - 8 September 2012 - University of Southampton
CALL FOR PAPERS NOW OPEN
http://www.llas.ac.uk/baal2012


Invitation to be part of the OCR Design of A Level roadshows
OCR are holding Design A level roadshows across the country to collate and compare Higher Education’s views on core academic abilities and pedagogical approaches of those working with first year undergraduates across a range of HEIs. This will be an opportunity to share your views and hear those of your peers. The outcomes of this research could lead to recommendations for improvements to A levels.

An invitation response form from OCR is attached to this e bulletin if you would like to be involved. Please return these to OCR. OCR are particularly keen to hear the views of those who currently work with first year undergraduates. If you have any queries please contact sally.brown@ocr.org.uk


ICT4MFL Daily
ICT4MFL is an initiative which aims to promote the use of technology in teaching with a particular focus on language teaching. This paper aims to bring together the latest stories of interest from Twitter in one place using key term searches and hashtags. LLAS tweets are regularly quoted along with lots of other tweets about technology in language teaching.
It's free and you can subscribe here

LLAS blog 

How to embed Open Educational Resources into academic practice - some tips from HumBox users. Kate Borthwick, LLAS

HumBox is an online space for sharing humanities teaching resources. It contains over 1300 resources from a range of humanities disciplines and is an excellent place to showcase your teaching. HumBox is managed by LLAS. 

1. Use your OER repository as your personal website.
When you publish an open educational resource in a repository (like HumBox), it receives a unique URL. You can send your students directly to this URL to access the resource. This is an easy way to put your material online.
2. Avoid carrying paper/USBs with you when you present at conferences.
You can publish your slides, handouts, plus any related information in one HumBox collection – and then simply give out the unique URL for this collection to your audience. This keeps all of your files in one place and is always accessible (as long as you have an internet connection).

Click here for the full post

The LLAS brochure

Please find a brochure detailing LLAS events for the coming academic year 2011-2012 here. This brochure contains details of all of our events for 2011/12 which include:

  • Practical workshops providing skills development and training in a range of fields such as the use of new technologies, pedagogic research, language teaching, relating theory to practice
  • Conferences on a range of themes including languages in higher education, e-learning and languages of the wider world
  • Professional development events aimed at early career lecturers, senior managers, subject specialists in LLAS disciplines, postgraduate students and language teachers
  • Bespoke events for departments on any of the themes covered in this brochure

Call for papers

Sustaining a Global Society : Languages of the Wider World - DEADLINE EXTENDED TO 12 December 2011
29-30 March 2012 - SOAS, London
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6408

Language Futures: Languages in Higher Education conference 2012 - DEADLINE 9 January 2012
5-6 July 2012 -  Edinburgh
www.llas.ac.uk/events/6404

LLAS Why study languages? calendar

FREE calendar download: This calendar, for the month of December 2011, in Polish, was produced by LLAS Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies. It was created with help from teachers working on the JISC-funded Community Cafe project. Look out for another language next month Quiz questions and answers are also included. This is the fourth of a 16-month series lasting until Dec 2012. Please visit : http://languagebox.ac.uk/2007/. You can find all months so far at http://languagebox.ac.uk/1991/. 

Hard copies available to purchase: This is the fourth year that the popular ‘Why Study Languages?’ calendar has been produced. The January-December 2012 calendar features 12 languages, one per month. Languages featured this year include: Icelandic, Gaelic, Urdu, Spanish, Persian, French, Punjabi, Estonian, Malay, Hungarian, Welsh and German.

The calendar is available for FREE, with a charge of £3.50 for postage and packing. Funding from the JISC has made this possible. For more information, please go to http://www.routesintolanguages.ac.uk/calendar

Forthcoming events 

DECEMBER 2011

The LOC tool for teachers : authoring your own online learning materials
19 December 2011 - University of Southampton
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6499

JANUARY 2012

Theory and Practice in Vocabulary Learning and Teaching - REGISTRATION RE-OPENED - More places now available
20 January 2012 – University of Reading
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6416

Blended learning for languages.  How to successfully integrate technology into everyday teaching
23 January 2012 – University of Bristol
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6449

E-Learning Symposium 2012 - Early bird rates extended to 8 December 2011
26-27 January 2012 - University of Southampton
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6395

FEBRUARY 2012

Maximising the use of your VLE for language learning and teaching
8 February 2012 – Coventry University
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6423

Using facebook for (language) teaching
14 February 2012 – University College London
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6414

Teaching for Success : supporting international students in the classroom
15 February 2012 - Bath Spa University
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6522

MARCH 2012

Effective language teaching in the virtual classroom
1 March 2012 – The Open University and 9 March 2012 – online 
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6418

Revolution and Revolt : Understanding the Forms and Causes of Change – BRISMES Annual Conference 2012
26–28 March 2012 – London School of Economics and Political Science
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6487

Sustaining a Global Society : Languages of the Wider World – CALL FOR PAPERS DEADLINE EXTENDED TO 12 December 2011
29-30 March 2012 – School of Oriental and African Studies, London
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6408

APRIL 2012

Life and work in academia : event for new and aspiring lecturers in languages, linguistics and area studies
12 April 2011 - Aston University Conference Centre, Birmingham
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6398

The LOC tool for teachers : authoring your own online learning materials
17 April 2012 - University College London
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6495

MAY 2012

Essential e-Learning Skills for Teachers of Non-Latin Languages
8 May 2012 - Manchester Metropolitan University
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6518

JULY 2012

The LOC tool for teachers : authoring your own online learning materials
4 July  - University of Southampton
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6500

Language Futures: Languages in Higher Education conference 2012 - CALL FOR PAPERS DEADLINE 9 January 2012
5-6 July 2012 -  University of Edinburgh
http://www.llas.ac.uk/events/6404

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LLAS Centre for languages, linguistics and area studies 
University of Southampton | Avenue Campus | Southampton | SO17 1BJ 
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www.llas.ac.uk

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