Conference 2006: Crossing frontiers (6-7 July 06)

Date: 6 July, 2006 - 7 July, 2006
Location: Cardiff University
Event type: Conference

The third biennial conference for languages in higher education, jointly organised by CILT, the National Centre for Languages and the Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies

Programme and proceedings

 

The Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies CILT The National Centre for Languages University Council of Modern Lanugages ALAssociation of University Language Centres SCHML Standing Conference of Heads of Modern Languages in Universities

 

conference brochure

This two-day conference was jointly organised by the Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies and CILT, the National Centre for Languages, in partnership with key three key subject associations in languages and related studies in higher education: UCML, SCHML and AULC.

Crossing frontiers follows on the success of Setting the agenda for languages in higher education in 2002 and Navigating the new landscape for languages in 2004.

The conference was of interest to all those concerned with the learning and teaching of languages in higher education, both in the UK and internationally. It was also of relevance to those involved in other sectors which border on higher education such as secondary schools, further and adult education.

In a recent report commissioned by the Department for Education and Skills, a number of initiatives to address a diminishing national capacity in languages in the UK were proposed. These included the designation of certain modern languages as of strategic national importance, the development of institutional international policies (which explicitly include reference to languages), and a formal dialogue with professional bodies to develop professional accreditation of language and other internationally related HE courses. The report also recommended that, in order to widen and increase participation in language learning, better strategies needed to be developed to promote and support languages across sectors. This might be achieved through a more co-ordinated programme of outreach work with schools and colleges together with the provision of materials such as Languages Work to demonstrate the ways in which language learning can contribute to employability in a global market. Thus, this conference seeks to explore the ways in which these needs might be met both strategically and through the curriculum.

Footitt, Hilary (2005). The National Languages Strategy in Higher Education. London: DfES
www.dfes.gov.uk/research/data/uploadfiles/RB625.pdf

Conference themes

Conference papers are arranged into the following blocks:

Working across sectors

  • Outreach and widening participation
  • Lifelong learning
  • Stimulating demand for languages in higher education
  • Widening participation and inclusion
  • Promoting our subject areas
  • Outreach with schools

The curriculum

  • Less Widely Used and Less-Taught Languages
  • Qualifications and accreditation
  • independent learning
  • Personal Development Plans
  • Using Virtual Learning Environments
  • The international dimension
  • Issues in TESOL
  • Collaborative learning
  • Online tutorials
  • Teaching Less Widely-Used and Less-Taught Languages
  • Blended learning
  • E-learning communities
  • New methods of delivery
  • Less Widely-Used and Less-Taught and Strategic Languages
  • Translation and interpreting
  • Language assistantships

Teacher education

  • Initial teacher training
  • Supporting new teachers
  • Teacher education

Workshops

  • Association of University Language Centres (AULC)
  • Association for Language Learning (ALL)
  • Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies (LLAS)
  • Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETLs)
  • Euro RCSG Riley Education

Invited speakers and panels

  • Introduction - Mike Kelly, Director, Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies
  • Opening address - Jane Davidson, Education and Lifelong Learning Minister, Welsh Assembly
  • Plenary - Tony Thorne, King's College London
  • Plenary - Elspeth Jones, International Dean, Leeds Metropolitan University
  • Plenary - Hilary Footitt, University Council of Modern Languages
  • Employability Panel - Facilitated by Teresa Tinsley, Assistant Director, CILT, the National Centre for Languages

Programme and proceedings - click on the icon to read the full paper

Download print versions

Programme (rtf, 658Kb) | Programme (pdf, 140Kb)
Abstracts (pdf, 372Kb)

Day one: Thursday 6 July 2006
Time Parallel session 1 Parallel session 2 Parallel session 3 Parallel session 4 Parallel session 5
09.30 - 10.30 Arrival, registration and morning coffee
10.30 - 11.00 Introduction: Mike Kelly
Director, Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies
11.00 - 11.15 Welcome to Cardiff: Ceri James
Director, CILT Cymru
11.30 - 12.30

ALL workshop

LLAS workshop

Less Widely-Used and Less-Taught Languages

Qualifications & accreditation

Independent learning

Languages in Schools
Facilitator: Linda Parker
This workshop will bring delegates up-to-date with the latest developments in languages in secondary schools.

(Co-sponsored by the LLAS Subject Centre)

Subject Centre Showcase
Facilitator: Alison Dickens
This session will present some of the Subject Centre's recent projects and research

Elena Polisca
Paper: Promoting less widely taught languages: the outreach experience of FLAGS (Foreign Language Awareness Group for Schools)
Promoting less widely taught languages: the outreach experience of FLAGS (Foreign Language Awareness Group for Schools)

Marina Orsini-Jones
weblink: Sound opportunities with Horizon Wimba Voice Tools
Using voice tools and subtitling software to stimulate the acquisition of employability skills while learning Italian (and/or other languages)

Gerry Procter
Asset Languages - a new route to certification in language learning

James Milton
Paper: French exams and the CEF
French exams and the CEF

Julie Lawton
Paper: Enquiry-based learning: an approach to enhanced independent learning in the Humanities
Enquiry-based learning: an approach to enhanced independent learning in the Humanities

Bettina Hermoso -Gomez
Online feedback

12.30 - 13.30 Lunch
13.40 - 15.10

Outreach and widening participation

Initial teacher training

Personal development plans

Using virtual learning environments

The international dimension

Jocelyn Wyburd and Ameeta Chadha

"Keep talking"

Sarah Wullink
powerpoint
Widening Participation in Modern Foreign Languages at the University of Nottingham

Linda Parker
Breaking barriers to inclusion

Shirley Lawes and Ana Redondo

Reconceptualising PGCE Modern Foreign Languages: the merits of M-level initial teacher education

Irmgard Wanner
Interactive e-learning modules in language teacher education

Gee Macrory and Angela McLachlan
powerpoint
Bringing modern languages into the primary classroom: investigating effective practice in teacher education

Susan Beigel

A case study of the effects on student attainment, and on retention, of personal development planning (PDP) via departmental mechanisms for improving student learning and through the institutional Progress File

Miranda Van Rossum

The aware language learner: promoting reflection in an online Dutch course at intermediate level

Marina Orsini-Jones

Plans and e-plans: integrating Personal Development Planning (PDP) into the languages curriculum

Maria Fernández-Toro
powerpoint
Using e-learning for self-assessment in advanced productive skills: from essay writing to liaison interpreting

Hélène Duranton and Helen Phillips

Developing online self-access materials for subject specific language courses at an advanced level (SAM Project)

Jonathan Bunt
The Virtual Manchester Campus (VMC): a site and tool for distance learning Independent Language Learning Programmes (ILLP)

Marie-Odile Leconte

Delivering the international agenda; are we as language lecturers the best people to do it?

Danielle Barbereau

Exploring the evolving role of HEI language centres in the context of national and international languages strategies

Miranda Y P Lee
Enhancing employability in the global market - workshops for parallel text drafting

15.10 - 15.40 Afternoon tea
15.45 - 16.00 Conference address: Jane Davidson
Minister for Education, Lifelong Learning and Skills, Welsh Assembly Government
pdf
16.00 - 16.45 Plenary: Elspeth Jones
International Dean, Leeds Metropolitan University
Internationalisation - Crossing Cultures, Changing Culture
16.45 - 17.45

Marketing languages workshop

Issues in TESOL

Lifelong learning

Collaborative learning

Language assistantships

Making a difference: creating demand and attracting students
weblink: Euro RSCG Riley
Facilitator: Adam Gumbley, Euro-RSCG-Riley
This workshop will look at how university staff, both administrators and academics, who work in language departments, can make a real difference in marketing their subject, creating demand, and then working throughout the application process to turn enquiries into current students

Kikuko Shiina and Toru Tadaki
Why Japanese cannot put forward their point of view: Two cultures of literacy

Tim Graham and Alice Oxholm
powerpoint
Exploring the changing attitudes of TESOL teachers to classroom-based research

Del Morgan
powerpoint
Sector, what sector? (An experiment in providing language skills for adults)

Toni Ibarz
Exploring blended language learning in a lifelong learning context

Rose Clark
E-Journals & blogs in Curriculum & Language Integrated Learning (CLIL)

Shu-Mei Hung

Intercultural communicative competence in tele-collaborative foreign language learning

Robert Crawshaw and Julia Harrison
Pragmatic factors affecting communication between language teaching assistants and mentor / responsables' in France and England

Joan Hoggan

Language Assistants: Enhancing the Learning Experience

17.45 - 18.30 Drinks reception
hosted by CILT, the National Centre for Languages, to celebrate the publication of Teaching Languages in Higher Education by John Klapper
18.30 - 19.30 Free time
19.30 Conference dinner

 

Day two: Friday 7 July 2006
Time Parallel session 1 Parallel session 2 Parallel session 3 Parallel session 4 Parallel session 5
09.00 - 09.30 Day registration
09.30 - 10.30

CETLs workshop

Online tutorials

Stimulating demand for languages in HE

Widening participation and inclusion

Teaching Less-Widely Used and Less Taught Languages

Embracing languages of the wider world, embracing a world of multimedia: SOAS-UCL CETL and UU CETL
powerpoint
Facilitator: John Gillespie
This session encompasses two presentations and a paper. Each of the Languages CETLs, (Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning), will introduce their general background, aims and projects

Clare McCullagh and Jonathan Smith
On-line tutoring for journal article writing skills: new genres of dialogue?

Annette Duensing, Ursula Stickler, Carolyn Batstone and Barbara Heins

Face-to-face or face-to-screen? - An analysis of tutorial interaction online and face-to-face

Nick Byrne
powerpoint
Tracking new patterns in the uptake of language study at universities across Europe: facts, figures and issues picked up from the AULC surveys and DfES & ENLU projects

Keith Marshall
powerpoint
Constructive collaboration v. cut-throat competition

Cathy Watts

Widening Participation: a case study

Jenny Lewin-Jones and Joe Hodgson

Differentiation strategies for the inclusion of students with severe visual impairment in MFL modules in higher education

Margeret Tejerizo
"To and from Russia - with love?" The changing face of the 'Year Abroad' in Russia since the demise of the USSR

Michael Prosser

The introduction of Chinese onto the curriculum of Spanish engineering students at the Polytechnic University of Valencia

10.35 - 11.35

AULC workshop

Promoting our subject areas

Blended learning

Supporting new teachers

E-learning communities

Podcasting

Facilitator: Andrew Grenfell
This workshop will consist of a one-hour introduction to Podcasting (the syndicated distribution of audio or video files across the internet).

Paul Rowlett
A professional body for linguistics: the Linguistics Strategy Group

Liz Hudswell and Paula Davis
pdf
Cross-sector collaboration mapping project

Nebojsa Radic
The Junior CULP Project: phase 2

June Clarke and Paul Redhead
I can hear you but I can't see you: the pedagogical implications of web-based synchronous teaching for language learning

John Trafford
The language learning experiences of new teachers of modern languages in England

John Klapper
Weblink: Understanding and developing good practice
Supporting the professional development and training of language teachers in higher education

Marina Mozzon-McPherson
Virtual learning spaces as learning communities

Margaret Southgate

Speaking across frontiers - promoting the independent use of synchronous voice conferencing by scattered groups of Open University language learners

11.35 - 12.00 Morning coffee
12.00 - 12.50 Employability Panel: Language skills, employability and the international economy
pdf
Teresa Tinsley
, Assistant Director (Communications), CILT, the National Centre for Languages.
Speakers include:
David Frost, Director General, British Chambers of Commerce
Isabella Moore, Director, CILT, the National Centre for Languages and former Vice-President of Eurochambres
Theodoros Koutroubas
, Director & Senior Policy Advisor, European Council for the Liberal Professions
12.50 - 13.50 Lunch
13.50 - 14.30 Plenary: Hilary Footitt
Languages and War
14.35 - 15.35

Teacher education

Outreach with schools

New methods of delivery

Less-Widely Used and Less Taught & Strategic Languages

Translation and interpreting

Linda Murphy

Language teaching at a distance: establishing key principles to develop professional practice

Christine W L Wilson and Rita McDade
powerpoint
Training the trainers of the trainers: team-working across boundaries to turn a dream into a vision

Sabine Little
powerpoint
The Innovation Exchange project: online collaboration between HE students and secondary pupils

Teresa Tinsley and Alison Dickens
Getting the message across

Christine Leahy
"ICT for ULP" - Principle consideration for the introduction of Information and Communication Technology to university language programme teachers

Christian Fandrych
Academic language competence in Modern Foreign Language degrees. Towards an integrated, bilingual approach

Teresa Tinsley, Ceri James and Joanna McPake
Community languages: responding to 'superdiversity'

Ann Carlisle
Meeting the FCO's strategic language needs - a worldwide challenge

Isabelle Perez and Christine W L Wilson
powerpoint
The team approach to specialist training in Public Service Interpreting and Translating at Heriot-Watt University

Ariane Bogain and Val Thorneycroft

Translation, theory and practice: an interactive approach

15.40 - 16.20 Closing plenary: Tony Thorne, Director, Language Centre, King's College London
Slanguistics, or just Lemon Meringue?
16.20 - 16.30 Summing up and concluding remarks: Isabella Moore
Director, CILT, the National Centre for Languages