Invitation to
The final conference of the MaMLiSE Project titled:
Majority and Minority Languages in School Environment: Helping teachers, pupils and parents
held in Poznań on the 15th June, 2023
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This conference is intended for all those who wish to widen their understanding of the linguistic diversity that is now characteristic of schools in many countries, and for those who are interested in related pedagogic issues. This includes teaching/learning methods and strategies that promote inclusive, multilingual practices in both the formal educational context and in the home environment. The aim is to ensure that all pupils have access to equitable education irrespective of their backgrounds, including those from migrant and refugee backgrounds. It is also our intention to highlight and help to foster, the more open and critically informed thinking and pedagogical approaches that will be required of school managers, support staff, teachers, parents and pupils.
During the conference, we wish to present the outputs developed in the MaMLiSE project to relevant stakeholders, especially teachers and teacher students, teacher instructors/educators, education policy-makers, NGOs, social workers, other interested researchers, and discuss with them the results of our work. The intellectual outputs developed in the project are designed primarily to support:
- school teachers, teacher educators and school leaders in delivering effective instruction in linguistically heterogeneous classes, guided by the assumption that both newly immigrated as well as multilingual pupils who have been living in the country for a longer period of time and were born there should be taken into account. A range of in-service training courses and support materials will be presented which can help teachers of all subjects, including those in preparatory classes, to offer more language sensitive instruction. On the basis of the training courses prepared in the project, conference participants, e.g. teachers, will learn, for example, (1) how to adapt teaching materials from various subjects to the level of the school language knowledge which particular pupils have at their disposal and (2) how to didactically support them with the relevant teaching principles, including the concept of the language-sensitive lesson.
- parents in developing their children’s individual multilingualism and establishing literacy practices by means of a series of video tutorials, pertaining to language and communication in first-, second- and third-generation migrant families, including translanguaging practices.
We offer two types of conference participation. Those who are interested in becoming familiarised with the concepts and good practices mentioned above can join our event as a member of the audience/discussant. We also want to offer interested researchers and professionals a forum for exchanging relevant ideas and expertise in the form of paper presentations in thematic sections. We envisage a post-conference publication in a peer-reviewed journal of selected presentations delivered during the conference.
Languages of the conference: Polish and English with simultaneous interpretation into Polish provided.
The participation in the conference is free of charge. We also provide a complimentary conference packet and coffee service for registered participants.
The conference preparations agenda:
- Submission deadline for section presentation proposals (200-250 word abstract in English or German): 15th February, 2023
- Notification of abstract acceptance: 10th March, 2023
- Registration deadline for non-presenting and presenting participants (free of charge): 30th April, 2023
- Conference: 15th June, 2023
- Full paper submission deadline: 31st December, 2023
- Reviewing process: 31st May, 2024
- Final publication decision: 31st July, 2024
- Publication date: 31st December, 2024
Rationale behind our project concept
While multilingualism and cultural diversity have long been a reality in many parts of the world, the importance of developing multilingual practices in schools and homes has only been actively recognised as a key policy goal more recently as the need to secure greater social inclusion and cohesion has become a more obvious and pressing reality. In response to these needs, the conference will focus on the topic of creating better educational opportunities for multilingual children at schools, including dominant language development and heritage language maintenance, by helping their teachers and parents to become better supporters. Our tenet is that raising a multilingual child, competent both in the heritage and dominant language, requires tight informed cooperation between families and educational institutions. We argue that schools and school staff exert a fundamental, yet often unnoticed, influence on the awareness level and language maintenance practices which families display.
The approach to multilingualism that we want to present and discuss during this conference seeks not only to include the entire linguistic repertoire of pupils and to promote the flexible use of all languages to further language acquisition, but also recognises that their full linguistic identity and personality must be drawn on to serve as an additional resource in learning and to enhance social participation and equality. By including home languages in the school environments, a gap for minority-speaking families can be bridged to help build family-school partnerships. At its heart, this approach seeks to exploit the diverse multilingual repertoires now present in schools by means of an increased focus on minority languages, language awareness, language use, and language development across the curriculum.
Organisational Committee
• Anna Szczepaniak-Kozak (chair)
• Emilia Wąsikiewicz-Firlej
• Sylwia Adamczak-Krysztofowicz
• Anna Pieczyńska-Sulik
• Angelika Garczyk
• Julia Stachowska
Scientific Committee
• Anna Szczepaniak-Kozak (chair)
• Emilia Wąsikiewicz-Firlej
• Sandra Ballweg
• Andrea Daase
• Angela Farrell
• Mary Masterson
In case of any queries, please contact us at: mamlise@amu.edu.pl