“Heritage language schools are where everything is at. The students there, they’re bilingual, they’re plurilingual, they’re in touch with what’s happening overseas. They’ve got strong senses of their heritage identity, their national identity. They’re the ones, the schools are where everything is happening. They are a really important complimentary sector of education, and they really need to be supported because of this. The heritage language schools form and start communities. They provide such service to communities that in some ways, monolingual administrators are not aware of this. They’re not marginal, they’re central.”
Ken Kruickshank’s Bio
Ken Cruickshank is Professor of Education and TESOL at the University of Sydney. He is also Director of the Sydney Institute for Community Languages Education. He was a language teacher for many years and more recently has been working to promote the teaching and learning of heritage languages in Australia.
Resources
Resources:
Open language online portal with free resources in many languages
International conference website with copies of presentations from 2021 http://icchle.org/
SICLE website with access to information and resources about heritage languages
Teacher website with information on upgrading qualifications and getting accreditation in Australia
To learn more about previous guests on It’s About Language or access other episodes of the podcast, visit It’s About Language or click on the Podcast tab above.
