IALLT Online Learning Series
Title: Your Burning Questions about Remote Language Teaching
Presenters: Angelika Kraemer (Cornell University), Georges Detiveaux
(University of Houston-Downtown) and Trish Nolde (Georgia State University)
Date: Tuesday, March 24, 2020
Time: 12:00pm PST / 1:00pm MST / 2:00pm CST / 3:00pm EST
Webinar Duration – 1 hour
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSey0ThPuCzU71Z4qDx1XS2V9tOtu3Vq55gSoizS-YyQIftkyA/viewform
–K12 Inc. is responding to the nationwide wave of school closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic by offering free online curriculum, platforms, training, and technical assistance for students, families and school districts.
Resources for Schools and School Districts
For any school or network of schools – district, independent, religious, or charter – attempting to scale online offerings quickly, K12 is offering the following solutions. All courses are available in Spanish and 64 other languages.
As educators scramble for ways to facilitate online learning for homebound students due to COVID-19, the Sora reading app byOverDrive Education is offering nearly 250 eBooks and audiobooks for free to partner schools. Schools that are not OverDrive partners may also request no cost eBooks and audiobooks. The Sora app includes public library connect, which allows students to access public library collections while at home, so they can enjoy even more eBooks and audiobooks.
The COVID-19 (Coronavirus) outbreak is having a global impact, and affecting local communities. Staff in public libraries of all types, locations, and sizes are learning the facts about this public health crisis and helping to inform their patrons.
Like schools and other public buildings, public libraries should be closed, but EveryLibrary’s mission of sharing information goes unchanged.
EveryLibrary, a 501c4 organization that builds voter support and advocates for public funding for libraries, is answering the call providing resources and tips for families looking for free elearning sites, separating fact from fiction about COVID-19, and tips how to be productive for all.
“Your local library is a great place to turn for information about COVID-19, the disease caused by the Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2). Not only are libraries a trusted source of vetting information, there is a long history of libraries as a destination for answers to health questions.” says John Chrastka, EveryLibrary Executive Director.
Online Resources Libraries have always been there for people in times of need or crisis, whether it is in person, over the phone, or online. As parents face the uncertainties of school closings and the disruption or cancellation of children’s activities due to social distancing, it is comforting to know that your local public library can still be of service to you even from the safety of your own home and free of charge.
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) has created a help desk for Educators to discuss COVID-19. The community is open to everyone, users just have to create an account on the ISTE website. The Help Desk offers a discussion thread for teachers on resources, how to deal with COVID-19, grants, webinars, and more.
The ISTE Latino community is curating and sharing Spanish resources in support of teachers, students and families engaged in teaching and learning online and from home. We are working to identify free available resources appropriate to all subject/content areas, and not limited to the teaching of Spanish as a content or foreign languages area. Please share your Spanish resources here or at ISTE Latino.
We are also coordinating 4 ISTE Latino webinars in Spanish, as part of the ISTE/EdSurge COVID-19 Webinar Series efforts, to address the experiences and needs of our community members in Latin America:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/ISTELatino/
Corwin has created online toolkit for school leaders in hopes of being helpful for school leaders who are experiencing shut downs and/or moving learning to an online environment during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. The company collected resources from reliable sources to make sure that educators have everything they need to support students in the weeks ahead – and beyond.
The toolkit features the following sections:
The American Educational Research Association announced today that it is cancelling plans for a virtual 2020 Annual Meeting in April. The decision was approved in a unanimous resolution by AERA Council, the association’s governing body, on March 22. AERA had announced on March 6 that it was shifting from a place-based conference, scheduled for San Francisco, CA, April 17-21, to a virtual meeting due to the coronavirus pandemic.
In a message today to AERA members and annual meeting registrants, AERA Executive Director Felice J. Levine and AERA President Vanessa Siddle Walker noted that since the association’s March 6 announcement of a virtual meeting, the individual and societal pressures brought on by the pandemic have magnified substantially.
“At that time, we dreamed of creating an online platform where, without cost to anyone, competitively selected and invited paper presenters and other participants would be provided with an opportunity to share their work and benefit from connecting with a worldwide audience of attendee,” wrote Levine and Walker. “It seemed both feasible and responsible to invent and build a space to connect a breadth of scholars with practice and policy persons at all career ages and stages and to build it as a product that would in perpetuity remain available for all.”
“Yet, the rapidly changing circumstances, even as recently as this weekend, made us question whether our vision of a safe-haven virtual environment could be realized,” Levine and Walker wrote. “We have been monitoring the coronavirus disease, now sweeping the United States, over the last week to assess whether our vision of a free, open-access Virtual Annual Meeting for all would continue to provide the safe and secure space for participants and attendees we had imagined, or whether it was adding to a ‘to do’ list growing exponentially for far too many.”
“As we said from the outset in our March 6 letter, ‘[A place-based] annual conference has many wonderful strengths, but it just cannot be classified as urgent or extraordinary in the face of the heightened risk,’ wrote Levine and Walker. “After a full Council discussion last evening, we collectively reached the very same conclusion about a virtual meeting—that our first priority in light of ever-increasing risk is to affirm that the highest value that we share is the physical and emotional needs of all people connected to the world around us.”
Today, on March 20, the United Nations celebrates French Language Day.
Language Days at the United Nations were introduced in 2010 to celebrate multilingualism and cultural diversity.
The United Nations celebrates six “Language Days” each year, dedicated to the six official languages of the United Nations, namely Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.
These days are an opportunity to raise awareness in the international community about the history, culture and use of each of these languages.
The date of the Day of the French language was chosen symbolically with reference to March 20, 1970, which marks the creation of the Agency for Cultural and Technical Cooperation (ACCT), which has become the International Organization of La Francophonie (OIF).
In 2020, the United Nations celebrates its 75th anniversary with a broad, inclusive global debate on the role of global cooperation in building the future we want.
As part of the UN75 Initiative, the United Nations organizes dialogues in various parts of the world with different partners. The goal is to reach as many people as possible, to hear your hopes and fears and to learn from your experiences, but also to spark your thoughts and actions on a global scale.
Your voice counts. Participation in the dialogue, in person or online, is open to everyone. The resulting insights and ideas will be presented to world leaders and senior UN officials at a major event to be held in September 2020, during the 75th session of the General Assembly. Your opinions and ideas will be disseminated online and by various partners.
50 years of Francophonie
The date March 20 is also recognized by the International Organization of La Francophonie as the International Day of La Francophonie. The United Nations regularly cooperates with the OIF and its member states in the spirit of the provisions of the resolutions on cooperation with the OIF periodically adopted by the General Assembly.
In 2020, La Francophonie is also celebrating an important anniversary: 50 years of existence. This is an opportunity for the OIF to go back to the origins, to the spirit of its founders, but also to project itself into the future and imagine the Francophonie of tomorrow. Many events will be organized throughout the year, from March 20 to December 31, 2020, on five continents. Consult the OIF website for the calendar of events.
Discovery Education’s Experience platform is packed with over 180,000 assignable, editable activities and resources for K-12, based on core curriculum concepts and popular topics in math, science, social studies, ELA, and health. Whether teachers are looking for fun videos, interactive activities, or complete, ready-to-use lesson plans, Discovery Education Experience has many resources teachers want and students need to enhance virtual learning.
Choose from thousands of vetted, high-quality resources that adapt to and complement your teaching practices, including videos, images, interactives, reading passages, podcasts, and more. All content is ad-free, carefully curated, and segmented by grade level to help find exactly what you need.
All resources within Experience can be shared with students in a variety of ways, including email, web links/URLs, school’s learning management system, social media, and other web-based classroom tools.
Join upcoming live events or watch past ones.
Use the resources below to get going now.
The evolving situation with COVID-19 has caused a rapid shift to remote teaching and learning at many schools and colleges across the country, with many teachers being asked to quickly develop a plan so that courses can accommodate this change.
Vista Higher Learning offers courses are conducted exclusively online using our Supersite, Prime, Portales, and Portails language learning platforms. Activities such as student partner chats, authentic media, and online assessments all help smooth the transition to remote teaching.
Resources to guide the transition
Transition to Remote Teaching Webinar series
The Vista three part webinar series offers the educator’s perspective on ways to evaluate, rethink, and modify courses so that teachers can switch rapidly to a remote delivery model.
Led by Donna Marques and Kate Grovergrys, these sessions help plan for an uncertain time.
How-To Guides for Your Remote Classroom
How-To Videos for Your Remote Classroom
On-demand Training Webinars
Delivered when teachers need, these webinars help teachers take advantage of features from the Vistas digital language learning platforms. Teachers are led by experienced faculty and staff as they show how to get the most of vhlcentral.
Support Central
Search and connect to user guides and find answers to other questions about how to use the platform, technical requirements, and more.
Not sure where to start?
Language Magazine is a monthly print and online publication that provides cutting-edge information for language learners, educators, and professionals around the world.
LanguageMagazine 2023