As it celebrates its 45th year in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, MOSAIC CEO Olga Stachova says the organization’s focus has remained the same: to offer people the tools they need to succeed and to champion the skills they bring with them.
Source: MOSAIC marks 45 years of service helping new arrivals adjust to life in B.C. | CBC News
While the federal government’s new three-year plan to increase immigration levels is admirable, it needs to be accompanied by increased federal supports to ensure that newcomers succeed upon arrival in Canada. Ottawa’s immigration plan, which was reaffirmed in its most recent fiscal update, plans to recover from the downturn in 2020 by targeting 401,000 new […]
Source: Immigrants need more support to succeed in Canada – iPolitics
The power of storytelling can facilitate dialogue and community building
An online storytelling project is capturing portraits and personal stories of immigrants and refugees to provide a better understanding of what it’s like to settle in Canada.
Nothing comes easy, put your mind on what you want to do, and work toward achieving your goal, follow your dreams.
Source: With Hard Work And Determination, Everything Is Possible – Migrant Stories
Marina Iyeme-Eteng had no idea what to expect when she landed in Saskatoon — but almost five years on she’s used that uncertainty to her advantage, creating a YouTube channel about the city that has amassed than 250,000 views.
Source: YouTube channel offers an immigrant’s guide to life in Saskatoon | CBC News
The Centre for Education for Racial Equality (CERES) at the University of Edinburgh, The Bell Foundation and Unbound Philanthropy have today published an executive summary of the report ‘English as an Additional Language and Initial Teacher Education’¹. This research was undertaken to develop an understanding of how, and to what extent, English as an Additional … Continued
SASKATOON – Three University of Saskatchewan (USask) researchers have been awarded federal funding to examine how artificial intelligence (AI) will transform higher education, how one major event . . .
This article explains that newcomers to Canada have been struggling with interrupted English language education since the start of the pandemic. Families are concerned that language learners may have lost some of their English skills during isolation, as well as opportunities to meet new people and make friends in new communities.
The author explains that immigrants and refugees who come from countries where there is no online education are feeling disadvantaged in Canada, as classrooms switched to computer mediated language teaching in March. Newcomer families are choosing to send children back to the traditional school system this month (September 2020), so kids can avoid falling behind their Canadian classmates.
I think it’s fair to say that everyone (teachers and students) are feeling degrees of disadvantage as virtual classrooms appeared overnight. I would like to offer a new phrase – computer gymnastics – to describe the high velocity shift to unfamiliar teaching methods, translation of previously physical lesson plans into synchronous and asynchronous lessons, and attempts to explain new software platforms to language learners, while on the platform. It seems comparable to learning to ride a bike while you are reading the book about how to ride a bike.
Interesting, exciting, nerve-wracking… we are going to hear amazing stories about language education in the coming months!
The new tool guides written and digital content about COVID-19 and our lives during the pandemic.
Source: New language guide helps to destigmatize COVID-19
I was surprised by this guide. The press and guide title made me think it would be language used around COVID exclusively, but it is (quietly) an exhaustive 38 page list of words that should not be said or written. Wow!
This concept of overt (within a community) language reconstruction was new to me in 2018 when I attended Urban Ethnographic Language School in Vancouver’s DTES. During the summer, my word choices were frequently corrected by mentors and community members, each time with an explanation why it was better to say it a different way. This became such a recurring theme, that it shaped the ethnography I produced, and the way I think and speak about urban centre street involvement.
The BCCDC Language guide reflects the language shaping practices I witnessed in the DTES. The list is missing a few new terms I learned in 2018 which makes me wonder if they have changed again. Further, the guide lacks an explanation of who made these language use decisions, how the words were selected, and why. All together, this is an excellent read, and a great jump-off point to a sociolinguistic research project.
karinwiebe 