FOHLC Europe Blog

When the Global Call to Action for Heritage Language Education  was launched in February 2024, it laid a comprehensive roadmap for protecting and promoting linguistic diversity. But maybe you were left wondering:  What can I personally do to help? Now, we’ve made it easier than ever to take action with a handy checklist. This simple guide breaks down some practical steps you can take to support heritage language education in your community. What you can do will depend on your role -- heritage language learner, parent, teacher, journalist, policymaker, etc. -- but we've got everyone covered! Download the checklist below and start making an impact today! Download a pdf By HLE Network

An interview with Drs Indu Vibha Meddegama and Maja Skender-Lizatovic, founders of the Community Language School at York St John University in England By Aga Pędrak When thinking about community-based heritage language schools (supplementary or complementary schools), what we usually imagine is a school that operates outside the mainstream school hours, for example during the weekends or afternoons, and provides mother tongue classes to young migrant generations. In addition to heritage language classes, complementary schools often offer cultural events, extra-curricular classes, seasonal celebrations, history, and geography lessons, and sometimes they also introduce religious education – all of these through the means of the heritage language. According to the National Resource Centre for Supplementary Education ( NRCSE ), there are approximately 3,000-5,000 supplementary schools operating in England. As they exist outside the formal educational system, these schools usually work tigh...

By Jim Anderso n,  Goldsmiths University of London, with schools and universities across the world Community based heritage language schools often experience difficulty in engaging students in studying the HL, especially once they go beyond primary age. There may be a feeling that the language does not connect with their lived experience or with real world issues. The link to culture may feel artificial and unchanging. There may be little opportunity for students to invest themselves emotionally in their learning or to feel the excitement of genuine meaning-making.   Addressing the needs of HL learners The international Critical Connections project, launched in 2012, seeks to address the above issue by involving young people in creating short bi/multi-lingual digital stories around issues which matter to them such as the environment.  It is innovative in bringing together learners of heritage as well as foreign languages in community based as well as mainstream sett...

By HLE Network  This is a re-posting of an interview published on HLE Network's website on February 3, 2023 An interview with  Dr. Miglena Hristozova, deputy chairwoman of the  Initiative für Mehrsprachigkeit und interkulturelle Bildung  (IMIB) in Freiburg, Germany. Her organization recently received the Freiburg Integration Award 2022 for their pioneer work in the field of multilingualism.

By Sabine Little and Aga Pedrak FOHLC Europe , or Forum of Heritage Language Coalitions in Europe, is an exciting new collaboration between several organizations involved with heritage language education in Europe. With the FOHLC Europe steering group being geographically dispersed, it is not often that we get a chance to meet face to face, so it was a rare pleasure when Aga Pedrak from Ireland and Sabine Little from England got a chance to meet up at Nottingham Trent University’s roundtable on “Engaging with Language and Heritage” in March 2023 . The one-day conference was organised as part of the university’s Knowledge Exchange programme, an opportunity to bridge the gap between academia and other organisations, to learn from each other, and to create knowledge together. The event included attendees from museums and libraries, NGOs, storytellers, and, of course, academics.  The concept of language and heritage was, unsurprisingly, interpreted in many different ways. Intangible cu...