Catalonia

San Sebastian Group

2010-01-19T20:18:00.003Z

The second group of gaelic teachers are preparing for a visit to San Sebastian to learn about the Basque Education system during the first week in February 2010. Follow them at the link above.

School visits

2009-11-05T17:01:00.002Z

Today we saw in action what we had been told about yesterday and on Tuesday,

We visited two primary schools and a secondary school in El Prat and were given the opportunity to speak with teachers and see classrooms. We saw how the Immersion Classrooms operate, where children from different countries who have come to live in Catalonia after pre-school age (3-5).

New students from outwth Catalonia are taken out of class only when the whole class are doing language work in Catalan to work with the immersion teacher, which is similar to EAL provision in Scotland. Active learning and learning in context is used, not only for school vocabulary, but also to develop everyday vocabulary.

One thing which was evident was the cooperation that exists between schools, between sectors and with the community. Teachers from other schools get together regularly to share materials and professional dialogue, and they also come up with inter-school and community projects. Members of the community who have something to contribute and are Catalan speakers are encouraged to come into schools and to run or become involved in projects.

Visual displays were evident but could have been more informative.

Adult Learners in Catalonia

2009-11-05T16:39:00.002Z

Alicia Company from the Consortium for Linguistic Normalisation spoke about how non-Catalan speakers who move into Catalonia are supported in order to learn the language and become immersed in the Culture.

They have a mentoring system, where a Catalan speaker is paired with a non-Catalan speaker in order to help the non-Catalan speaker learn the language. There are very strong links between institutions and newcomers in order to make them feel welcome.

The culture of new citizens is to be valued and recognised, and in turn the new citizens will embrace the culture and language of the receiving community and they become part of the community's identity.

They achieve this in a variety of ways. A book has been produced by the centre in El Prat called Simbols recognises the origins of the immigrant people and the diversity of cultures, but also shows the ability of all people of different cultures to come together. It promotes linguistic and cultural diversity and sees it as a positive factor. The book looks at the different symbols of the world and what they mean to individual cultures.

Every year, parents and members of the community come together to put on a theatre production for the children of El Prat. This is performed entirely in Catalan and it shows the collaboration between parents and children and the value they place in the Catalan language and community.

The vast majority of people living in Catalonian have the will to learn and communicate in Catalan. In order to live fully within the community, in terms of work and making friends, it is not just advisable to learn Catalan, but a necessity.

Making Leadership Attractive

2009-11-04T19:11:00.004Z

On the homepage under the "Interesting News " section there appears to be a pdf article (3rd bullet point) called "Make school leadership an attractive profession". Can someone in the group follow up to ascertain the approach/principles. What might we learn from this? Thoughts below in comments?

Catalan Education Portals

2009-11-03T20:53:00.002Z

http://www.xtec.cat/

An Education Portal for Catalan teachers which provides:

•Resources
•Lesson Plans
•Administration
•News
•Collaborative areas

110,000 teachers access this portal every day!

Minority Language?

2009-11-03T20:46:00.005Z

How do we define a minority language?

Catalan is spoken by 10.8 million in 4 countries and is considered a minority language.

Gaelic is spoken by 60,000 approx. in Scotland.

Though the number of Catalan speakers is so much higher than Scottish Gaelic speakers, it maintains its minority language status because it doesn't have a state.

Are they both minority languages to the same extent?

What is Plurilingualism?

2009-11-03T20:35:00.003Z

Today we learned about the notion of Plurilingualism. This is the belief, from the Catalan point of view, that people should be able to speak at least 3 or 4 languages. The model for this is the mother language and Castillian Spanish plus two other languages.

Could this ideology ever be embraced in Scotland?

How can we change attitudes towards languages in our society?

Where is El Prat de Llobregat?

2009-10-31T00:42:00.007Z

The group will visit El Prat de Llobergat, a town south of Barcelona. More information can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Prat_de_Llobregat

The town is south of Barcelona - 1.5km from Barcelona airport and 15minutes from the city centre of Barcelona. Some photos can also be found on http://maps.google.co.uk and http://www.panoramio.com

Easy Catalan

2009-10-30T23:26:00.004Z

For some simple words and phrases have a look at this website. It's looks like a good place to start learning Catalan. http://www.easycatalan.com/

A few words of Catalan

2009-10-30T22:56:00.008Z

For anyone interested in learning a few everyday words try Omniglot. Not sure however that " El meu aerolliscador està ple d'anguiles" will be of much use? ........My hovercraft is full of eels!

BBC has a few phrases with accompanying audio files.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/other/quickfix/catalan.shtml

Does anyone have any other sites they can recommend re Catalan for beginners?

La Castanyada

2009-10-30T22:02:00.003Z

Learn about the festival on November 1st and read about an American parent living in Catalonia with children attending a local school. Some interesting links as a starter for ten?

Tell us about you

2009-10-30T10:17:00.000Z

Where is your school on the map? What about a couple of introductory sentences about you and your school.... just to get started? By the time you arrive in Gerona you will know a lot more about each other!

On Our Way

2009-10-30T09:35:00.001Z

The group are meeting up for the first time on Monday 2 November 2009. The blog is to allow us to share our experiences, thoughts and views of the visit exploring Immersion Education in Catalonia. What will we learn which may inform good practice in Gaelic Education in Scotland?