Considers implications of widespread and growing multilingualism (including English as second language) among students in Great Britain and the rest of the world. Schools can build on the strengths of those students' linguistic diversity and should offer a range of language experiences and languages for all students. (CB)

First-year students of French at the University of Wisconsin at Madison had 50-minute classes five days a week, meeting in large groups with a professor twice a week, and in small groups with teaching assistants three times a week. The team-taught model helped reduce problems experienced in teaching load and class size. (CB)

A research sample of 56 college and universities provides nationally representative descriptive data on the linguistic theory and applied linguistics content in the curriculum of graduate programs in bilingual education in the United States. Suggests directions for change in such curricula. (Author/LMO)

Errors in the spoken French of immersion students, reflecting a fossilized interlanguage and language transfer, are attributed to an erroneous assumption underlying immersion instruction: that students acquire the second language in the same way they acquire their native language. An improved syllabus aimed at second-language learners is…

A study of the attitudes and assimilation orientation of primary school teachers in New South Wales prior to publication of new state multicultural education policy addressed attitudes about maintaining ethnic identity and language, school involvement in teaching ethnic languages and multicultural curricula, and teacher characteristics of…

Presents results of a questionnaire, completed by elementary and secondary principals and teachers, concerning foreign language instruction, including information on background demographics, amount of instruction, offerings, curriculum, teacher qualifications and training, and major instructional problems in both public and private schools.…

Discusses the abundance of electronic equipment available for use in second-language instruction in contrast to the shortage of courseware available. The lack of courseware is attributed to teacher resistance to and fear of technology and the lack of institutional support for teachers to design courseware. (LMO)

Academic alliances among educators who share ideas about teaching are flourishing in almost every state. First started in foreign languages, they are now being set up in other disciplines, primarily English, geography, history, mathematics, and science. (MSE)

The English-as-a-second-language teacher's role is explored, with five specific areas of responsibility elaborated: (1) providing comprehensible input; (2) preparing learners to cope with nonclassroom language; (3) providing references and resource materials; (4) providing focused instruction in particular areas of language; and (5) providing…

English-as-a-second-language programs must have as their central intent the enabling of people to make meaning in English. Dimensions of context and vision and the tensions which may exist between them are explored, and an effort is made to point the way to curriculum as human praxis. (Author/CB)

A midwestern college's foreign language program restructured some of its courses to address students' interests in learning to read a foreign language for graduate school or other purposes. The description of a class in theological German illustrates the varied cultural, professional, and personal reasons students may have for choosing such…

Provides information about the curriculum characteristics of first- and third-year high school Spanish textbooks and determines what differences exist among the texts involved. Study results indicate that these textbooks are consistently "deficient" on nearly all of the dimensions examined. (Author/SED)

Describes an integrated series of computer-assisted reading (CAR) materials under development at the University of East Anglia in Norwich. The discussion indicates some of the problems in teaching reading with computers, describes the framework of the CAR project, and gives specific examples of activities. (SED)

Discusses an interactive video project designed to facilitate the teaching of culture and language in an integrated manner and describes the project's hardware, authoring system, the types of visual reference materials used, the organization of the phases which make up each of its units, and what it teaches. (Author/SED)

Discusses the evaluation of "survival texts" for immigrants in terms of the accuracy of the texts' portrayal of immigrants' reality and the extent to which they shape reality. Examples show that frequently the materials' content and communicative structure do not reflect authentic interaction and that they emphasize subservient social roles. (SED)