Teaching and Training Resources

Bringing Language Online: A Virtual Training for Cherokee Nation

How to engage indigenous language learners in a virtual classroom and how to develop fun and engaging language learning materials for your community.

Cognitive Scientists ID Mechanism Central to Early Childhood Learning, Social Behavior

A study from Indiana University provides compelling evidence for a new and possibly dominant way for social partners to coordinate joint attention, key for parent-child communication and early language learning. These studies could also have major implications for the treatment of children with early social-communication impairment, such as autism, where joint caregiver-child attention with respect to objects and events is a key issue.

Early Childhood Educators Hold Key to Children’s Communication Skills

Researchers have completed a new examination of peer-reviewed science that reveals how early childhood educators can ignite the growth of language and communication skills in infants and toddlers. Their conclusion: it takes more than baby talk.

Early Learning and the Developing Brain – Dr. Patricia K. Kuhl (Video)

A YouTube video describing education within childhood and the development of the brain. The video is titled: ECE Water Cooler Conference 2016 “Early Learning and the Developing Brain” Dr. Patricia K. Kuhl

Family Language Plan

This document contains approximately 1,100 vocabulary words. This word count does not include the phrase lists. With around 1,000 words in most languages, you’ll be able to ask people how they’re doing, tell them about your day and navigate everyday life situations like shopping and public transit. This means that once a learner successfully acquires the words in this document utilizing various activities and methods, they will enter conversational language proficiency.

First Nations Language Curriculum

This document was developed at the request of the First Nations Education
Steering Committee (FNESC). Recognizing the diversity and wealth of First Nations
languages and cultures in British Columbia (BC) and their critically endangered
state, this paper is intended to assist First Nations language teachers, members of
First Nations language communities, educational staff in First Nations and public
schools, and policy makers as they consider First Nations language and culture
frameworks at the K – 12 level, as informed by existing and emerging research and
approaches. In addition, it is also meant to serve as a guide for designing language
and culture K – 12 curriculum that will provide practical tools for First Nations
language groups, curriculum developers and teachers.

Indigenous Speakers Share their Languages on Google Earth

Of the 7,000 languages spoken around the globe, 2,680 Indigenous languages—more than one third of the world’s languages—are in danger of disappearing. The United Nations declared 2019 the International Year of Indigenous Languages to raise awareness about these languages and their contribution to global diversity. To help preserve them, our new Google Earth tour, Celebrating Indigenous Languages, shares audio recordings from more than 50 Indigenous language speakers.

Interactive Music Classes Improve Babies’ Social Development, Communication

Past research has found that infants even as young as a few months old respond positively to music. A new study has discovered that interactive musical training can improve communication and social development as well as increase certain brain responses.

More Than Recess: How Playing On the Swings Helps Kids Learn to Cooperate

The measured, synchronous movement of children on the swings can encourage preschoolers to cooperate on subsequent activities, researchers have found.

Self-esteem and Cultural Identity in Aboriginal Language Immersion Kindergarteners

In gauging the success of Aboriginal language immersion education, the focus is often placed on measuring language acquisition and academic achievement. Although useful, these metrics only tell part of the story; to achieve real school success, it is also vital to develop high personal self-esteem that results in a positive concept of oneself as a learner, and high collective self-esteem, or attitude toward one’s heritage, family, community, and school. This article describes the impact of Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe) immersion education on the personal and collective self-esteem of kindergarteners, and discusses their concept of ethno-cultural identity, as compared to previously studied cohorts of Inuit learners in immersion and mainstream language schools. The results give important insights into not only the self-esteem of children in this immersion school as part of a measure of its overall success, but also the school experiences of Aboriginal children in different cultural, geographic, and educational contexts.

Smithsonian’s Recovering Voices Initiative

The Smithsonian’s recovering voices initiative promotes the documentation and revitalization of the world’s endangered languages and the knowledge preserved in them.

Speech and the Brain

This article reviews the two areas of the brain that process language for speech and comprehension. It will provide a deeper understanding of the sophisticated elements and processes of language learning.

The Association Between Lifelong Greenspace Exposure and 3-Dimensional Brain Magnetic Resonance Imaging in Barcelona Schoolchildren

Journal article that describes how lifelong exposure to greenness was positively associated with gray matter volume in the left and right prefrontal cortex and in the left premotor cortex and with white matter volume in the right prefrontal region, in the left premotor region, and in both cerebellar hemispheres. Some of these regions partly overlapped with regions associated with cognitive test scores (prefrontal cortex and cerebellar and premotor white matter), and peak volumes in these regions predicted better working memory and reduced inattentiveness.

The Goldilocks Effect: Babies Choose ‘Just Right’ Experiences

A scholarly article from the University of Rochester discussing how infants ignore information that is too simple or too complex, focusing instead on situations that are “just right,” according to a new study. Dubbed the “Goldilocks effect” by the people that discovered it, the attention pattern sheds light on how babies learn to make sense of a world full of complex sights, sounds, and movements.

The Neuroscience of Joyful Education: Brain research tells us that when the fun stops, learning often stops too.

The Science Behind Music: Why Music Should Be Integrated Into Early Education

They explained that when children learn to play music, their brains begin to develop “neurophysiological distinction” between certain sounds which help improve literacy skills. These newly developed skills lead to an increase in academic achievement.

Thriving Through Nature – Fostering Children’s Executive Function Skills

Thriving Through Nature describes why the development of executive function skills is important and how experiences in nature can play a critical and positive role in this process.

Young Children Develop Foundational Skills Through Child-initiated Experiences in a Nature Explore Classroom

Walsh and Gardner (2005) identified six “Key features of experiential learning” (see Table 1) that must be present in order for young children to gain full advantage of hands-on learning. Current literature suggests that children need to engage in experiences of their own initiation (Elkind, 2007; Greenman, 1988; Jones & Cooper, 2006). Children need the freedom to explore, to direct their own play under the watchful eye of knowing adults (Almon & Miller, 2009; Copple & Bredekamp, 2009).