UNESCO Position Paper

1

• UNESCO Position Paper
• Education
• in a multilingual world
• India Workshop on Multilingual Education with
  Special Focus on Tribal Education
• October 25, 2005
• CIIL, Mysore

2
Introduction Living in a World Where...

• All children have access to quality primary
  education
• 50 percentage increase in literacy
• by 2015

3
Introduction Language Dynamics

• Political transformations and new language
  policies
• Disappearance of hundreds of languages
• Mass migratory movements
• Internet
• Globalization

4
Challenges for education systems

• Linguistic diversity and multilingualism
• 6-7000 Languages in the world today
• Wide Range Iceland 1, Papua New Guinea 800
• 70 of world languages found in 20 nation states
• Yet, bilingualism and multilingualism are the
  norm rather than the exception
• From traditional diversity to diversity brought
  about by migration
• Need to understand impact of school versus home
  languages on children

5
Challenges for education systems

• Minority and majority languages
• National borders/contexts define majority
  languages
• e.g. Mandarin is majority language in China,
  minority language elsewhere
• Minority is ambiguous and context dependent
• Social, political as well as numerical dimensions

6
Challenges for education systems

• Official languages
• Most countries have only one official language
• Official languages used for legal/government
• Yet, most are still multilingual
• National languages
• Some countries recognize national languages
• Symbolic Status and visibility
• Conceptual Shared values and worldview

7
Challenges for education systems

• Languages of Instruction Teaching the basic
  curriculum of the educational system
• Choice of language or languages of instruction
• Usually, pressures to use only one (more later)
• Mother tongue speakers can be at a disadvantage
  similar to foreign language learners

8
Challenges for education systems

• Mother Tongue Instruction How to Define?
• Language one has learned first?
• The language one knows best or uses most?
• Spoken variation or more formal school version?

9
Challenges for education systems

• Challenges to Students
• To learn both a new language and the knowledge
  that it contains
• Extra difficulties for Illiterates, Minorities,
  Refugees
• Gender Women more likely to be monolingual

10
Challenges for education systems

• Mother Tongue Instruction Challenges to
  Educators
• Unwritten language
• Unrecognized as a legitimate language
• Lack of appropriate educational terminology
• Lack of educational materials
• Multiplicity of languages in school
• Lack of trained teachers
• Resistance by students, parents, teachers

11
Challenges for education systems

• Linguistic rights
• Claims for languages often coincide with
  political change
• International Agreements state
• Schooling in their languages, if so desired
• Access to the language of the larger community
  and to that of national education systems
• Promotion of positive attitudes with regard to
  minority languages
• Access to international languages.

12
Challenges for education systems

• Language teaching
• Language as a specific part of curriculum
• Access to new value systems, world views
• Bilingual and multilingual education
• Culturally and linguistically distinct
  communities can only be addressed by multilingual
  education
• Additive approach to multilingual education is
  key Dont teach another language as a
  replacement (subtractive approach)

13
Normative framework

• United Nations standard-setting instruments
• UNESCO Declaration and Convention
• Outcomes from international conferences

14
UNESCO guidelines

• Principle I

UNESCO supports mother tongue instruction as a
means of improving educational quality by
building upon the knowledge and experience of the
learners and teachers.
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UNESCO guidelines

• Principle II

UNESCO supports bilingual and/or multilingual
education at all levels of education as a means
of promoting both social and gender equality and
as a key element of linguistically diverse
societies.
16
UNESCO guidelines

• Principle III

UNESCO supports language as an essential
component of inter-cultural education in order to
encourage understanding between different
population groups and ensure respect for
fundamental rights.
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Conclusions

• A careful balance needs to be made between local
  languages and access to global languages
• There is a need for a clear statement for
  language policy in relation to education,
  particularly within the context of Education for
  All