AUGUST 2010

An in-service training course for teachers of Estonian as a second language will commence on 14 September as part of the “Language Studies Development 2007–2010” programme. The course is designed for teachers of Estonian as a second language from general education and vocational education schools. 160 teachers have already completed the course. The group of teachers beginning the course in September will be the fifth to undergo training within the framework of the programme.

 

The course consists of four training modules. The first module takes place from 14–16 September just outside of Tartu. The following three modules will be held from October to December this year.

 

The aim of the course is to introduce the changes arising from the European language learning framework document to the teachers. Attending the course will give teachers of Estonian as a second language the chance to enrich their teaching strategies with active teaching methods and to find out more about best practice in the teaching of Estonian as a second language and in integrated language and subject teaching. A key topic is the creation of the language environment in classes. Also under discussion will be options for integrating Estonian and other subject studies during lessons; and the role of teachers of Estonian and the support the provide to other teachers in the planning and implementation of Estonian-language subject studies and in motivating students. The teachers will be trained by recognised language experts and teachers, including Maie Soll, Leelo Kingisepp, Piret Kärtner, Hiie Asser, Mare Kitsnik and Tõnu Tender.

 

The courses and materials used are free of charge for participants. Attendees are also provided with free accommodation, catering and transport to and from the training centre. The in-service training is being organised by the Our People Integration and Migration Foundation (MISA) and financed by the Ministry of Education and Research and the European Social Fund.

 

Thos interested in attending the course should contact Multicultural Education Unit coordinator Maarja Mänd by e-mailing maarja.mand@meis.ee. Registration is open until 6 September 2010 or until the maximum number of attendees is reached.

 

For further information please contact: Maarja Mänd, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9853 / E-mail: maarja.mand@meis.ee

 

A training course for teachers from upper secondary schools with Russian as the language of instruction entitled “In-service training on ILSL methodology: Learning strategies” is due to begin in September.

 

The volume of the course is 78 hours (3 CPs). The course is designed to provide the participants with the knowledge of integrated subject and language studies methodology and Estonian language skills they need for their professional work.

 

The following topics will be covered as part of the course:

and others.

 

There will also be a focus on updating the participants’ skills in Estonian, developing their competence in vocabulary, their writing skills and their skills in self-expression.

 

Those wishing to register for the course can do so by e-mailing e-mail address tartu@ami.ee.

 

For further information please contact: Maarja Mänd, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9853 / E-mail: maarja.mand@meis.ee

 

More than thirty police officers, rescue workers, librarians, medical staff and education workers from Ida-Viru County spent three weeks in Pärnu in June and July working with colleagues their to polish their skills in Estonian. A further two groups – this time of public servants from the county – will be following their example in autumn.

 

The workplace exchange programme led by the Integration and Migration Foundation (MISA) fulfils a number of objectives: it empowers people to practise and communicate in Estonian in their professional environment and share their experience with their colleagues, thus encouraging the promotion, understanding and acceptance of different cultures, customs and backgrounds.

 

MISA’s partner in organising the workplace exchanges in 2010 is Sola Integra OÜ. As part of the programme, the participants have been sent on 21-day exchanges to work with colleagues in Pärnu and have also been given the opportunity to attend 60 hours of Estonian language classes, both before and during the exchanges. The participants then later themselves host colleagues from Estonian living and working environments.

 

MISA has been organising workplace exchanges as part of the “Language Studies Development 2007-2010” programme with the support of the European Social Fund since 2008. By the end of 2010 a total of around 170 people will have developed their language skills as part of the programme.

 

For further information please contact: Tea Kotkas, Coordinator, Lifelong Learning Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9061 / E-mail: tea.kotkas@meis.ee

 

The company which is to receive support for “Raising awareness of the Equal Treatment Act”, Part 3 of the “One Media” project competition, was announced at the end of June: OÜ Alfa-Omega Communications.

 

The aim of the activities to which support is allocated is to raise awareness among members and workers of civic associations and among directors and personnel specialists in companies of human rights and the Equal Treatment Act.

 

As part of the project, the associations and companies will be sent circulating letters, informative materials will be produced and a multicultural organisation competition and themed conference will be organised. The project will run until June 2011.

 

The project is being financed by the European Fund for the Integration of Third-Country Nationals and from the budgetary resources of the Ministry of Culture.

 

For further information please contact: Kati Tamm, Coordinator, Civic Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9027 / E-mail: kati.tamm@meis.ee

 

 

 

The companies which are to receive support for “Promoting civic activity and integration in the media”, Part 1 of the “One Media” project competition, were announced in July. These companies will produce television and radio programmes and update news portals. A total of 3.8 millions kroons was allocated in support of these activities.

 

Three projects were supported in the television category: all of the programmes will be broadcast on ETV2, with one series of programmes also broadcast on ETV1. A 16-part series to be shown in autumn 2011 is to be produced as part of Osakond OÜ’s “Tralli-Valli” project. In the series, 10 Estonian residents from different backgrounds will showcase a part of Estonia the way they see it. The Estonian National Broadcasting project “Kolmnurk” /Triangle/ will comprise 36 weekly discussion programmes to be broadcast between September 2010 and May 2011. The non-profit organisation Filmiklubi MP DOC will be producing a 16-episode series as part of the “Köök – rahvaste paabel” /The kitchen – the Babylon of nations/ project in which series host and editor Priit Kuusk will work in various Tallinn restaurants promoting the temperament, philosophy of preparation and team behind a wide range of national cuisines. This series will be broadcast in autumn 2011 on both ETV1 and ETV2.

 

In the radio category, the Estonian National Broadcasting project “Ühiskondlik leping” /Social Pact/ received support. 12 discussion programmes will be broadcast on Raadio 4 from October 2010 to April 2011.

 

The news portals supported were the Estonian National Broadcasting project “Launch of the kodanik.err.ee portal” and the non-profit organisation PX Band project “PLUG in KesKus!”. The latter will see the Estonian-language cultural newspaper KesKus community and Russian-language cultural magazine PLUG community brought together on Facebook, with articles translated into both languages and pop-up campaigns being organised.

 

The projects are being financed by the European Fund for the Integration of Third-Country Nationals and from the budgetary resources of the Ministry of Culture.

 

For further information please contact: Kati Tamm, Coordinator, Civic Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9027 / E-mail: kati.tamm@meis.ee

The next summer school being organised by the Parents Association of the Language Immersion Programme is to be held from 6–8 August 2010. Before the start of the next academic year the parents will be discussing how to communicate with their children even more effectively, working together to debate the role and tasks of parents in the language immersion programme and drafting the association’s working plan for the forthcoming period.

 

The basis for the drafting of the working plan is the programme’s strategic plan for 2009–2013 and the internal evaluation criteria of institutions that have joined the programme. There will also be time for the parents to become better acquainted with Saaremaa and enjoy time with their children.

 

For further information please contact: Svetlana Belova, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9848 / E-mail: svetlana.belova@meis.ee

A reading conference entitled “Linguistic skills area in learning” is to be held in Finland on 11 & 12 August 2010. At the conference, Estonian nursery school workers and representatives of the Integration and Migration Foundation, which is responsible for the language immersion programme in the country, will be showcasing the experiences of the nation’s nursery schools in implementing the programme.

 

Giving presentations at the conference will be programme trainers and nursery school workers Hedi Minlibajeva and Nonna Meltsas and MISA coordinator Svetlana Belova.

 

For further information please contact: Svetlana Belova, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9848 / E-mail: svetlana.belova@meis.ee

 

 

On 12 & 13 August 2010, advisers from Lääne-Viru County who are supporting teachers in the transition to Estonian-language teaching and its implementation in nursery schools and schools will be coming together with colleagues at the Pariisi Holiday Village. The summer school will focus on topics related to the new curriculum (with presentations by Irene Käosaar and Maie Soll from the Ministry of Education and Research) and the advisory experiences of Finnish colleagues (with a presentation by Tiiu-Kai Kotka from the Espoo School Board).

 

The activities of the advisory centres in the Kohtla-Järve, Narva, Tallinn and Tartu regions in the coming academic year will also be discussed.

 

For further information please contact: Karin Piirsalu, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9854 / E-mail: karin.piirsalu@meis.ee

 

 

 

Around 50 language immersion teachers will be attending the first session of the “Seven days of cooperative immersion” training course at Nelijärve from 16–18 August. Alongside the principles of the programme, the course will also examine teamwork, the stages of group work, newspapers as teaching materials, tableaux as a form of drama, outdoor learning and work in activity centres, preparation of teaching materials and study maps. Existing language immersion materials will also be showcased.

 

With the support of methods of work based on learning from experience, the participants should obtain the ideas, skills and knowledge they need in order to cope with Estonian-language teaching in different subjects and at different levels of school.

 

The trainers will be Maire Kebbinau, Anne Kloren, Liina Norit, Anu Parts and Anna Sele. The following session will take place in two separate groups in Narva and Tallinn in November.

 

For further information please contact: Maire Kebbinau, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: 659 9847 / E-mail: maire.kebbinau@meis.ee

 

 

 

School directors, directors of studies, language immersion coordinators and teachers just starting out in the programme or who have not previously attended language immersion training will be taking part in the first part of the two-session “Language immersion ABC” course on 24 & 25 August 2010.

 

The second session of the course will be held in late October.

 

For further information please contact: Maire Kebbinau, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: 659 9847 / E-mail: maire.kebbinau@meis.ee

 

 

 

Language immersion teachers from nursery schools will be attending the 2^nd session of the basic training course for the programme in Toila from 22–24 August. The topics studied will be connected to children’s development and the assessment of this and the implementation of language immersion working methods at the start of the academic year. A number of individual subjects will also be examined in greater depth.

 

The trainers on the course will be Ene Kurme, Angelika Lall, Nonna Meltsas and Hedi Minlibajeva.

 

For further information please contact: Svetlana Belova, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9848 / E-mail: svetlana.belova@meis.ee

 

 

 

Educational institutions have until 1 January 2011 to submit their initial internal assessment report to the Ministry of Education and Research. The report is required to gain a better understanding of the conditions, institutional management decisions and future activities that are important to children’s development.

 

Nursery schools and schools that have joined the programme have already arrived at their ‘language immersion panorama’ in previous reports, mostly as random tangents – hence the need to provide them with comprehensive and systematic support material.

 

In its development strategy, the language immersion programme emphasises quality as a key word, to which internal assessment recommendations help to give meaning. The recommendations and experiences shared at the internal assessment workshops at last year’s language immersion conference (entitled “Advice and assessment – the roads signs for the quality of the language immersion programme”) have formed an effective basis for the development of assessment criteria in the implementation of the language immersion programme.

 

The working group led by Kehra Upper Secondary School director Urve Rannaääre has worded the recommendations, based on the general framework of internal assessment, for the description of key areas and fields in the language immersion panorama.

 

The working group was very productive in generating ideas, as the immersion internal assessment advisers (Mare Lihtsa and Nonna Meltsas) and internal assessment experts (Marika Pettai and Kadri Peterson) highlighted issues based on experience to date and kept the group on track. Their aim was to produce a sample description of the criteria which a) would not make an educational institution’s evaluation system significantly more involved or time-consuming; b) would be clearly worded; c) would fit in with the existing internal assessment procedure; and d) would include the key factors in the implementation of language immersion.

 

In discussions with target groups (teachers and directors from nursery schools and schools) we came to the realisation that in introducing the language immersion panorama we will gain a better view of the programme as a part of a whole, understand the role it plays in the overall development of an institution and grasp the true meaning of the principle of cooperation and reciprocal enrichment.

 

From the descriptions of the assessment criteria of the five key areas – leadership and management; personnel management; working with interest groups; resource management; and the teaching and shaping process – we can move on in the development of the programme’s quality system to the drafting of a recognition procedure.

 

Following the discussions at the August summer school of the Parents Association of the Language Immersion Programme, final recommendations will be issued to the educational institutions and local governments who join the programme at the start of the new academic year for approval.

 

During the workshops at the 2010 language immersion conference we will be presenting recommendations taking into account the feedback we have already received and discussing how following these recommendations is affected by the differences arising from the length of language immersion experience of institutions, local government priorities and needs, opportunities and so on. This will form one of the bases for our future activities – drawing up auxiliary materials which will make it easier for institutions which have joined the programme in carrying out internal assessment. Both the internal assessment process and the development of the language immersion panorama as part of it are ongoing processes.

 

For further information please contact: Karin Piirsalu, Coordinator, Multicultural Education Unit / Telephone: +372 659 9854 / E-mail: karin.piirsalu@meis.ee