Blog posts about Education

Father Builds Inuit Video Game

by Richard Kazandjian January 29, 2012 Education

When it comes to protecting threatened languages, technology can be a double-edged sword. It can serve to discourage young people from speaking the language of their parents and grandparents, or it can provide tools to help them learn it and space for them to practice it. Here’s one especially sweet example of how technology can [...]

0 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Texting in Endangered Languages

Texting in Endangered Languages

by Richard Kazandjian January 18, 2012 Education

If you’re trying to preserve an endangered language, technology can be both your best friend and your worst enemy. More and more frequently, however, technology has become an ally in the quest to keep indigenous languages alive. Apps and computer programs have been developed to bring these previously left-behind languages into the digital age. That [...]

1 comment Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Speaking Dothraki

Speaking Dothraki

by Richard Kazandjian December 16, 2011 Education

Now  more than ever, it seems like constructed languages have really taken off. Tolkein got the ball rolling with his elvish languages, Sindarin and Quenya, and Klingon has been showing up in some of the strangest places imaginable. Now, the success of HBO’s “Game of Thrones” series has fans trying to pick up another fantasy [...]

0 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for A Bounty on Engrish

A Bounty on Engrish

by Richard Kazandjian December 7, 2011 Education

Visitors to South Korea, take note. The Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) has set a bounty on the awkward, low-quality translations known as “Engrish.” These malapropisms are a prime source of amusement for tourists abroad in Asian countries (see The Top 10 Asian English Translation Failures for examples), but locals are generally somewhat embarrassed by their [...]

0 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Ojibwe Language Into Modern Day

Ojibwe Language Into Modern Day

by Richard Kazandjian December 2, 2011 Education

The Ojibwe language is the fourth most common Native American language spoken in North America, with a total of approximately 56.531 speakers in the US and Canada. Even so, like most native languages, it is in some danger of dying out as most of the speakers are elderly. However, steps are being taken to preserve [...]

0 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Brain of a Bilingual Baby‎

Brain of a Bilingual Baby‎

by Richard Kazandjian September 8, 2011 Education

New parents are bombarded by well-meaning advice about how their parenting techniques could affect their child’s developing brain. A lot of this advice is exaggerated, like the potential benefits of showing your tots “Baby Einstein” videos. However, there’s a scientific consensus that infancy and early childhood is the best time to become bilingual, and that [...]

0 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Cuts Threaten Italian Academy‎

Cuts Threaten Italian Academy‎

by Richard Kazandjian August 26, 2011 Education

Across the globe, government services are being slashed in the name of austerity. In many countries, language services are not exempt from the chopping block– and in Italy, the damage may go so far as to include the Italian language academy itself, the Accademia della Crusca. The academy was established in either 1582 or 1583. [...]

0 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Chinese Opera Program

Chinese Opera Program

by Richard Kazandjian August 25, 2011 Education

Music may be the “universal language,” but that didn’t make learning to sing opera in Chinese any easier for the 20 American singers who joined China’s “I Sing Beijing” program this summer. The Associated Press chronicled the vocalists’ struggles in a recent article. You probably remember learning to sing “Frère Jacques” and “Feliz Navidad” in [...]

1 comment Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for How Far Would You Go?‎

How Far Would You Go?‎

by Richard Kazandjian August 16, 2011 Education

As babies grow up and develop language skills, they lose the ability to hear and produce sounds that aren’t used in their native language. This typically happens between 8 and 10 months, and it’s one of the things that makes it so difficult to learn a new language as an adult. However, with practice, most [...]

2 comments Read the full article →
Thumbnail image for Teaching Deaf Children

Teaching Deaf Children

by Tanguy August 1, 2011 Education

There is a long-standing debate in the deaf community over the best way to educate deaf children. Should they be taught with other deaf children, in classes that emphasize sign language? Or should they be “main-streamed” into classrooms with hearing children, taught spoken language as much as possible and encouraged to take advantage of new [...]

2 comments Read the full article →

← Previous Entries