Submitted by: Adele de Biasi Pelz

The World Language Department devoted this meeting to discussing the abstract entitled: Diversity and Inclusion in World Language Instruction by Sheri Dion. The article talked about four main topics :

-Cultural Diversity
-Student Diversity in Assessment
-Student Interest
-Teacher experience

Our conversation focused on the area of integrating Critical Cultural Awareness (CCA) into our curriculum with the goal of preparing our students for intercultural relationships with greater diversity.

The role and inclusion of both student and teachers’ identities, monolingual classrooms, and multilingual students were also discussed and used to highlight the importance of personal experience and student diversity and interests, which are considered resources in teaching WL and empower students to reflect on their impact in a global world.

As a department, we navigated  beyond our cultural projects towards creating an environment of balance through culture and content which provides a safer space for our language learners.

We came away with enrichment activities to bring to the fore our students’ personal history and narrative by conducting interviews, making oral presentations and writing personal reflections.

El Dia de los Muertos celebration at the LS was discussed and we talked about putting together an interconnected cultural event in the Spring through a festival of languages throughout the dvisions.