Republicans Introduce Bill to Replace Foreign Language with Coding in Virginia Public Schools
Glenn R. Davis, R-Virginia Beach of the Virginia House of Delegates has introduced a bill that could essentially eliminate foreign language classes in favor of coding classes in Virginia. Virginia, which in 2013 had...
Messaging App for Language Learners
“Tandem” is a relatively new language-learning app where language learners can chat with each other in order to improve their language skills. Users can have conversations with native speakers of languages including Spanish, Russian,...
Babies Retain Birth Language
A new study has found that languages learned very early in life are subconsciously retained even when there is no conscious memory of the early experience remaining. The study, conducted by Radboud University, Western...
Washington Study Sheds Light on ELL Advanced Course Enrollment
Education Northwest along with the Institute of Education Sciences and Regional Educational Laboratory at Education Northwest analyzed the patterns of advanced coursework among Spanish-speaking students, other language minority students whose primary/home language is a...
New Study Finds Virtual Schools Underperforming
School performance measures for both virtual and blended schools indicate that they are not as successful as traditional public schools, according to NEPC’s Sixth Annual Report on Virtual Education, Full-Time Virtual and Blended Schools: Enrollment,...
Google Translate Launches Real-Time Language Transcription Functionality
Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced on his Twitter handle that the Google Translate app on Android is rolling out new feature called Transcribe that can live translate speech into another language in real time....
Apple’s Siri Learns Shanghainese in Ongoing Race to Dominate Voice-Assist
Last week we saw the release of Google Assistant, an electronic assistant that follows commands on mobile phones. While these tech super-giants are...
Coding Bills Threaten Language Requirement
The U.S. House and Senate have both introduced bills that encourage the replacement of math, science, and foreign language courses with computer coding in high schools.
In June, U.S. senators Bill Cassidy, MD (R-Louisiana), and...
Encouraging Spanish/Portuguese Collaboration
During last month’s Second International Conference on Portuguese and Spanish Languages (CILPE) in the Brazilian capital, Brasilia, leading Ibero-American language experts came together to create an action plan to strengthen Spanish and Portuguese in...
Study Links Toddler’s Screen Time to Slower Speech Development
In recent years, young children and toddlers have been increasingly exposed to handheld devices. It’s become commonplace to see babies playing games on tablets, smartphones, and other technological devices, rather than with wooden blocks...