Dreams Along the Journey
Anniversary Lecture Series at Jules Verne Campus (click here for poster)
1. Which language do you dream in?
Wednesday, November 29, 2023 at 7:00 pm in the Oasis (in German and English)
Bilingualism from an Early Age: How to Reap the Benefits of Bilingualism
Prof. Dr. Theo Marinis & Elisabeth Süß, University of Konstanz
with a word on our JVC approach from Dr. Kerrie Elston-Güttler, Head of Learning House
Multilingualism is the norm in many countries around the world and the rate of multilingualism has been increasing through globalization. This applies to Germany as well as can be seen with the increasing number of bilingual schools and interest in learning additional languages. At the same time there is a need to better understand how the bi-/multilingual mind works and how best to support bi-/multilingual children in order to reap the benefits of bi-/multilingualism. In this talk, we will discuss some of the challenges and opportunities of bi-/multilingualism and how bi-multilingualism can bring advantages to the individual and the society. To do that we will bring evidence from scientific research to answer questions, such as: How does the age of the learner affect language acquisition? How does bilingual education benefit children’s language and cognitive skills? What is the role of the input from the environment in how languages are acquired? Why is it important to support heritage languages and how best to support them? Why do bilinguals sometimes mix their languages within a sentence and is this problematic? We’ll close by addressing how JVC specifically addresses what we know about language acquisition and what’s behind our successful, immersion approach.
Theo Marinis is Professor of Multilingualism and Director of the Centre of Multilingualism at the University of Konstanz. In the last 25 years he has been investigating how children and adults acquire languages in a large number of countries, including Germany, Greece, India, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Turkey, and the UK. He worked on the EU project The Multilingual Mind as well as the Moodle course Teacher Education About Multilingualism that aims at informing teachers and about multilingualism from a linguistic, neurocognitive, and educational perspective.
Elisabeth Süß is a PhD student, an academic staff member, and member of the Center for Multilingualism at the University of Konstanz. In her PhD project, she studies how words are stored in the mind in bilingual children and how words from these two languages are accessed in speaking and listening.
Kerrie Elston-Güttler is Head of Learning House at JVC. With a PhD in English & Applied Linguistics from the University of Cambridge and post-doc research at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, she specializes in bilingual language acquisition and used scientific insights to help develop the bilingual immersion concept practiced at Jules Verne Campus.
Anniversary Lecture Series:
2. Living with Artificial Intelligence: The Potential of AI for the Future
3. Our youth is bright but tired: We need a healthy sleep culture