Edge Hill Report

LAGB Spring meeting 2002, Edge Hill

CLIE (Committee for Linguistics in Education): Report from the LAGB representatives

1. 14-19 Green Paper

The Government Green Paper on the education of 14-19 year olds includes the following recommendations:

• maths, English, science and ICT [but not a second language] would be compulsory

• there should be a “statutory entitlement .. to access a subject within each of modern foreign languages, design and technology, the arts and the humanities

In addition an accompanying paper on Language Learning includes in its aspirations that:

• all primary school children will be entitled to study languages by 2012

• local and regional support networks for primary schools will be developed

• there will be 200 Specialist Language Colleges by 2005

• the number of people studying languages in further and higher education and in work-basedtraining will increase

The full Green Paper, a summary and the paper on language learning is available at:

Consultation is invited from all interested parties (deadline 31st May). If anyone would like to contribute comments, please contact one of the LAGB reps (addresses below)

2. A/AS level English

The QCA has publishedthe new A/AS level English subject criteria (available at: Examination Boards vary as to how these specifications are interpreted, but they include:

• knowledge and understanding of “frameworks for the systematic study of language, including phonology and phonetics, lexis, morphology, grammar and semantics” and “the application and usefulness of diferent linguistic frameworks for the description and analysis of speech and writing”

• “describe, explain and interpret variation in both spoken and written language”

3. CLIE meeting, February 20th 2002
• Presentation by Jim Anderson (Goldsmiths College) on Community Languages. The speaker emphasised the present marginalisation of CLs, the need for a National Curriculum -related framework for the teaching of CLs, and an integrated policy for language learning (modern foreign languages, community languages and English as an Additional Language)

• report on meeting at QCA attended by Dick Hudson on behalf of the LAGB. Recent developments at the NLS focus on the role of speaking, for which teachers are in need of much support. Although linguists are seen as a source of expertise, we are not always able to offer an immediate solution to their requirements.

Sue Barry (CLIE Reporter)

April 2002

on behalf of the LAGB representatives on CLIE: Dick Hudson (), Anthea Fraser Gupta (), Keith Brown (), Sue Barry ()