Professional Development

We will continue to update this site with professional development learning opportunities for language educators.

Les clés du Coordinateur de langues : Une plongée profonde

Boostez les services en langues modernes dans votre conseil scolaire !

La BCLCA vous invite à une série de 4 webinaires conçus pour les nouveaux coordinateurs et ceux qui sont désireux de bonifier l’offre de services de leur département des langues modernes. 

Rejoignez Joanne Brunel et Trish Kolber dès le 8 octobre à 15h30 pour des discussions pratiques et inspirantes sur un grand nombre des responsabilités et possibilités de ce rôle important.

BCLCA Book Club with Dr. Bill VanPatten

The BCLCA is delighted to announce the professional development mini-series on language acquisition with Dr. Bill VanPatten. 

La BCLCA est très heureuse de vous annoncer la mini-série de développement professionel sur l’acquisition des langues avec Dr. Bill VanPatten.

Join us for our extraordinary 2024-25 BCLCA Book Club! We will read and discuss “Language Acquisition in a Nutshell: A Primer for Teachers” by Drs. Bill VanPatten and Russel Simonsen. The BCLCA Book Club is FREE (see details below) and open to EVERYONE.

You will have the opportunity to meet and ask questions to the highly esteemed and beloved Bill VanPatten, father and self-proclaimed Diva of Input Processing in Second Language Acquisition.

Dates & Chapters:

  • Thursday, October 17, 2024: Chapter 1
  • Thursday, November 28, 2024: Chapter 2
  • Thursday, January 23, 2025: Chapter 3
  • Thursday, February 20, 2025: Chapter 4
  • >>> Thursday, March 13, 2025: Meet Dr. Bill VanPatten!

Time & Location:

  • 3:30 pm – 4:30 pm
  • On Zoom. Sessions will be recorded. The link will be emailed out closer to the event.

Who is Invited to the BCLCA Book Club?

Anyone interested in how we actually acquire languages as opposed to teach or learn them, and how we can create these favorable language acquisition conditions in our own classrooms.

Investment:

This Book Club is sponsored by the BCLCA (BC Language Coordination Association) and is FREE to all participants.

Please order your own copy of the book through Indigo, Amazon or ACTFL. If you attend all five BCLCA Book Club sessions (live or video recording) and you are an educator in BC, you will get fully reimbursed for your book at the end of the BCLCA Book Club. Please keep your receipt. More information will follow.

Your BCLCA Book Club Hosts:

  • Michelle Metcalfe: Michelle a highly knowledgeable and experienced language teacher in the West Vancouver School District who has been teaching successfully with Communicative Comprehensible Input-Based strategies since 2010. She has met BvP and Steven Krashen at numerous conferences. Michelle is a Linguistics Major and a graduate of SFU and has a passion for linguistic theory and Second Language Acquisition and their applications in the classroom.

  • Dr. Fränzi Karlen: Fränzi is the Language Coordinator for SD73, Kamloops-Thompson. She is committed to raising awareness of and promote methods compatible with language acquisition theory. Fränzi speaks four languages fluently and has been an educator for over 32 years. Fränzi is a member of the Executive Committee of the BCLCA.

Our Commitment to You:

Your Hosts are committed to facilitating a friendly, safe, engaging and fun Book Club environment.

Format of the BCLCA Book Club:

At the beginning of each Book Club session, the Hosts will provide a brief summary of the chapter to refresh our memory. The majority of Book Club time will be spent discussing the implications of our reading, including our questions and “yeah-buts. ” Thank you for coming to Book Club prepared as it will allow us to have a conversation at a much higher level.

The BCLCA Book Club will be conducted in English.

How to Prepare for the BCLCA Book Club:

Please come to the BCLCA Book Club having read the designated chapter (see Dates & Chapters above). Each chapter is about 30 pages short and is written in an easy-to-read, engaging and practical manner.

Summary of the book, Language Acquisition in a Nutshell:

Language Acquisition in a Nutshell: A Primer for Teachers will be your definitive guide on second languages and how they are acquired. Written in an easy-to-understand tone with an occasional touch of light-heartedness, Language Acquisition in a Nutshell is made for both teachers and teachers in training. It will show you new ways to think about second-language acquisition, while providing practical ways to implement your new insights. Language Acquisition in a Nutshell does not tell teachers how to teach or what to teach. Rather, the authors help teachers be as informed as possible as they make decisions about what they do and what they expect of their learners— and perhaps what they expect of themselves. (Published 2022, ISBN-13: 978-1942544760)