MLC Centre Head Welcome Note: Professor Alister Cumming Editor’s Note: Mohammed Al-Alawi New Faculty Profile: Professor Enrica Piccardo Visiting Professor Profile: Professor Andrea Hoti SLE Orientation 2009 ML C Coffee House New Ph.D. student Profile: Choongil Yoon New M.Ed. student Profile: Thomas Fenton A note from the SLE Ph.D. & MA representatives Update on the SLE Ph.D. Forums Upfpdate on the MLC Informal Seminars Upcoming Conferences and Symposiums MLC Bulletin Staff Editor: Mohammed Al-Alawi Layout Design: Lisa Rupchand Supervisor: Alister Cumming Welcome to the Modern Language Centre (MLC) and graduate program in Second (SLE)!

It is a great pleasure to welcome all new and returning students and faculty to the MLC this autumn. Our enrolment of students is higher than in previous years, particularly for the M.Ed. program; we are happy to see so many of you join us from afar and from 9 nearby as well as those starting up the new online M.Ed. cohort. We are also especially happy to welcome a new professor in the Centre and program, Dr. Enrica Piccardo, who brings a wealth of experience and new perspectives from her previous work at universities in France and Italy.

200 The MLC was one of the first research centres established at OISE in the late 1960s. It continues to be one of the most productive in terms of research projects, publications, and affiliated students graduating. Last year our mandate and funding for the Centre was successfully renewed, after a rigorousexternalreview,forthenextfiveyears.Welookforwardtocontinuingthishistoryof success and impact on education in Ontario and around the world. We welcome you to join us in this process by engaging in the activities associated with the MLC.

all Mohammed Al‐Alawi has graciously agreed to edit the MLC Bulletin this year, and promises to keep us all informed this way, as you can clearly see. Robert Kohls and Won Seung Jun continue to

F organize the MLC Informal Seminars. Christian Chun and Art Babayants have been elected to act as SLE student representatives. Jennifer Shade Wilson and James Corcoran are organizing the SLE Ph.D. Forum. I trust many of you will take on other roles in student activities and associations as the year continues. Please join us for the MLC Colloquium series on alternate Fridays to hear about, and discuss, the current research of professors associated with the Centre, addressing a wide range of in issues in langgguage education in Canada and internationally. Best wishes for a productive, engaging, and enjoyable academic year!

Alister Cumming, Head, Modern Language Centre let l An Honorary Announcement... Professor Alister Cumming, Head of the Modern Language Centre, received an honorary doctorate, Honoris Causa, from the University of Copenhagen. Queen Margrethe II of Denmark presided over the ceremony on November 12, which was webcast from the University of Copenhagen at:

Bu http://nyheder.ku.dk/alle_nyheder/2009/2009.11/aarsfest2009/

Congratulations Professor Cumming!! MLC Editor’s Note

Greetings and welcome to the MLC Bulletin. Now that fall has settled in we would like to wish all faculty and new and returning students a productive and enjoyable year ahead. The purpose of the Bulletin is to provide a forum for the MLC community to share information and highlight important and up‐to‐date academic and social events.

On behalf of the MLC community, I would like to express my sincere thanks to the past editor Paul Quinn for his tremendous contribution to the MLC Bulletin by producing an outstanding Bulletin full of valuable information, announcements, tips, etc. A big THANK YOU to you, Paul. With the help 9 from you all, I am positive that we will do him proud, and the Bulletin will continue to provide a rich forum for communication and exchange of ideas leading to ongoing collaborations. I hope you all enjoy this year’s issues of the MLC Bulletin.

As Head of the MLC, Prof. Alister Cumming will be our faculty supervisor and Lisa Rupchand, administrative and financial assistant for the MLC and SLE graduate program, will be assisting us with

200 the layout and design of the MLC Bulletin.In this edition, you will read profiles of a new faculty member, Dr. Enrica Piccardo, a visiting professor, Dr. Andrea Hoti, a new Ph.D. student, Choongil Yoon, and an M.Ed. student, Thomas Fenton. Also, we present photos and information from the CTL/SLE orientation and MLC coffee house. I would like to thank Christian Chun and Art Babayants (SLE Ph.D. and M.A. representatives), Jennifer Shade Wilson and James Corcoran (Ph.D. forum organizers), and Robert Kohls and Seung Won Jun (Informal seminars organizers) for their contributions to this edition. all Remember, this is your Bulletin. If you want to contribute news, announcements, conferences, etc.,

F please email me your material or drop them off in the “MLC Bulletin” mail folder located in the student mail folder area outside room 10‐244. More details inside!

Cheers, in Mohammed Al‐Alawi Email: [email protected] let l Bu MLC New SLE and MLC Faculty Member Dr. Enrica Piccardo

Professor Enrica Piccardo recently joined the Second 9 Language Education Graduate Program and Modern Language Centre, specializing in French Language Pedagogy.

Mohammed: First of all, we would like to know more about your background? Where do you come from? Dr. Piccardo: I was born in Italy and studied at the University of Genoa specializing in foreign

200 languages. My first foreign language was German and then I had English and French. I started working as a foreign language teacher of French and German as foreign languages and eventually getting my permanent position as a secondary school teacher in English. At that time in Italy, we were not pedagogically prepared for teaching but just content prepared. Therefore, I started to look for methodology courses in Italy and abroad in England, Germany, and later France. I continued to be a teacher in several types of schools and in different areas until 1995 when the Ministry of Education made a selection for future teacher trainers and I passed the selection. This was the

all beginning of my interest in language pedagogy. In 1999, I was recruited as a pre‐service trainer at the University of Genoa in a post‐graduate course initiated by the Ministry of Education working

F part‐time at the university and part‐time in the secondary school. Later, I did my Ph.D. dissertation (binational thesis: Italian and French) on creativity and new technology in foreign language teaching and learning. Mohammed: So, what happened after you completed your Ph.D. program? Dr. Piccardo: I decided to move on and be a faculty member and eventually I got a position in France in as an associtiate professor at the JJhoseph FFiourier UUinivers ity in GGblrenoble, thkhanks also to my bina tiona l Ph.D. degree. Mohammed: What courses/research projects were you involved in while you were at the Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble? Dr. Piccardo: I was associated with IUFM, a special institute responsible for training future let elementary and secondary teachers and was particularly in charge of English and Italian language teachers. However, I worked for French as a foreign language outside France. l Meanwhile, my research plan was to continue the thread on creativity and adding another domain of research which was the impact of the new documents of the Council of Europe on the teaching and learning of languages. I have been directing a couple of Ph.D. students in the area of , emotions, and affect in language learning. For the assessment domain, I am presently coordinating, with another colleague, a project for the European Center for Modern

Bu Languages (ECML) based in Austria. The project started two years ago, and two more years remain to finish it. MLC Mohammed: To follow up on what you just mentioned about the issue of creativity and new technology, I was reading recently one of your articles “Creative Computing in EFL” published in the Humanizing Langgguage Teaching Magazine (()HLT). One finding caught my attention when you talked about “low technology and high creativity.” Dr. Piccardo: Exactly, this was the most interesting result of this research. The fact is that there is inverse relation (the more sophisticated the technology is, very often the less creative the pupil is) because the only possibility s/he has to interact with it is by following exactly what the technology wants him/her to do. Also, what was interesting to see was the emotional reactions of the students and how they were totally interested while engaging in the process of using technology. Specifically, there were differences in attitudes that students had between using software for language learning or 9 for general purposes. Because I saw these great differences of attitudes, it is on this line I continued my research. In a sense, I focused less on new technologies later and more on the emotional aspects of language learning. Because 2009 has been declared the year of creativity in Europe and as a chief editor of the Journal of Synergies Europe, we decided to prepare an issue on creativity. We had contributions from all over the 200 world. The issue is almost ready and will be publis he d at the end of 2009. The journal can be accessed online (http://gerflint.eu/). Currently, we accept articles written in five languages (French, English, Italian, German and Spanish). Also, another upcoming issue will be on projects working with intercomprehension (i.e., languages which belong to the same family). The basic idea of the journal is create a synergy among European countries because very often all researchers are conducting similar projects but because they are written in different languages they don’t share the results, whereas if F they shared their results, they could further expand and deepen their results and not do the same job twice.

Mohammed: Who do you consider your role model? in Dr. Piccardo: During my Ph.D . program, I had a grant from the European Union to follow a trainer development course run by Pilgrims at the University of Kent at Canterbury where I met several people like Sheelagh Deller who wrote a fascinating book called “Lessons for the Learner” as well as Mario Rinvolucri who has always been a reference for me especially in how he conducts training professional development for teachers and his visions of what language learning is. Also, there are

let many people in Italy and worldwide whom I haven’t met personally but who have greatly influenced my research orientations. l Mohammed: What is next for you in terms of research? Dr. Piccardo: During the little time I have spent in the MLC so far, I have seen how rich and research‐ oriented the environment is. I’ve met several researchers in OISE and UofT in general who have written extensively in areas I am interested. Some of them I didn’t know were here although I am familiar with their work. Also, there is one of the world biggest centers for creativity nearby, the Bu “Center for Studies in Creativity” located in Buffalo, NY. Therefore, I am really thrilled to continue my two main research threads (i.e., assessment and action‐oriented approach and language learning in one side and the domain of affect, emotions and creativity in the other side) in a comparative perspective exploring how applicable the European Common Framework of Reference for Languages is to the North American context. MLC Mohammed: Do you have particular hobbies? Dr. Piccardo: As far as sports are concerned, I like swimming and skiing. I have not gotten the chance to practice swimming here yet because of the moving but I hope to start swimming regularly again as I did in France. I adore reading novels and I also like cinema, theatre, and music especially the opera. In addition, I like travelling and would like to have the chance to visit different places especially in South America like Argentina and crossing different continents like Africa and other places. Mohammed: We would like to thank you very much for your time and wish you all the best in your coming courses and research projects. 9 Dr. Piccardo: It was interesting to talk to the MLC Bulletin. Thank you.

Laugh a Little...or a lot... 200 all F in let l Bu MLC Meet the visiting Professor: Dr. Andrea Hoti.

It is my pleasure to introduce Dr. Andrea Hoti, a visiting professor in the MLC from Switzerland. She has kindly agreed to share with us her teaching and research experiences both in Switzerland and Canada.

Mohammed: Can you please tell us about your background? Where do you come from and where did you teach before?

9 Dr. Hoti: I am working as a lecturer and researcher at the University of Teacher Education in central Switzerland (Lucerne). I teach a course called ‘multicultural education’ for future kindergarten, primary and secondary school teachers taken by about 200 students each year and taught by a team of four instructors. It’s a compulsory seminar course. However, I am engaged more with my research projects.

200 Mohammed: Are you bilingual? My mother tongue is German (Swiss German dialect) and I speak French at home with my husband and with our son (who is learning to walk right now and made his first steps on Canadian ground) when we are all together. We live in the French speaking part of Switzerland. Also, I speak English and since I publish articles in international journals, it is easier for me to write in English than in French. I speak some basic Spanish and Albanian as well.

all Mohammed: So, can you elaborate on your recent research projects? Dr. Hoti: Recently, I finished a project on third language acquisition in primary schools as they

F introduced a second foreign language in central Switzerland where children now start to learn English from the third grade on and French from the fifth grade on. This school reform is based on the decision of the European Council to foster bi/multilingualism among European citizens.

Mohammed: What were you trying to achieve from this project and what were the main findings? in Dr. Hoti: Some teachers and parents feared that the children would be overwhelmed with “so many” foreign languages to learn but our results actually show that learning English before French helps children to learn French afterwards.

Mohammed: What are your other research interests? Dr. Hoti: I am also interested in research in the field of multicultural education as well as anti‐racism let education. My Ph.D. dissertation was on racism in Switzerland including a youth sample of 3,104 15‐ year‐old teenagers. I found out that identity plays a crucial role regarding attitudes towards l immigrants. There seems to be competing patterns of identification with the Swiss nation showing a tension between tradition and modernity. Some people, especially in the countryside still emphasize the myth of Switzerland’s “special status” including values like neutrality and independence. They are more at risk to reject immigration and cultural diversity when they are afraid of losing their cultural identity as well as their economic privileges. The other type of identification is more

Bu frequent in cosmopolitan areas where more people would like Switzerland to join the European Union and engage internationally. At the same time they are more open towards immigration and towards multiculturalism in Switzerland. MLC Mohammed: During your time in the MLC, what courses have you being teaching and how do you perceive your teaching and research experience within a Canadian context? Dr. Hoti: I have been teaching a seminar course “Foundations of Bilingual and Multicultural Education”. I’ve tried to adapt it to the Canadian context by using different texts for the reading and films because my course material at home is almost entirely in High German. I frequently compare the situation in Switzerland or in Europe in general and in Canada or in North America in general. But, I always try to leave space for the students to bring their own experiences as well as their ethno‐cultural background in. It’s fascinating to work with such a diverse group of students here at the University of Toronto. 9

Mohammed: What is your next step after being here in OISE? Dr. Hoti: I am fortunate to get the current scholarship for two years from the Swiss National Science Foundation which allowed me to come to Canada to work on my post‐doctoral dissertation. Next year I am going to Frankfort to the German Institute for International Educational Research. Moreover, I am preparing a new international research project together with Dr. John Berry from 200 Queens University in Kingston. It’ s called “Mutual Intercultural Relations in Plural Societies.” We will explore different acculturation strategies that youth have as either immigrants or non‐immigrants in different countries. The Swiss study will focus on the impact of the school on students in order to opt for the integration strategy, which seems to be the most benefitting strategy for a successful psychological and socio‐cultural adaptation.

Mohammed: What do you like to do in your free time? all Dr. Hoti: I like to go for a walk with my family, especially to the playground and have fun with my little son. We also like F to meet my husband’s brother and his family. They are Canadian and live close to Toronto. I always wanted to try dog‐sleding and I hope to be able to do it soon especially where I am in Canada at the moment. in MhMohammed : Thank you very much for your time and agreeing to talk to the MLC Bulletin. Dr. Hoti: You are welcome. let l l Bu MLC SLE Orientation Thursday, September 10, 2009

September 10 marked an exciting start to the academic year as many new and returning students, faculty, and staff got together for the Orientation Party which was a huge success! The various events suitably oriented new students as to what they can be expecting in the coming weeks and years. This annual event provides an opportunity for new students to meet the MLC faculty, students and staff. Thanks to Robert Kohls for taking these photos during the orientation party. 9 9 200 all F in let l l Bu MLC MLC Coffee House

Than ks to Chr is tian and AtArt who organidized the MLC coffee house on FidFriday, October 2, 2009. The idea was to offer new students a chance to meet other students and for old students to have the opportunity of making new friends. Everybody had the chance to meet and get to know each other outside of class and share diverse cultural backgrounds, academic interests and general hobbies. 9 200 all F in let l Bu MLC Doctoral student profile Choongil Yoon, Ph.D. student in SLE

Choongil is a new Ph.D. student in the SLE program who has a lot of experience from Korea and the States. To get to know Choongil more, I conducted the following interview with him.

Can you tell us about your background? Where are you from? Where did you study? I am from Korea. I did two M.A.s: one in Korean‐English Translation at a Korean university and another in Second Language Studies at the University of Hawaii. Before that I studied German lit at college. So I studied a little bit different things whenever I moved on to a new school. But they are all related to langgguage learning, and now I am here to study that more deeply, I hope.

What are your current research interests? I haven’t had any concrete ideas about my research for Ph.D. thesis. But I have been interested in , academic literacy, and corpus linguistics. As a second language learner of English myself, I have had a fair share of difficulties writing my way through graduate schools and also have been seen many international students getting frustrated with academic writing. That’s why I took an interest in these areas. So I did my M.A. thesis research on second language writing exploring the transfer of textual organization between different cultures.

How did you end up in OISE/UT? To be honest, before I considered going on to the Ph.D. I knew little of OISE. But when I searched for programs and sought advice from my professors, I realized OISE is an ideal place for studying second langgguage writing and literacy with its diverse student pppopulation and great professors in the field. Personally even though I have been interested in pedagogy, I have had no teaching experience other than tutoring a few students. So I chose OISE. I visited a friend in Toronto in 2007 and I liked it here very much. I thought I would be a bit better off in a big city than in a neighborhood surrounded by corn fields or cacti. ☺

Where do you see yourself next? I am not sure yet but I can imagine myself still studying and researching in the area of second language writing 10 years from now and hopefully teaching as a professor, not as a student. (Something would be going totally wrong if I am still a student 10 years from now.)

What do you like to do in your leisure time? I like grocery shopping (window grocery shopping to be exact). I am in a new place and local supermarkets here are full of things that I never knew or haven’t seen before. For example, I go to a supermarket and just walk around aisles and discover unfamiliar food and try to figure out how to cook or eat those. Silly but fun for me. And I do like watching TV sitcoms. Recently I am hooked on the Big Bang Theory! Mmm, Anyone interested in knowing more about me? Just buy me lunch and I’ll share all my secrets with you. Master’s student profile: Thomas Fenton, M. Ed. Student in SLE

Meet Thomas, a personable and taldlented new M. Ed. SdStudent.

I grew up in Winnipeg MB and went to secondary school in Ontario. I graduated from the University of Western Ontario with a degree in Philosophy on 2000. Since then, I have been working as an ESL instructor and TESOL trainer both in Toronto and South Korea. I am only just starting out in the M.Ed.

9 program, but so far I am most interested with the theories of SLA and SLT, in particular, the ontology of language. In the near future, I see myself furthering my career in teacher training and development. In my free time, I compose and record folk songs. 200

A note from THE SLE Student Representatives

all Congratulations on your admission to the graduate pgprogram in Second Langgguage Education and welcome to the Modern Language Centre (MLC). You are joining a dynamic group of graduate

F students who come here to study from around the world. As SLE graduate students, we have the exciting opportunity to join a community of leading scholars in the field.

Two of the best ways to learn about the latest changes and developments at OISE/UT are through the University's websites and your own Blackboard/UToronto email account. To keep in the loop, be in sure to check the "SLE Announcements" in your Blackboard Academic account regularly!

This year, we would like to continue the Buddy Program to orient new students with the SLE program and the MLC. If you would like to take part in the buddy program, please contact either one of us. We are here to represent you. Please feel free to contact us with any of your concerns or suggestions and let us know if you would like to get involved in planning and facilitating MLC student let events. We look forward to hearing from you. l l We wish you a very successful academic year and are sure that you will find being a student in the MLC a very rewarding and enjoyable experience.

Sincerely,

Bu Art Babayants Christian W. Chun MAM.A. stdtuden t, SLE Ph.D . candida te, SLE MLC SLE Ph.D. Forum

Several years ago, the doctoral students in SLE expressed an interest in having a space in which they could support each other both intellectually and socially on their journey. From these discussions came the SLE Ph.D. Forum, initially described by the founder, Ranya Khan, as “an opportunity for current SLE Ph.D. students to present their work, discuss topics and areas that are of interest to them, seek advice, guidance and support from their colleagues, and engage in informal conversations about academic interests. The purpose of this group is to create an opportunity for students to engage in academic discussions as well as have opportunities to socialize with colleagues.” 9 Because this group is organized by current students, for current students (with the guidance of the faculty sponsor, Julie Kerekes), the shape of it varies slightly each year. This year, the Forum meetings will be held from 5‐6:30 p.m. on the following Fridays: Oct. 23, Nov. 20, Jan. 22, Feb. 19, and March 26. The first half‐hour of each meeting will be set aside for eating and socializing, and the last hour will be devoted to presentations and/or discussions on the selected topic. This year’s coordinators, James Corcoran and Jennifer Wilson, have compiled a list of topics that current 200 students have suggested and are looking for volunteers to lead discussions on these at the meetings in the winter and spring:

‐The thesis process (pacing, balance, etc.) ‐Data collection in SLE ‐Work‐life balance all ‐JbJob search ‐Analyzing our data F ‐Student publishing ‐Research methodology in SLE ‐Developing theoretical frameworks (What are common ones in SLE? What are their important contributions in to our field?)

The topics of the first two meetings are set –October’s topic is "What does it mean to be a Ph.D. student?" and Nov. 20 will provide a student view of the comprehensive exam let process. Anyone wishing to be a presenter for either topic or who wishes to lead a discussion at a later meeting should contact James or Jennifer. Look for the announcements prior to each meeting, l and please come!

NB: A change for this year is that children over the age of five are welcome. The coordinators will have a space set up for arts and crafts or quiet reading.

Jennifer Shade Wilson and James Corcoran Bu MLC MLC Informal Seminars

The MLC Informal Seminar Series will meet on Fridays (see the Schedule blbelow ) from 12 to 1 pm in the North SSieminar Room (10‐24)254). The seminar series has been fully student‐organized, and continuing from last year Robert Kohls and Seung Won Jun, both third year Ph.D. students, will be organizing the seminars this year. The seminar series continues to provide a friendly and supportive environment for M.A., Ph.D. students, and visiting scholars for sharing their research with the MLC community. This year, returning students who have just finished their M.A. and Ph.D. theses, new students in the program, and two visiting scholars will present their research findings at the seminars. So come and join us for the fun. We look forward to an exciting year! Robert Kohls and Seung Won Jun

MLC Informal Seminar Schedule (2009-2010)

Date Presenter(s) Title Alter(n)ative literacies: Elementary teachers’ October 2nd Gail Prasad practices with culturally and linguistically diverse students in one French‐language school in Ontario Al‐Alawi, Jun, Kohls, Using primary trait scoring with at‐risk adolescent October 16th & Wilson writers

Promoting literacy in Ontario October 30th Dr. Shiva Sadeghi schools: A multiliteracies perspective

Dr. Mario Lopez‐ "My Friends Teach Us": Intercultural and November 13th Gopar multilingual education for "mainstream" children

Applied linguistics in globalization: Rethinking SLA as November 20th Hyunjung Shin Second Language Capital Acquisition Learning about otherness: The treatment and December 4th Geoff Lawrence impact of culture learning in international language teacher preparation Using sequencing as an item type in reading tests for January 15th Dr. Kiyomi Yoshiwaza EFL learners at the university level January 22nd Reed Thomas TBA The ideological construction of a second reality: A January 29th Greta Camase critical analysis of a Romanian EFL textbook (published between 1983‐1988,during communism) Innovation in French teaching at the February 12th Mardi Michels elementary level: An exploratory investigation “Learning to compete with everyone, everywhere, February 26th Christian W. Chun and everything”: Interrogating the intertextualities of ‘Globality’in an EAP classroom Literacy engagement and identity investment of March 12th Saskia Stille elementary ELLs

A study of designing a course web site to facilitate March 26th Meng‐ying Lin sociolinguistics learning Upcoming conferences and symposiums

February 27-28, 2010 Academic Literacies Symposium Interdisciplinary Approaches to Academic Literacies across Educational Contexts Indiana University of Pennsylvania The Interdisciplinary Approaches to Academic Literacies Symposium aims to expand

9 current understandings of academic literacies of diverse student populations.

April 29-29, 2010

Celebrating Linguistic Diversity Annual Conference Sponsored by the Modern Language Centre 200 OISE, University of Toronto

June 1-3, 2010 all

F ANNUAL CONFERENCE Concordia University, Montreal Submission Deadline for Proposals: November 15, 2009 For more information, please visit http://www.aclacaal.org/ in

A bit of Inspiration...

“Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death.” ‐ Albert Einstein let “If you're trying to achieve, there will be roadblocks. I've had them; everybody has had them. But

l obstacles don' t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don' t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.” ‐ Michael Jordan Bu MLC