Friday, March 6

Whole-School Practices for Languages:  An integrated audit for school leaders

Join Dr. Eowyn Crisfield for a full-day, pre-conference workshop designed for school leaders and language curriculum leads who are ready to take a holistic look at language learning and use in their schools. 

Through an integrated school audit process, participants will explore how different strands of language—English as an additional language, host country language, world languages, and home languages—interconnect and contribute to a linguistically inclusive school culture. 

Grounded in research and best practices, this workshop empowers schools to align their language approaches with broader DEIJ goals, and culminates in the creation of a personalized school development plan. See the full workshop description below for more information.

Date: March 6, 2026

Time: 8:30 AM – 3:30 PM

Target audience: School leaders (senior and middle), curriculum leads for languages (EAL/ELL, home, host country)

Fee: 

• Early Bird Price: 100 USD add-on to the 2-day conference 

• Regular Price: 125 USD add-on to the 2-day conference

• Stand-Alone Price: 150 USD pre-conference ONLY

Languages are at the heart of international education, by default if not by design. The myriad intricacies of educating multilingual students in international and national contexts means that each school is unique in profile and complexity in terms of language. We name languages in schools in different ways, but the general categories are: language of instruction (LoI), language acquisition (EAL/ELL or equivalent in other languages), host country languages, World (modern, foreign) languages, and home (identity, mother tongue) languages. This categorisation leads to a mindset that each of these is individual, and this is commonly reflected in organisational, curricular and pedagogical structures. What this approach neglects is the common underlying factors in language teaching and learning, and how our students use their languages.

This whole-school audit allows school leaders to develop their understanding of leading linguistically inclusive schools. It focuses on individual areas of language in schools as parts of a whole, with the student at the centre. It also encourages schools to interrogate how their approaches to languages and language align with initiatives promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion across the curriculum, for all learners.

Over the course of the day, we build knowledge on key topics covered in the audit through exploration of the research on key areas relating to languages in education. After each knowledge building section participants are invited to complete the associated audit section for their school. It is ideal for schools to have a team of 2-4 participants who can contribute to understanding all sections of the school. After completing the audit, participants will develop an action plan with short, medium, and long-term developmental goals.

Program

Getting started: Thinking about school policy and community 

• Language Policy

• Stakeholders

Getting it right from the start: Admissions and induction

• Admissions

• Induction

Support Structures for multilingual learners and multilingualism

• Peer and teacher support

• The role of L1 in English medium education

Systems and support for learning languages

• EAL/ELL

• Host Country language

• Home languages

• World languages

Understanding the Linguistic Landscape of Your School

Creating a School Development Plan for Language Provisions