1. Three good, inter-related project mini-sites from the ECML which I was reminded about while attending one of their events today:

one on Plurilingual and Intercultural Education https://www.ecml.at/Thematicareas/Plurilingualandinterculturaleducation/tabid/4145/language/en-GB/Default.aspx,

one on Resources for assessing the home language competences of migrant pupils https://www.ecml.at/ECML-Programme/Programme2020-2023/Resourcesforassessingthehomelanguagecompetencesofmigrantpupils/tabid/4297/language/en-GB/Default.aspx,

and a third on Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) https://www.ecml.at/Thematicareas/ContentandLanguageIntegratedLearning/tabid/1625/language/en-GB/Default.aspx

Lots to explore!

2. If you’re not an astrophysicist – and you don’t suffer from this week’s phobia, astrophobia – challenge yourself by listening to this podcast from The Conversation on The James Webb Space Telescope: what astronomers hope it will reveal about the beginning of the universe https://theconversation.com/james-webb-space-telescope-what-astronomers-hope-it-will-reveal-about-the-beginning-of-the-universe-podcast-173436

And if you are an astrophysicist, I’d like to think you’ll still find it interesting!

3. Here’s a blog post from Philip Kerr on the relationship between TESOL/TEFL researchers and English language teachers and the way in which the former typically frame the latter as being less expert than themselves, ’We need to talk’ https://adaptivelearninginelt.wordpress.com/2021/12/13/we-need-to-talk/ There’s a good set of references at the end, too.

Link here to an article, The Dysfunctions of the Theory/Practice Discourse, by Mark A. Clarke (with whom I worked on a summer school in Yugoslavia many years ago, I now realise) that Philip suggests first raised this issue https://www.researchgate.net/publication/264606374_The_Dysfunctions_of_the_TheoryPractice_Discourse and PDF below.

4. And, finally, here’s a piece on a survey of views of the UK that Ipsos MORI conducted for the British Council of one thousand ‘educated adults’ aged 18-34 in each of the (other) nineteen G20 countries in autumn 2021 https://www.britishcouncil.org/brand-britain-wins

I’ve checked and ‘educated’ means ‘with a minimum of secondary education’. PDF of a readable summary version of the report here https://www.britishcouncil.org/sites/default/files/global_perceptions_survey_2021.pdf and below. I admit to being slightly surprised by the results!