MELP featured in the MN Daily

The Minnesota English Language Program was featured in the February 8 Minnesota Daily. The article highlights the growth that has occurred within MELP in the past 3 years, while underscoring the importance of welcoming international students to the U of M community.

The DCL: Planning ahead for media-rich courses

CLA language instructors: The Digital Content Library (DCL) is an efficient way to share films with your students. The DCL is pleased to digitize films, but as their services are growing in popularity, they would greatly appreciate as lead time as possible. The Language Center can help by submitting content to the DCL on behalf of language instructors. When planning classes that are media-rich, please contact your departmental liaison or email elsie@umn.edu to discuss your needs.

iTeach Workshop - March 2 - Fair Use in the Second Language Classroom - Co-sponsored by the ESL Forum

The Fair Use Doctrine is probably the most important exemption to copyright protections for educational settings, allowing many uses of copyrighted works for the purposes of teaching and research[1]. Yet, knowing how to apply the fair use doctrine in the second language classroom can be quite confusing, both in terms of developing teaching materials and in providing guidance for student projects. Please join us as Nancy Sims, copyright librarian for the University of Minnesota, gives us some insights into the world of Fair Use for educational purposes.

[1] http://www.lib.umn.edu/copyright/fairuse.phtml

Fair Use in the Second Language Classroom - Co-sponsored by the ESL Forum
Presenter: Nancy Sims, U of M Libraries
Wednesday, March 2
12:20 - 1:10 p.m.
Jones 35

iTeach Workshop - Feb 17 - Creating Accessible Course Materials

Creating Accessible Course Materials

Language instructors are constantly creating new course materials to make use of authentic resources. We create Word Documents and PDFs, and upload countless images into our Moodle course websites. But how often do we think about the accessibility of the materials we create? For many of us, it's probably not something in the forefront of our minds. Thankfully, the University of Minnesota has a new web resource - accessibility.umn.edu - to help instructors improve the accessibility of their course materials for the widest possible audience, regardless of ability. Please join us as Phil Kragnes of Disability Services and the Office of Information Technology shows us simple ways to improve the accessibility of the materials we create for our students.

Creating Accessible Course Materials
Presenter: Phil Kragnes, U of M Disability Services and OIT
Thursday, February 17
12:20 - 1:10 pm
Jones 35

For more information about the topic of accessibility in education, see these recent articles from The Chronicle of Higher Ed:
Universal Design, Usability, and Accessibility
ADA Compliance is a 'Major Vulnerability' for Online Education Programs
Colleges Lock Out Blind Students Online

Fasten Seat Belts: Quick videos to learn about cultural differences

Are you looking for a quick, cultural conversation starter for your class? Consider playing one of the videos found on Fasten Seat Belts. These online videos, which range from 20 seconds to a little over a minute long, provide some quick tips and expressions about cultural differences for some countries in Europe and Asia. Here is a sample video about table manners:



In addition to these short videos, there are audio clips that cover some basic expressions such as hello, good-bye, and numbers.

The audio and videos on this site were funded by the European Commission's Socrates-Lingua department and by the European Commission's Life Long Learning Programme in an effort highlight cultural differences and break cultural and linguistic barriers.

Thanks to Ryan at Language Lab Unleased! and Richard Byrne at Free Technology for Teachers for the tip!