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Hearing impairment

Moderate learning difficulties

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Specific learning difficulties (Dyslexia)

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Visual impairment

Modern foreign languages and hearing impairment

• Mairi MacAulay, Headteacher, Aberdeen School for the Deaf, presented a paper at an international conference on deaf education: Foreign Language Learning and Deaf Children.
• Valgerður Stefánsdóttir's presentation New approaches in teaching deaf students at the EU Workshop in Klagenfurt addresses the problems of teaching foreign languages in general, and Danish in particular, to the hearing impaired in Iceland.

Modern foreign languages and moderate learning difficulties

• Kathryn Taylor works in a school for students with moderate learning difficulties. Her report Teaching languages to students with learning difficulties compares different teaching methods in MFL with MLD students.

Modern foreign languages and special educational needs

• The National Association for Special Educational Needs (NASEN) publishes Silvia Edwards' MFL/SEN title Modern Foreign Languages for All: Success for Pupils with SEN.
• David Fulton publishes Hilary McColl's MFL/SEN title Modern Languages for All.
• The Lewisham Professional Development Centre has published a Modern Foreign Languages Special Needs booklet.
• The National Curriculum document Planning, teaching and assessing the curriculum for pupils with learning difficulties: Modern foreign languages.
• Sonja Moore's Foreign Language Teacher's Guide to Learning Disabilities.
• The learning disabled student in the foreign language class, a PowerPoint presentation by F. X. Moore of Longwood College in Virginia.
• MFL and SEN, Ken Bonham's mindmap of issues in Special Educational Needs and Modern Foreign Languages. Pupils with Specific Learning Difficulties (Dyslexia) often use mindmapping to convey and link ideas.
• The Centre for Information on Language Teaching and Research Information Sheet 76: Languages and special needs (lower attainers and students with learning difficulties).
• Craig Packard's Foreign Languages and Learning Disabilities. ERIC/CLL Minibibliography.
• David Wilson's Bibliography of Modern Foreign Languages and Special Educational Needs.
• MFLSEN, an online forum dedicated to the teaching of modern foreign languages to pupils with special educational needs.
• MFL and Special Needs, five information sheets: Introduction, The family, Where we live, Hobbies and interests and Using on-screen word grids, exemplifying the use of ICT in the teaching of MFL to students with SEN.
• Ewa Dzierzawska's article about learners of English as a foreign language with general and specific learning difficulties How to help children with learning difficulties in a primary language classroom.
• Roddy Kay's article Special Needs: a challenge neglected by ELT, originally published in the newsletter IATEFL Issues, inviting the EFL/ESL/ELT community to address the neglected issue of teaching English to speakers of other languages with special educational needs.

Modern foreign languages and specific learning difficulties (dyslexia)

• Margaret Crombie's paper Teaching and learning of Modern Foreign Languages for Dyslexic Students on the British Dyslexia Association's website.
• The University of Hull Open Learning Centre for Languages guidelines Dyslexia and Learning a Modern Foreign Language.
• Dyslexia, Language Learning and using languages other than English: a website dedicated to technologies of use in teaching MFL to students with Specific Learning Difficulties (Dyslexia).

Teaching materials for MFL learners with SEN

• Val Lawson has created Arrivé!, a large-print French course, in collaboration with Modern Foreign Languages teachers at her mainstream secondary school. It was originally developed for a Year 7 teaching group including a pupil with Downs Syndrome and several others with specific learning difficulties. Read more about the course on her KS3 French and German Resources page and read a sample unit in Adobe Acrobat format on her Download area.
• The Makaton Vocabulary Development Project has designed Resource Vocabulary signs and symbols for the early levels of a number of National Curriculum subjects, including modern foreign languages.
• John Murray Publishers have issued books of strategies and resources for special needs in French, German and Spanish: Le français, c'est facile, Deutsch, kein Problem and ¿Español? ¡Ningún problema!

Modern foreign languages and visual impairment

• Carol Gray's article Coping with the National Curriculum in Modern Foreign Languages: An equal opportunities issue? in The British Journal of Visual Impairment.
• LANGLEARN-L, an online forum dedicated to issues arising from second language acquisition by individuals with blindness and visual impairment.
• The MFL theme issue of the Royal National Institute for the Blind Curriculum Close-Up newsletter.
• Debbie Day's list of Foreign Language Resources for Parents & Teachers of Blind Kids.

© 2001 David R. Wilson