Episode 13 - International Literacy Day!

Happy International Literacy Day! Welcome to our extraordinary episode as part of our celebrations the week of September 8th! We learn why it is important to reflect, advocate and celebrate all of the work that is going into promoting literacy worldwide. We talk to international, Canadian and Quebec guests for the celebration about this year's theme "Literacy and Multilingualism."

Did you know that they are over 7000 languages in the world and only about 5% are represented on the internet?

First, we talk with representatives from UNESCO, Borhene Chakroun, Director of the Education Division of Policies and Lifelong Learning systems and Gabriela Cieploch, Project Officer / Communication, Section of Youth, Literacy And Skills Development, Division for Policies and Lifelong Learning, Education Sector. We learn more about the ILD and a global perspective on literacy and about this year’s theme of Literacy and Multilingualism and the year of Indigenous languages.

Then we talk with Canadian researchers, who work on Literacy and Multilingualism, Dr Becky Chen and Diana Burchell at the University of Toronto. We learn about the value and challenges that come with knowing more than one language in a child’s development with the right support. We also chatted about the importance of parents’ leadership in the family when it comes to learning more than one language, especially when a different language is spoken at home than in school.

And of course we couldn’t miss an opportunity to chat with Gabrielle Thomas from LQ on how we are celebrating International Literacy Day with a week of events!

Every two weeks our hosts Jaimie Cudmore and Chris Shee from Literacy Quebec explore topics around community building, lifelong learning and literacy for English-speakers in Quebec. Contact us at admin@literacyquebec.org

Links mentioned in the episode:

1) UNESCO's International Literacy Day

· UNESCO’s website for International Literacy Day

· UNESCO International Literacy Prizes 2019

· What UNESCO does for literacy

· Subscribe to UNESCO’s education newsletter: Monthly Digest

· Read more about UNESCO’s work in Education

· Follow and share information about ILD on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram with the #LiteracyDay

2) Multilingualism and Literacy Lab at University of Toronto

https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/chenlab/index.html

3) Literacy Quebec's International Literacy Day Events

https://www.facebook.com/literacyquebec.org/photos/rpp.205750747010/10156451341442011/?type=3&theater

4) Frontier College's Forum on Literacy and Civic Engagement

https://www.frontiercollege.ca/Get-Involved/Events/2019-National-Forum-Literacy-and-Civic-Engagement