Key Languages News

Come celebrate the joy of the season. Monday, December 15 at 6:00 p.m. Key Languages Club is going to have a multicultural celebration with typical dishes and Christmas carols from various countries.

FREE consultation with language course. Be more competitive on the job market. Improve your language skills. Sign up for a language course and Key Languages will offer you a complimentary one-hour consultation with executive career coach JEANNETTE KRAAR.

FREE registration in December. Get ready for 2009. If you are planning to learn a new language next year or to improve your language skills, take advantage of this offer. No registration fee in December.

Call it Reform, Unification of the Portuguese Language or Acordo Ortográfico.
Come to us to know what is happening in January 2009.

Language in the News

New Bilingual Maps for Visitors to Chinese Cities. The Street Smart series now has Beijing, Hong Kong and Shanghai. These are laminated fold-out maps that feature vivid graphics and are bilingual.  They cost $8.95 and can be found at stores or at www.vandam.com.  The NewYork Times. October 26, 2008.

Language of Choice. Foreign Language Charter Schools offer Greek, Spanish, Hebrew, French and Italian in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties. Mandarin Chinese will be offered in 2009. They show the foreign language push for U.S. students to compete internationally. The Miami Herald. October 20,2008.

Finance Jitters Spur Interest in Jobs Abroad. More professionals, especially those in finance, are seeking opportunities abroad. The executive search firm Korn/Ferry International found out that 53% of 438 respondents believe the best job opportunities are in developing economies like Brazil, Russia, India and China.The Wall Street Journal. October 16,2008.

Handwritten Urdu Newspaper Stands Out in Indian Media Mob. The Musalman, the oldest Urdu-language daily paper in India, has been handwritten by Urdu calligraphers for the last 81 years. The paper has 23,000 subscribers and it hasn’t changed despite the availability of Urdu computer fonts. The Wall Street Journal. September 16,2008.

Eight Industries Needing Bilingual Workers. In almost every line of work the ability to speak a second language is an asset. Here are some industries and jobs where language skills are needed: health care, hospitality, education, law enforcement, customer service, social services, finance and communication. CNN.com.  September 15, 2008.

Learning tips

Have fun while learning a language. Check out these websites:

bbc.co.uk/languages (videos for learners)

Africanlanguages.com
(information about African languages)

Spanishbooster.com (resources on culture and grammar lessons)

sonia-portuguese.com
/text/proverbs.htm (proverbs in Portuguese)

laukart.de (multilingual songbook)

cervantestv.es (cultural tv channel in Spanish)

from The Language Educator. October 2008

Quote

“Language is not a cultural artifact that we learn the way we learn to tell time or how the federal government works. Instead, it is a distinct piece of the biological makeup of our brains.”

From The Language Instinct

Pick of the season

The Language Instinct

How the Mind Creates Language

By Steven Pinker

Watch  Mr. Pinker’s interview on  www.booktv.org

Click on In Depth/ Archive/ Steven Pinker