Nuremberg Recommendations
Physical environments for learning
Early foreign language learning takes place in nursery schools, primary schools and other educational establishments. To meet the criteria for qualified learning programmes, the locations provided must ensure a safe environment for the children in terms of size, furnishings and equipment, must allow the learning processes to be directed in child-appropriate ways, and must be so designed as to exclude any risk of impairment of children’s health as they learn.
Design for each learning group to consist of the smallest possible number of children, accommodated in an age-appropriate physical setting, is the best way to ensure that every child finds sufficient opportunities to speak and can be cared for as appropriate to his or her needs. A stable learning atmosphere in, if possible, the same room for every meeting underpins the continuity of the learning process.
Every institution should have sufficient space to permit the reaching of clear understandings with all relevant practitioners and teaching staff on modalities of child supervision, learning objectives, methodology and teaching content, particularly if the foreign languages programme is to be delivered by an additional specialist teacher.
Recommendations:
The classrooms in which children learn should be used on as sustained a basis as possible, so that the children can develop in an environment where they can feel secure.
Specialist teachers responsible for different learning levels should keep each other mutually informed. The following means are recommended:
- Exchange of teaching plans, guidelines, targets, teaching content and topics
- Cross-institutional use of learner portfolios
- Coordination meetings
- Reciprocal inter-institutional study visits and joint CPD events
Source Information
[1] Cf. also BIG (2009)
[2] Cf. Wassilios Fthenakis (01/2010)
[3] Cf. ib.