Building Language Agency

Professional Development

Building Language Agency for all Learners

January 3 - 23, 2025

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Program Description:

We live in a multilingual, transnational world. A fundamental understanding of how language works and how it connects to our daily choices, as well as to societal and historical patterns, is a crucial skill for all teachers. Rather than imposing linguistic rules and norms on students, we can empower students (and ourselves) with more linguistic choices and tools. This approach offers practical tools for analyzing, critiquing, and creating the texts and interactions that we encounter in our everyday lives. Most of all, we gain linguistic agency via exploration of grammar, vocabulary, intonation, metaphor, and more.

This course provides a solution to teachers who are struggling to balance the language needs of all students, including both those who are learning English as a new language and those who speak English at home. Teachers who do not have a background in language, language instruction, or language development will gain an understanding of how language works, and how linguistic analysis can be a pedagogical tool for student empowerment. Our approach to language and literacy transcends current debates about language instruction by offering teachers a paradigm shift related to how language can be used to foster student agency in all classrooms and all learners.

Dates: January 3 - 23, 2025

Times: Live Zoom sessions held from 6:00 - 9:00pm ET, on the following dates:

January 6th
January 9th
January 13th
January 16th

Format: Online Modules with Live Zoom Sessions (See dates and times above)

Price: $590

For more information, questions or to register: Email tcacademy@tc.columbia.edu

Please Note: This course is offered on a non-credit basis or for 2 credits. Registration for this course through TC Academy is for the non-credit offering and Academic Credits will not be awarded. For instructions on how to register for the credit offering see below.

This course can be taken for credit in accordance with TC's enrollment policies. If you are not a current student and would like to take this course for credit, please review the Non-Degree Application Instructions page on our website and proceed accordingly. Also, please note that if you plan to take this on a for-credit basis, college tuition and fees will apply. If you are a continuing student in a degree program and have approval from your advisor, you can register for this course beginning on December 4th. Winter session courses will follow spring registration and payment deadlines.

Instructor(s)

Vivian Lindhardsen is a senior lecturer in Language and Education and the Director of the AL & TESOL program at Teachers College, Columbia University, where she teaches Second Language Assessment in PK-12, Pedagogical English Grammar, Educational Linguistics, and several PK-12 TESOL Methods courses. She holds a Ph.D. in TESOL and Applied Linguistics from Copenhagen Business School, Denmark, and an M.A. in English Language and Literature from Copenhagen University, Denmark. Dr. Lindhardsen has more than 30 years of experience as a language educator, including teaching English and foreign languages at several levels of education, including elementary school, middle school, high school, undergraduate level, and graduate level. She also has experience as an assistant principal in a middle school in Copenhagen. She is interested in second language assessment and pedagogy in PK12 settings and how language learners can use their language resources as empowerment. She has published books, chapters, and journal articles in language assessment.

Sarah Chepkirui Creider is a lecturer in the Applied Linguistic and TESOL program at Teachers College, Columbia University. She is a conversation analyst, and specializes in teacher-student interaction; teacher reflection; and political conversations, particularly among mixed-race groups. Her work has been published in Linguistics & Education; the Journal of Contemporary Foreign Language Studies; Learning, Culture & Social Interaction; Discourse Studies; Language and Information Society; and the Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice. Her book (co-authored with Hansun Waring), Micro-reflection on Classroom Communication: A FAB framework, was published by Equinox in 2021. Sarah has a doctorate in Applied Linguistics from Teachers College, Columbia University. Her work, as both an academic researcher and facilitator, is focused on what she calls a “micro-revolution” — the possibility for change inherent in each moment of everyday interaction.

Learning Objectives

Analyze the structures of language and explain how grammar, vocabulary, and other rhetorical devices shape communicative potential, agency, social cohesion, and even daily life
Enhance student awareness of language as a tool
Develop strategies for empowering language learners by creating classroom practices that foster students’ linguistic agency and self-expression
Reflect on personal experiences with language agency

Who Should Attend

Any TC students who will be working in multilingual environments
TC graduates who want to develop skills related to multilingual workplaces
Pre- and in-service teachers, from all programs
Current teachers, including cooperating teachers

Upon Completion

Participants who successfully complete this course will receive a Certificate of Participation.

Licensed educators in NY state are also eligible for a Continuing Teacher Leader Education (CTLE) certificate for a total of 30 CTLE hours.

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