„Multicultural“ classroom interaction PhDr. Marie Hádková, Ph.D. PhDr. Jaromíra Šindelářová, CSc.

The Education Act (Act Nº 561) Section 20 The Education of Foreign Nationals Non-EU Nationals Nationals of other European Union member States

Non-EU Nationals Persons, who are not citizens of the Czech Republic and who reside legally in our country as migrants, immigrants or refugees, shall have access to basic, secondary and tertiary professional education with the same conditions as citizens of the Czech Republic.

Nationals of other European Union member states shall naturally be granted access to education and school services with the same conditions as citizens of the Czech Republic

Foreign nationals´children Education based on Czech Non-EU Nationals (children) Education completely carried out in the Czech Republic – i.e. The Vietnamese community EU Nationals (children) Education carried out exceptionally in the Czech Republic – i.e. chidren of foreign business people

Preparation for the inclusion of foreign nationals´children into basic education Free preparation Learning the Czech language adapted to the needs of such pupils At least 70 lessons No longer than 6 months Maximum number of pupils per group – 10 Certificate specifying the level of proficiency acquired in Czech during the course

Difficulties The target language itself The planned target level of language proficiency The teachers´ competence in instructing Czech as a foreign language The teachers´ competence in multicultural teaching

Czech An inflected language Its words change their form depending on their position within a sentence A richly developed system of conjugation and declension Differences between Literary and Nonliterary Czech (written and spoken language)

Framework Educational Programmes Czech children are supposed to achieve in foreign language subjects during the whole primary school education the following: The first foreign language – A2 The second foreign language – A1 The children of foreign nationals are supposed to achieve A2 in Czech within 6 months of the course outset

The necessary language level of competence for cooperating during lessons instructed in Czech Reading textbooks, texts Writing homework Cooperating with the teacher Cooperating with other pupils Talking to schoolmates + Personnal needs B1 – approximately 300 lessons

Instructing Czech as a foreign language being problematic for primary school teachers A completely new task The lack of suitable textbooks Insisting on using the same methods as when instructing Czech as a mother tongue Czech grammar classified as the most important topic

Multicultural situation in the classroom being problematic for primary school teachers New cultural and ethnic backgrounds New ways of practising education Intercultural competence

An improved situation would require: 1.Recreation of the target language competence (levels of proficiency) with respect to the needs of foreign children 2.Creation of new textbooks (based on the reference level descriptions for the Czech language) 3.Supplementary training for Czech teachers (intercultural competence,teaching Czech as a foreign language) 4.The elaboration of instruments for the evaluation of this language preparatory course 5.Cooperation among all European countries (CEFR) 6.Cooperation among Slavonic countries (languages)

Thank you for your attention Jaromira.Sindelarova