Reclaiming Our Languages

North America

Reclaiming our languages Annotated BibliographyDownload

“teepaalilaani” © Hannah Buchanan 2025

  • Breathing Life into New Speakers: Nsyilxcn and Tlingit Sequenced Curriculum, Direct Acquisition, and Assessments

    Johnson addresses the publishing gap between community language education and the field of Indigenous language revitalization by sharing a path to proficiency involving consistent assessment, sequenced curriculum, and anecdotal reporting. They discuss how to create and then use a sequenced curriculum to allow learners to achieve concrete skill progression and create an immersion environment. They also discuss developing modes of assessment for beginner, intermediate, and advanced learners, especially relating to the use of film/video.

    Johnson, S. M. K. (2017a). Breathing life into new speakers: Nsyilxcn and Tlingit sequenced curriculum, direct acquisition, and assessments. Canadian Modern Language Review, 73(2), 109–132. https://doi.org/10.3138/cmlr.3549

  • Learning through an Aboriginal Language: The Impact on Students’ English and Aboriginal Language Skills

    Usborne et al. explore how learning through an Indigenous language impacts student language skills in English and in the Indigenous language, by contrasting a Mi’kmaq immersion program with a Mi’kmaq as a second language program in a Nova Scotian public school. They provide an example of how community-anchored assessment-based longitudinal research can serve the language needs of an Indigenous community and they find that Indigenous immersion language programs can actually correlate to higher language skill development in both the Indigenous language and English.

    Usborne, E., Peck, J., Smith, D.-L., & Taylor, D. M. (2011). Learning through an Aboriginal language: The impact on students’ English and Aboriginal language skills. Canadian Journal of Education, 34(4), 200-215. https://www.jstor.org/stable/canajeducrevucan.34.4.200