If there is a direct correlation between career success and communication skills, then surely, being able to communicate in more than one language is a force multiplier. And in an increasingly connected world, it will no longer just be an asset; it will be a necessity, which is why bilingualism is integral to educating for the future. But a bilingual education is not just about teaching languages. Suisui Yu, Wellington International British School Shanghai's Director of Academics (Chinese), is quick to point out, "Integrated bilingual education aims to promote cultural fluency, so pupils can interpret the world around them and solve problems in both languages."  

"It is about cultures as much as it is about the languages," Paul Rogers, Director of Wellington College China's Festival of Education, adds, "It is important that pupils are able to think, express and even dream freely in English and Chinese."

 
Events from the past years

As part of the wider theme of Interpreting the Future of Education, we will explore this topic and several others in depth at Wellington College China's 2021 Festival of Education. From 17–25 April, our Tianjin, Shanghai and Hangzhou campuses will host a series of talks, panel discussions, workshops and online virtual events featuring educators, researchers and other experts in the field. Below are just a few of the speakers lined up for this year's events.

Explore the Bilingualism strand

01

 
Effective Bilingual Teaching Methodology: Content Language Integrated Learning
Kristy Anderson
Tianjin, 17 April

Ms Anderson has been an educator for over 20 years. She has worked with a wide range of children and schools as a classroom teacher, deputy head, regional advisor for literacy and, since 2014, she has devoted much of her time to initial teacher education and research. She previously served as assistant professor in the School of Education, Durham University. There she led English for Primary Education and worked with hundreds of future teachers. She provided professional guidance for teachers through the authorship of books and leading academic research and focused on helping teachers develop their skills for working with children who have English as an Additional Language.  

02

What Teaching and Learning Chinese Might Look Like in the Future
Yang Zhou
Tianjin, 17 April
Ms Yang Zhou holds a bachelor's degree in Chinese Language and Literature and a master’s degree in Chinese Curriculum and Pedagogy and a certificate in Teaching Chinese as an Additional Language from both Hanban (Confucius Institute) and Beijing Municipal Education Commission. She has taught Chinese in both China and abroad and is responsible for the Mandarin curriculum development at Wellington College International Tianjin.   

03

Teacher as Learner
Julia Yu
Shanghai, 24 April
Dr Yu is a Chevening scholar and holds an MSc in Education from Oxford University and a PhD in Educational Psychology from Beijing Normal University. She has participated in research projects in the State Key Lab, taught in higher education institutes and worked in the Cultural and Education Section of the British Embassy. Dr Yu has accumulated extensive knowledge and experience in education, teaching and teacher professional development (PD). Ever since Dr Yu joined Cambridge International, she has been dedicated to supporting the PD of teachers and trainers in East Asia. 

04

Language Differences versus 
Language Disorders
Tiffany Chen & Ge Zhao
Shanghai, 24 April

Ms Chen is an internationally certified bilingual speech-language pathologist who specialises in conducting speech-language therapy with children that possess various degrees of speech-language delays/disorders. 

She is a licensed speech-language pathologist in New York and Taiwan. She is a member of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) and the recent recipient of ASHA’s Distinguished Early Career Professional (ECP) Certificate in 2020. 

Ms Chen has experience working in both educational and clinical environments supporting children and adults. She also provides parent education in order to increase awareness and carry-through of each client’s abilities.

Ms Zhao, a speech-language pathologist at ELG who specialises in individual and group speech-language therapies to help children and adults develop functional and social communication skills. 

She also works closely with parents and caregivers to maximise skill generalisation across settings and daily life. MsZhao has extensive experience working with school-age children and older adults with communicative-cognitive disorders. 

Before joining ELG, MsZhao provided therapies and administered assessments for children with a variety of speech-sound, language, and fluency disorders in US elementary schools. In addition, MsZhao worked in a skilled nursing facility with adults with brain injuries, neurological disorders and swallowing difficulties. 

05

Developing Reading Habits From a Point of Interest
Jingfen Zhang
Hangzhou, 25 April
Ms Zhang holds a PhD in Education from East China Normal University. She is a board member of the Beijing Ciyu Youth Service Center and co-founder of Shanghai Moleqode Education Technology Company Limited. 

She has seven years of experience in curriculum research and development at Junior Achievement. Her career has seen her develop the career enlightenment textbook Our City for primary school students in Beijing as well as the financial management framework for primary and secondary schools in the city.  

A teacher trainer for nearly 10 years, she has extensive experience in parent-child reading and has developed many practical strategies as a publisher, practitioner and educator. She has also given lectures on reading and learning methods at primary and secondary schools, educational institutions, enterprises as well as media in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen. 

06

Chinese Language Education and Chinese Character Thinking
Shanchuan Li
Hangzhou, 25 April 
Mr Li is a co-founder of the education company CoolCharacter, Inc. He also serves as the chairperson of the Shanghai Youth Language Development Center. In addition to his work in education, Mr Li has a prolific media career. He is a columnist for the children’s Chinese history magazine ’5000-Year History’ and a commentator on various programmes on Zhejiang and Hubei television stations. He holds a master's degree from East China Normal University’s Center for Chinese Language Research and Applications.  

07

 
Oracy in the Bilingual Classroom
Alice Stott
Virtual, 21 April 
Ms Stott is Director of Schools at Voice 21, the UK's national oracy education charity. Voice 21 aims to transform children's learning and life chances through talk and does this through supporting its network of schools to provide a high-quality oracy (spoken language) education. She is passionate about the value of talk in learning and is co-author of 'Transform Teaching and Learning Through Talk: The Oracy Imperative' (Rowman and Littlefield, 2019) and 'The Oracy Benchmarks' (Voice 21, 2019). Her interest in talk for learning has taken her into countless classrooms across the UK and as far as the USA where she travelled as a Churchill Fellow to research classroom talk practices. Before joining Voice 21, Ms Stott worked as an English teacher at secondary schools in East London.

In addition to bilingualism, this year's Festival of Education will explore four other strands:

Future Schools

Early Years Education

Wellbeing

Mental Health