Information about ISW - Languages

Workshops and workshop seminars will be offered on the following main topics:

• Open forms of literature instruction in all types of schools from elementary school through junior high school and high school to vocational school.
• Local, national and international children's and youth literature media networks
• Promotion of spelling and literacy in the classroom
• Development of textual competence under the conditions of multilingualism and multiculturalism
• Web blogs as an opportunity to develop writing competence
• Advice on setting up learning workshops and writing workshops 
• Bilingual and multilingual education courses
• Deepening of suggestions, proposals, topics from the regularly held KEC  (Kassel English Colloquia)
• Information on CALL(Computer Assisted Language Learning) and TELL(Technology Enhanced Language Learning)
• Establishment of addressee-specific learning environments (e.g. subject rooms, foreign language workshops as well as print, computer and self-learning niches at schools)
• Media literacy training with interactive whiteboard and iPads
• Romance task and study database

Until the summer semester 2009, there were four independent learning workshops at the former Department 02 "Linguistics and Literary Studies": at the Institute of German Studies the "Learning Workshop German-Primary Level" and the "Learning Workshop German as a Foreign and Second Language", at the Institute of English Studies/American Studies the "Learning Workshop English" and at the Institute of Romance Studies the "Learning Workshop Romance Studies/Foreign Language Teaching and Learning Research". These learning workshops had different histories, pursued different concepts, and were only outwardly networked with each other through the study workshop network of the Kassel Center for Teacher Education (ZLB). In the meantime, these four language- and culture-related learning workshops and their inventory form the Integrated Study Workshop (ISW) of the new Department 02 "Humanities and Cultural Studies". 

The Integrated Study Workshop - Languages (ISW - Languages) sees itself as a center for independent and exploratory study at FB 02. Students can develop individual approaches to subjects in humanities and cultural studies teaching and research. In the sense of guided self-study, the following working possibilities exist:

• Use of all media for the preparation of papers, homework and exams as well as for the preparation of lessons in the context of practical school studies (SPS) or teaching internships.
• Getting to know didactic application possibilities of technical media and software relevant to teaching
• Work on (empirical) projects, for example, in the context of subject-specific didactic practical school studies, study-related teaching and research projects, and in the area of language teaching and learning media.

The ISW also serves the transfer of knowledge via school internships and continuing education events in subject didactic teacher education.

It is connected with the other study workshops of the teacher training departments of the University of Kassel via the Center for Teacher Training (ZLB) and the Elementary School Workshop of FB 01.

All workshops link subject didactic concept development, practice-oriented teaching and research-based learning.