Brain-Based Learning Within a Multilingual Community

IMPORTANT NOTE: This is a cohort-style professional learning opportunity occurring between February and April, 2025. Participants are expected to attend both sessions either in person or virtually. We highly recommend that those who are able to attend in person. However, for those who cannot make it to Portland, we are offering a live-streamed and interactive virtual option.

Dates: February 22, 2025 and April 12, 2025 (half day sessions)
In-person Location: International School of Portland campus, Portland Oregon
Virtual location: Zoom
Presenter: Ana Lia Oliva, Ed.D. CCC-SLP and Christopher Merideth, Ed.D.
Audience: PreK through 12th grade educators and educational leaders

Workshop description

This is a hybrid event. We highly recommend in-person participation for those who are able. However, for those who cannot make it to Portland, we are offering a live-streamed and interactive virtual option!

Research demonstrates that children who learn more than one language experience numerous life-long cognitive, social, and linguistic benefits. However, knowledge about how multilingualism can positively impact the developing brain can often be missing from classrooms and school systems. As a result, many educators remain unaware of how to harness these existing multilingual strengths within their students, resulting in lost opportunities to leverage children’s unique brains, talents, and life perspectives.

In this multi-part professional learning opportunity, two educational researchers will explore the advantages of fostering a multilingual learning community within all classrooms through the lenses of neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and language. Sessions will include an introduction to brain-based learning theory, multiple demonstrations of visual language learning strategies, and opportunities for participants to give thought to how they might promote learning in their own educational settings. Session attendees will be introduced to contemporary ways to enrich all students’ learning experiences in order to empower children to become lifelong cultural and linguistic ambassadors among their communities.

Day One
February 22, 2025, 8:00 AM – 11:30 AM PST

This session will:

• Introduce participants to contemporary theories of brain-based learning, including The Neuro-Semantic Language Learning Theory, multilingualism, translanguaging, and dynamic language acquisition processes;
• Explore how the three academic lenses of neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and language can inform our understanding of multilingual learning;
• Examine the neurobiological characteristics of visual language learners and introduce practical strategies designed to empower the learning process of all students;
• Provide information for how to promote culturally and linguistically responsive classrooms that honor multicultural, neurodiversity, and multilingual diversity, while leveraging students’ language and learning potential;
• And more…

Between sessions one and two, participants will implement and reflect on new strategies.

Day Two
April 12, 2025 8:00 AM – 11:30 AM PST

This follow-up session will:

• Analyze the learning characteristics of the brain as children develop from late infancy into adolescence;
• Expand participants’ understanding of how to utilize brain-based learning strategies and implement visual language learning practices to promote students’ existing cross-linguistic strengths;
• Critically reflect on how participants might evolve their teaching practices to celebrate the lived experiences of students from culturally and linguistically diverse cultures;
• Learn how to foster a schoolwide culture of belonging and social inclusion within its diverse school environment;
• And more…