If you are a language teacher, one of the best ways to grow and improve your practice is through world language professional development. Most of what is offered is conferences that range from as little as a half day to as much as a week, but there are also opportunities to get a mentor or to travel and study in another country.
One positive aspect of the difficulties of the past few years is expanded virtual professional development opportunities. In 2024 most of the conferences are scheduled to be back in person, but some have shifted online, so they are available no matter where you are located. While online PD is not quite the same as in-person PD, it IS a lot cheaper and more accessible!
Here is a list of World Language professional development opportunities that are happening in 2024.
Note: This post contains affiliate links. If you sign up for an opportunity through an affiliate link I will receive a commission that allows me to continue this blog. Thank you!
World Language Professional Development (for all languages)
The World Language Teacher Summit is probably the best FREE annual summit for a broad range of world language teaching tips. It covers many different languages and levels and the best part is you can sign up to get access to past summits once it’s over. The 2024 summit for all languages usually occurs in the fall.
ACTFL webinars The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages offers some webinars for free. Many of them specifically relate to teaching online, and recordings of past webinars are also available.
Fluency Matters Conference (formerly IFLT) – In 2024 the Fluency Matters Conference will be in Denver, Colorado from July 8-11. Teachers focus on Acquisition Driven Instruction (ADI) and observe master teachers in learning labs within leveled cohorts based on their previous experience with ADI.
VOCES CI-Savvy This online textbook series hosts numerous free webinars for World Language teachers and the past ones are all available to watch at any time!
National TPRS Conference – The 2023 conference was in Illinois July 17-20. 2024 info is not yet available on their website. Participants choose a beginner or non-beginner track workshop for the first three days, and the remaining conference days host general presentations. This site also has regular online PD sessions about teaching through TPRS.
Idioma Online Courses – Idioma Education and Consulting offers a Master degree in World Languages and several courses for graduate credit and professional development. Some options for 2024 are Social and Emotional Learning in the WL Classroom, Literacy for Language Teachers, and Advanced Conversation and Culture.
World Language Summer Seminar – The 2024 conference is July 19-24 in Santa Barbara, California and is called “Equity, Justice, Sustainability”. There are a number of seminars for world language teachers, some language-specific, some related to DLI or Project Based Language Learning.
Comprehensible Iowa Conference – A very reasonably priced conference for CI enthusiasts in Iowa. The date for 2024 is June 7th and 8th with optional workshops on Friday and the main conference on Saturday.
The Center for Urban Language Teaching and Research (CULTR) – Through Georgia State University in Atlanta, CULTR offers different workshops in the summer. Topics have included technology and scaffolding interpersonal communication. The 2024 information is not set yet.
CARLA If you’ve never been able to travel to Minnesota for these summer institutes, now is your chance because some are also offered online. There are many interesting topics for any language and all levels in June and July. CARLA also offers webinars throughout the year.
COERLL This site has open educational resources for many languages, including many less commonly taught languages and great audio clips. They often host PD events.
STARTALK If you teach Arabic, Chinese, Korean, Persian or Russian, STARTALK is for you. Because these languages are deemed critical languages by the U.S. government, STARTALK programs have lots of money to give away and most of their workshops, including a full-week conference, are free. Check out the listing of their events, which are both online and in-person all over the U.S.
International Center for Language Studies Opportunities include advanced conversation classes for language teachers, a language teacher book club, and ed tech workshops.
The Agen Workshop Want to combine your PD with a trip to France? July 22-27, 2024 you can learn CI methods in Agen, France and participate in language labs in French, Spanish, Arabic, English, Mandarin or Breton.
Professional Development for Spanish Teachers
World Language Teacher Summit En Español This edition of WLTS was 100% en español May 15-19, 2023. You can purchase the recording of this PD for Spanish teachers or sign up for the next conference for all World Language Teachers in July.
Didactas Conferencia ELE There are shorter virtual trainings in Spanish and English for language teachers. You can attend individual events or purchase a membership, plus in the past, there has been a conference.
Conference on Spanish in the United States and Spanish in Contact with Other Languages Aimed at those at the university level or researchers. The 28th annual conference was at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas, TX from April 6-8, 2023. 2024 information is not yet available.
Hola Spanish Immersion If you want to learn and travel, check out two-week programs for teachers in the historic Spanish city of Toledo.
PD for Heritage Language, Dual Language, and Immersion
Empowered Educators This is an asynchronous online course that I’ve created for secondary Spanish teachers who teach heritage speakers or dual language immersion classes. It’s aimed at giving new(er) teachers the knowledge base and lesson ideas to get a confident start. It’s available at any time to work through at your own pace.
CARLA This summer there is both a heritage language institute and a secondary immersion institute that I’ve attended and can vouch for as being great!
University of Whitewater 2024 information is not yet available. Courses offered in the summer of 2023 included Teaching Heritage Languages Through the Language Arts, Building Thematic Units, Growing Translingual Readers and Writers, and Critical Approaches to HLE. They have also offered courses in Hmong heritage education.
Heritage Teacher Workshop Experienced teachers and workshop leaders Adrienne Brandenburg and Mary Beth Johnson have led both in-person and virtual workshops for teachers of Spanish for heritage speakers. In 2023 this workshop was June 12-13 in Fort Collins, Colorado.
University of Texas at Austin Event recordings from the past few years are available for free on topics like heritage learners. This is especially helpful for college and university instructors.
COERLL at UTexas – In San Diego in June 2023, the two-day workshop is “Strengthening Bilingual and Professional Pathways for Heritage Speakers“. Check back for updated 2024 information.
National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language – The symposium, which is aimed at those in academia, is February 22-24, 2024 in San Antonio, Texas.
Project GLAD and Dual Language– Dual Language Education of New Mexico (the hosts of La Cosecha) has summer workshops in June. Project GLAD teaches academic language and literacy and is a great technique for native and second language learning.
Center for Teaching for Biliteracy – Various multi-day online institutes on teaching for biliteracy and bridging between languages. There is a mix of online and in-person workshops and one that focuses on middle and high school.
UCLA Heritage Teacher Workshop – This online workshop includes synchronous and asynchronous work in June. It’s FREE but you need to apply well in advance.
Professional Development for Teaching Writing
Advancing Literacy, Teacher’s College at Colombia University – Literacy-related workshops, conferences, and seminars that occur throughout the year. Some are in Spanish.
National Writing Project – The National Writing Project has chapters based in universities all over the U.S. It helps teachers of ALL subjects, even math, incorporate writing into their curriculum and help their students become accomplished writers. Check your local site to see what PD is being offered this summer.
Social Studies and Global Citizenship PD
National Geographic Online Courses -Nat Geo has free courses that would be relevant to all teachers, like Citizen Science (also in Spanish). It seems they are changing their offerings in 2024. In the past, they had an educator certification program–read about my experience becoming a Nat Geo certified educator.
Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies Summer Teacher Institute -At the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee in July. 2024 information is not out yet, but last summer’s institute was Sustainable By Design: Reshaping the Human Landscape of Latin American Cities. The 2022 topic was Afro-descended communities of Spanish America.
World Savvy World Savvy is doing online professional development. Their sessions include Introduction to Global Competence, Leading for Global Competence, and Introduction to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. They also have a series of Global Competence Micro-credentials to allow teachers to show mastery of a range of skills that promote global competence like simulations and global collaboration projects.
Solving Global Problems and Global Education 101 – The US State Department has developed this 4.5-hour course that you can take at any time. It gives educators an understanding of problem-based learning and how to apply it to their classrooms and connect it with global competence.
Technology and Online Teaching PD
Learning Revolution – Multiple sessions by teachers from around the world have been held in the past and the recordings are still available. Digital tools and global citizenship are common topics but there is a range of everything under the sun from e-portfolios to sustainability.
ISTELive24 – The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) will host their annual conference June 23-26 in Denver. If you want to incorporate more technology into your classes, this is the conference to attend!
International Association for Language Learning Technology – This conference is only every other year, but there are free online webinars that happen periodically that you can access.
Professional Development Through Travel
CIEE – Working as a Program Leader in one of over 20 countries is a great opportunity to brush up on your language and culture skills. See my post about working in France and Denmark with CIEE.
Global Exploration for Educators Organization (GEEO) – GEEO has travel programs for educators from 5-23 days all over the world! They are small group tours and include recommended reading and lesson plans and you can even get PD credit.
If you have other online opportunities you want to share, please email me or add them in the comments below!
