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Russian Teachers Share Unique Language-learning Experiences

51 teachers from Estonian Russian-speaking schools and their mentors will gather to a forum in Tallinn today to share their experiences in learning Estonian. For half a year, a unique pilot project of the Open Estonia Foundation, British Council and the Integration and Migration Foundation “Our People” has enabled Russian-speaking teachers to practice Estonian with the help of personal mentors at their chosen pace and place – in cafés, skiing track or via Skype.

According to the Jelena Katsuba, the coordinator of the project, mentoring has turned out to be a good learning method. She explains that while in the beginning many participants were frightened by their experience in difficult grammar lessons, the personal and informal relationship with their mentors has helped them overcome barriers and use Estonian in everyday situations.The participants have also made a lot of new contacts and many have found new friends of a different ethnic background.

On the two-day language forum, mentees and mentors will share advice and lessons learned. They will also discuss questions related to the motivation and fears of language learners and bilingual identity. A similar forum will be held again in June and the mentoring pairs will continue their cooperation until autumn this year.

The aim of the mentoring project, co-financed from the European Social Fund, is to offer an alternative to traditional language courses and enable teachers of Russian-language schools improve their Estonian language skills according to their individual needs and possibilities. The project will also prepare teachers to the gradual transition to bilingual instruction at Russian-language schools where 60 per cent of subjects will have to be instructed in Estonian by the academic year 2011/2012.