A Foreign Language Assistant (FLA) is an assistant teacher, usually a native speaker, assisting a teacher of modern foreign languages in another country in lessons about the native language of the assistant.
The programs are meant to be of benefit for both assistants and pupils. It should help to improve the foreign language skills of the pupils on one hand and is, on the other hand, an opportunity for the assistants to deepen their language skills and their cultural knowledge, as well as a chance to get an insight into a different educational system.
In Germany, the responsible institution behind the FLA program is the Educational Exchange Service (Pädagogischer Austauschdienst), which is a governmental institution of the ministers of education of the federal states in Germany that organises and arranges international exchange programs in education on behalf of the federal states.
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Famous quotes containing the words foreign language, foreign and/or language:
“There is the fear, common to all English-only speakers, that the chief purpose of foreign languages is to make fun of us. Otherwise, you know, why not just come out and say it?”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
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“My God! The English language is a form of communication! Conversation isn’t just crossfire where you shoot and get shot at! Where you’ve got to duck for your life and aim to kill! Words aren’t only bombs and bullets—no, they’re little gifts, containing meanings!”
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