Diversity and Inclusivity in English Language Education (DIELE)

About the conference

Inclusive education aims to create equity in the classroom and raise attainment for all students, regardless of the challenges they may experience. In inclusive English language classrooms, curricula are accessible to all learners, instruction is innovative and differentiated, teachers ensure that the diverse community of learners feels welcome and valued, and the individual learners receive indispensable support to develop their inborn and new talents, and successfully achieve their goals.

This conference is an excellent opportunity for discussing key issues and current trends in promoting inclusive education in classrooms where English is taught as a foreign, second, additional or international language. A real strength of this event is that it brings together a diverse audience comprising academics, teacher educators, teacher-researchers, researchers, policy makers and materials developers, who are keen on promoting and utilising theory, research and practice to make English language education more attractive, effective, inclusive and innovative.

Conference aims

The aims of the conference are as follows:

• To offer a deeper understanding of diversity and inclusivity in English language education, and the benefits and challenges they bring to the teaching-learning process.
• To create a forum for sharing current and innovative practices that promote diversity and inclusivity in the English language classroom.
• To reflect on current English language courses and the extent to which they integrate the constructs of diversity and inclusivity into their curricula, and suggest improvements if need be.
• To promote interdisciplinary research of particular relevance to diversity and inclusivity in English language education and, more specifically, to enable teacher-researchers to present their empirical findings about specific pedagogical questions they have investigated and academic researchers to not only showcase their findings, but also enter into a dialogue about the implications of their studies for classroom practice.
• To bring together researchers and research scholars to exchange their experiences, discuss challenges and promote new approaches to researching diversity and inclusivity in English language education.
• To build a global network of experts that seeks to publicize the topics of diversity and inclusivity in English language education, and leads to the creation of two high-quality publications:
• an edited volume on Exploring Inclusivity in English Language Education: International Perspectives (edited by D. Bao, D. O’Reilly and M. Barnes); and
• a special issue of The European Journal of Applied Linguistics and TEFL on Diversity and Representation in the ELT Classroom (edited by A. Cirocki and H. Motschenbacher).

Significance of the conference

This conference will bring together academics, researchers, policy makers and materials developers to make preparations for diversity and inclusivity to become permanent in schools. The conference is a response to the significant gap in English language education and is hoped it will give prominence to the two concepts in question, thus addressing their noticeable insufficiency in current:

• debates at local and international levels;
• research, both pure and applied;
• publications that link theory, research and practice; and
• English language policies and curricula.