Project to create online Indigenous language courses

Collaborators

• 7000 Languages, a non-profit organization for course creation
• Prairies to Woodlands Indigenous Language Revitalization Circle (P2WILRC) – Southern Michif
• Hase' Language Revitalization Society - Kwak'wala

Objectives

• Creation of new online language learning tools for Indigenous languages by Indigenous community teams

Deliverables

New online language courses for learners of Indigenous languages:

• Kwak'wala language course
• Mi'kmaq language course (in development)
• Naskapi language course (in development)
• Southern Michif language course and Facebook beginner learning group

Activities

7000 Languages depends on speakers of the language to create content, such as vocabulary lists and audio recordings, to develop a course. Creating a course takes 50 to 100 hours of work, or about 6 to 12 months if worked on by volunteers. Work usually begins with a curriculum template, which communities can edit to fit their language and culture.

Legal information

• Communities retain ownership of all the content they create, including text and recordings.
• Each community can create unlimited free user accounts for the finished course. 7000 Languages also publishes courses, where anyone can access them for free.
• Courses are included in the education and library subscriptions distributed by Transparent Language. This means that students and library patrons will see these languages included under Transparent Language's list of "languages of the world".