No-Strings-Attached (for non-profit orgs and groups) Free Clip Art and Language Teaching Materials Resources

[Heather Souter]

Taanshi kiiyawaw, hello all,

Recently I found a website called The Language Menu that had some
useful clip art for language teaching/learning purposes.  I wrote to
the site manager to ask if on the off chance I might be able to use
the clip art from their site with no strings attached.  I received a
warm and generous response from the owner of the site.  Veronica
Gilhooly's answer was YES!  (See forwarded emails below for our
correspondence.) Since she seemed so genuinely interested in
supporting lesser-taught languages, I mentioned ILAT and asked if I
could tell you all about her generous offer and if she would allow
others to use the resources on the site as well.  Again, she said YES!

So, if you are interested,  here is the website address and also
Veronica Gilhooly's address as well.

The Language Menu   www.thelanguagemenu.com
Veronica Gilhooly      office at thelanguagemenu.com

Also, you may want to check out the English Banana.  (Much of the
stuff on their site could be adapted to any language.)  They have a
progressive copying policy (check this out on their site) that allows
organizations and groups to use the clip art and other materials on
their site for their own purposes (even to raise money!!!!!!) as long
as what is produced is not simply produced to sell commercially for
profit. Pretty generous if you ask me!  Anyhow, here is the link:
 The English Banana    http://www.englishbanana.com/

Eekushi pitamaa.  That is all for now.
Heather


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Learnwell Oy <office at thelanguagemenu.com>
Date: Apr 15, 2008 1:42 PM
Subject: Re: Question about Clipart on the Site
To: Heather Souter <hsouter at gmail.com>


Dear Heather

Thank you for your e-mail, I am glad you wrote back with such interest.

You are more than welcome to let the people on your ILAT list know
about the recourses and they are also welcome to use them the same way
you are. I am really happy that people are starting to use the site
for different purposes in language training and especially for
endangered languages, as this has been my aim from the start. The more
users we have the better.

If then anyone wishes to have a project with us adding their own
language to the site for teachers/students to use they can contact me.
No money needed to have the language added, it is a question of the
time to translate the word lists.

If you or someone in your group would like to write something about
your language project, we will add the text to our site and also in
our newsletter in May.This way you will get a bit more exposure in
different countries. We will hopefully be entering an EU project for
Less taught languages in the future, and if your project will be
successful with our tools/clip-art, I believe it could be a very good
reference for our project as well if we can show we have done
something previously to help "a small language".

 We will also be entering educational and language exhibitions, so
this will also be an area that your language could get some exposure
if the information is available on the site.
I will also in the future see if there is anything I can do to help
you create material for your language. If you see something we have
made and added to the site, and you would like the same thing to be
made for you, let me know and I will try to get that done if you can
add the missing text in your language.

Great you also found English Banana. They were very nice when I wrote
them about adding the worksheets and making them site of the month and
mentioned in the newsletter.

We have today added some new power points (pptx)for pronunciation with
voice overs (see the downloads area, but they will only work in office
2007 program though) so if you would like to have some made for you
that you can add the words/voice to we can also do that if you have a
possibility to make the voice overs at the university? A lot more
power points will be added in different styles. I have already started
the alphabet with pictures and choices, capitals of the world, colors,
some grammar ones and more.


I also added a link to your website for Technology-Enhanced language
Revitalization in our links area for language projects. If anyone you
know work on language projects and they would like to be have their
project website linked, please ask them to contact me. Same goes for
any project if I can be of assistance material-wise or in
dissemination of the language project.

A couple of tips regarding using the tools with languages not in our database:

a) download the PDF file from the downloads area called "Teacher's
tools in English". This will guide you through all the possibilities
of how to use the tools to make worksheets in different ways.
 b) As your language isn't in the database, choose for instance the
tool "Label the picture", pictures with answers to choose from and
language English. When you have chosen the corresponding pictures,
instead of printing the page, change the English words to your
language and then you have the worksheet with the words in your
language to choose from. This can be done in several of the tools,
just change the English word. I did notice that your language has
quite long words, so you might have to choose 9 or 12 pictures instead
of 15, 16 or 20 for the text not to be on top of each other. Try and
see what works.

I look forward to hearing from you and wishing you luck in your project.
BR
Veronica

Veronica Gilhooly
MD
Learnwell Oy
The Language Menu
Tehtaankatu 7
00140 Helsinki, Finland
+358 50 531 1453
 veronica.gilhooly at thelanguagemenu.com
www.thelanguagemenu.com



On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 8:07 PM, Heather Souter <hsouter at gmail.com> wrote:

> Taanshi Veronica,
>
> Kihchi-maarsii pur toñ iimeil!  Mituni ki-kisheewaatishin.  Mituni
> kihchi-maarsii!  Thank-you for your email.  You are very generous.
> Thank-you very, very much!
>
> I have told my supervising professor about your offer and she was very
> excited.  I also told her about English Banana and its special copying
> permission.  It is fantastic that there are some folks out there who
> understand about under-resourced languages and populations.  (I knew
> if I kept looking I would find some....)
>
>By the way, many other indigenous language
(revitalization/reclamation) >activists who have great difficulty in
finding clip art, etc. to create language
> learning/teaching materials.  Many of them subscribe to a mailing list
> out of the University of Arizona.  The list is called Indigenous
> Languages And Technology or ILAT for short.  Would it be all right if
> I told the list about your generous offer to me?  Would you welcome
> other indigenous language activists using your site in the same way
> you have said that I could use it?  I know that it would be a
> wonderful resource that would free up time ( so precious in regard to
> endangered languages!) and money (which is ALWAYS lacking!) so that
> more materials could be created and distributed....
>
> I will understand, of course, if you are not in a position to offer
> the same kind of use of your site as you have me, but I am sure you
> understand why I had to ask!  I will, of course, tell the mailing list
> about the English Banana (which I only learned about from you site!).
>
> Ah baeñ, kihchi-maarsii kihtwaam!  Ekushi pitamaa.
> Well, thanks again! That is all for now.
> Heather
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On 4/6/08, Learnwell Oy <office at thelanguagemenu.com> wrote:
> > Dear Heather
> > Thank you for your e-mail.I am happy to tell you a positive answer to your
> > request, yes , you may use the clip-art and any of the other material we
> > have on the site as you wish and add it a your website, no fee necessary. I
> > would be happy to help you out in this matter. The clip-art on the site is
> > actually drawn by a Canadian artist, Annette Hansen (see her website
> > http://www.artadore.fi/) , a personal friend of mine. She has drawn all the
> > nouns and animals, while the people, musical instruments and the verbs are
> > drawn by Petra Bergström, a Finnish artist.
> >
> > The website is owned by my company and it has been my "hobby" for the past 2
> > years to develop it, so it's a privately owned site, but as I am a teacher
> > myself and during the past few years I felt there was a need for tools for
> > teachers, so I developed them to my requirements and therefore still keeping
> > the site free for all teachers and students to use.
> >
> > One of the things I have been interested in, has been to develop material
> > for less taught languages, and as both Finnish and Swedish belong to that
> > group, the project was actually started with those two languages + English.
> > As we progressed with new tools an additions to the site and had more
> > requests from our users, we have added more languages and the possibility to
> > make bilingual material.
> >
> > You language, Michif, is not one I have heard about before, so it would be
> > interesting to support such a language on our site as well.
> >
> > If you would like to add another area to your graduate program, we could
> > start a project together to  disseminate information about your language, we
> > could add an article/story about your language to our site, and send
> > information about it in our next newsletter for our members to learn about?
> > We have just over 5500 members at the moment, and our site has between 500
> > and 800 visitors per day.
> >
> > Also if you would like to translate the word lists we have in excel format
> > to Michif, which actually means the names of the pictures in the clip art
> > gallery (around 4500 words) we could add your language to the site as well,
> > which would then make it possible for children to use the interactive
> > vocabulary games to practice vocabulary and for teachers to use the pictures
> > together with the translated words in their worksheets. You could maybe have
> > a chat to someone who is engaged in working with the Michif language, your
> > peer language activists / university professor about this?
> >
> > Anyhow, if you are interested let me know and feel free to e-mail me or call
> > me if you would like to talk about the possibility of a project like this.
> > If you are not interested, I hope you will be able to find material suitable
> > for your project from our site and I wish you the best with your program and
> > I hope you will let me know how the project went when you are done.
> >
> > I have also recently written an book called fun with flashcards, an idea
> > book for teachers of how to use flashcards in class with over 150+ ideas and
> > worksheet examples for every idea. The Swedish version is ready, and I am
> > now working on the English version.It should be finalized hopefully at the
> > end of this month. I will add some credits to your account today, and when
> > it will be in the online shop, and you will then be able to download it for
> > free for your project.It will give you ideas on games to play with children
> > as well as teaching grammar, vocabulary, role plays, conversation etc for
> > school aged children to adults.
> >
> > Wishing you a nice spring and success in your project.
> > Best regards
> >
> > Veronica
> >
> > Veronica Gilhooly
> > MD
> > Learnwell Oy
> > The Language Menu
> > Tehtaankatu 7
> > 00140 Helsinki, Finland
> > +358 50 531 1453
> >  veronica.gilhooly at thelanguagemenu.com
> > www.thelanguagemenu.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Apr 6, 2008 at 9:28 PM, Heather Souter <hsouter at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Taanshi Camperville, Manitoba, Canada uschi!  Heather Souter
> > > d-ishinikaashon.  En Michif (Métis) niiya.  D-ushipeehikaan añ ma
> > > lañg-inaan, Michif.
> > >
> > > Hello from Camperville, Manitoba, Canada!  My name is Heather Souter.
> > > I am a Michif (Métis).  I am writing to you in Michif.
> > >
> > > I am a graduate student registered at the University of Kansas but I
> > > have returned to my home in Canada for personal reasons.  I will be
> > > transferring to a graduate program at the University of Lethbridge,
> > > Alberta, Canada this fall.  I will be doing an MA in Michif
> > > linguistics while working towards the revitalization of our highly
> > > endangered language.
> > >
> > > Michif (sometimes known as Chippewa-Cree in the US) is a highly
> > > endangered language spoken only by Michif (Métis) in Canada and some
> > > Michif (Chippewa-Cree) in North Dakota and Montana. It is known by
> > > linguists as a "mixed" language (aren't all languages mixed?!!)  as it
> > > is based on two typologically different languages: Cree and French.
> > > However, it is not just "mix" of Cree and French as some morphological
> > > process and lexical items only occur in Michif (and not in either Cree
> > > or French).  At present, there are perhaps only 200-300 fluent
> > > speakers of language left, almost all of whom are over 70 years old
> > > and many in poor health.  At present, the language is not taught to
> > > children in the home nor in the schools.  I and other language
> > > activists are hoping to change that in spite of our lack of resources
> > > to do so.  (Hope springs eternal!!!)
> > >
> > > I am writing to ask you about the clip art on the site.  Is it in the
> > > public domain?  If not, could I get permission to use some of the clip
> > > art without fee in teaching/learning materials for Michif?  Also, can
> > > I store pdf files that are presently available and/or those that I
> > > create on a website for the promotion of the Michif language?  Nothing
> > > would be for profit-making purposes. I have been looking for a
> > > "benefactor" in regards to clip art and such for a long time, but so
> > > far everyone who has answered has declined citing the amount of money
> > > they have invested in creating the artwork.  I am hoping that this
> > > time I might have found a group who would like to help and are in a
> > > position to do so....
> > >
> > > In closing, I would like to commend you on your fine site.  Now, if
> > > you think you might be able to help in some way, please do get in
> > > touch!   And, please do not hesitate to ask me any questions about
> > > Michif, Métis people, or graduate work!  I would be happy to share
> > > what I know with you....
> > >
> > > Kihchi-maarsii!  Eekoshi.
> > > Thank-you very much.  That is all.
> > >
> > > Heather Souter
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Veronica Gilhooly
> > MD
> > Learnwell Oy
> > The Language Menu
> > Tehtaankatu 7
> > 00140 Helsinki, Finland
> > +358 50 531 1453
> > veronica.gilhooly at thelanguagemenu.com
> >  www.thelanguagemenu.com
>



-- 
Veronica Gilhooly
MD
Learnwell Oy
The Language Menu
Tehtaankatu 7
00140 Helsinki, Finland
+358 50 531 1453
veronica.gilhooly at thelanguagemenu.com
 www.thelanguagemenu.com