Languages Work*

Health and Social Care

 

Two million people are employed in Health and Social Care professions in the UK. As our society becomes increasingly multilingual, the ability to communicate in other languages becomes important at all levels, from support workers to consultants.

 

1. Which languages, apart from English, are spoken in your local community?

• Answer

  You may be surprised to learn the number of different languages spoken in your local community. There is currently no provision in the census to ask about language skills, but research carried out by CILT, the National Centre for Languages has identified some interesting statistics. For example, in Scotland, at least 11,000 children speak at least 104 languages; in Wales, at least 8,000 children speak at least 98 languages; and in England, at least 702,000 children speak at least 300 languages.

2. If you don’t know already, find out how to say ‘hello’ in those languages. 


• Answer

  Learn how to say hello and other common phrases that you may find useful at school, work, or on holiday by visiting www.cilt.org.uk/promoting. A ‘hello’ pronunciation guide is also available to accompany the resources celebrating the European Day of Languages, held annually on 26 September.

3. Which languages might be useful in addition to English?

• Answer

  There is no right or wrong answer, but hopefully you have started to think about the variety of circumstances in which language skills are important. A recent report, ‘Positively Plurilingual’ (http://www.cilt.org.uk/pdf/pubs/
  positively_plurilingual.pdf), published by CILT, the National Centre for Languages highlights the contribution of community languages to UK education and society.

   

Here are some groups of people who may not speak very good English. Say whether you think they would be more likely, less likely, or equally likely to need health and social services than English native speakers.

 

a) Foreign student b) Overseas tourist c) Refugee d) Business traveller e) Elderly member of ethnic minority community