Standardization

The Czech dialects of Zelów, Kuców, and Kłodzko Valley are not standardized. The local Czechs learned the language predominantly at home, but also by contact with religious texts and newspapers in Czech and Slovak. Before World War II, literary Czech was taught in Czech schools, thanks to the support of The Czech Educational Society. Due to the contact of those dialects with literary/standard Czech, they become similar (mainly from the lexical point of view) to Polish, which is a primary source of neologisms (Wróblewski 1996: 71ffWróblewski 1996 / komentarz/comment/r /
Wróblewski, Piotr 1996. Społeczność czeska w Zelowie. Problemowa monografia socjologiczna. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper.
).
Despite the gradual assimilation, Czechs from Zelów do not remain passive towards it; they try to cultivate their cultural and linguistic uniqueness:

• although services in the Evangelical-Reformed church in Zelów are conducted exclusively in Polish, the church choir sings in Czech (on chosen Sundays hymns as well);
• members of the Czech minority in Zelów remain in contact with the Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren in the Czech Republic; because of this, two or three times a year the Liturgy and the Sermon are conducted in Czech by a priest who comes from the Czech Republic on that day (the translation is available for those who do not understand Czech);
• each year, one or two people from Zelów go to the Czech Republic to attend a three-week course of Czech language. It is organized in cooperation with the Czech Embassy;
• on average, every two or three years Polish children go on summer holidays together with Czech children;
• students from the Czech Republic are being invited to Zelów as voluntaries, and conduct Czech lessons with children in the church (usually during summer holidays)
• the inhabitants are exposed to Czech literature and cinema in the above mentioned Czech Club.