Building blocks for planning language-sensitive teacher education

What are the professional competences required by language teachers in order to provide useful feedback to their learners? In October 2023, the University of Uppsala (Sweden) hosted the Scandinavian conference for language teachers and teacher educators (SKOLU – Skandinavisk konferens för lärare och lärarutbildare i språk) dedicated to the topic of feedback. Lukas Bleichenbacher, lecturer at the University of Teacher Education St.Gallen in Switzerland, was invited to deliver a workshop for participants to reflect on how giving feedback involves a whole range of professional competences. The discussion was illustrated with references to a range of materials produced by the European Centre for Modern Languages (ECML) of the Council of Europe, with a focus on the new Building blocks for planning language-sensitive education resource website. The participants shared their insights on various teacher competences required for feedback, concluding with  a focus on how feedback involves plurilingual, intercultural and cooperative competences, alongside pedagogical ones.

Lukas Bleichenbacher

Mr Bleichenbacher’s participation at the event was enabled through the ECML’s national  support scheme.

“Inspiring innovation in language education: changing contexts, evolving competences” – Join the livestream!

The conference represents the culmination of the four years of work of the ECML’s “Inspiring innovation in language education: changing contexts, evolving competences”  programme, involving, among others, 9projects, 1think tank, 12offers of training and consultancy (TaC) and a series of initiatives developed with the support of the European Commission.

The conference is aimed at all language education professionals and in particular at ECML stakeholders, policy makers and persons with a professional focus on the practice of language education (curriculum development, teacher education, material design…).

The programme involves plenary presentations, speeches, a round table, a series of smaller workshops for the presentation and discussion of programme outputs and outcomes as well as envisaged links to activities in the 2024-2027 programme.

The workshops on the second day of the conference will be organised thematically:

• Language teacher and learner competences,
• Transversal dimension of language education / Competences for life and work,
• Plurilingual and intercultural education,
• Languages of schooling; language in subjects.

Within each given theme there will be a focus on the completed project resources and related TaC activities from the current programme. Presenters will focus on the inspiring and innovative aspects of their TaC activity/new resources and will consider how the different approaches and materials presented in their thematic session complement one other.

This will also be an excellent opportunity to get a preview of the new ECML programme “Language education at the heart of democracy” (2024-2027).

In order to ensure access to a wider audience, the event will be streamed in both working languages (English and French) and the recordings made available on the ECML website.

Conference web page: English – French

Conference programme: English – French

Join the live streaming here – no registration required: English – French

#ECMLCELVconf2023

In summer 2023, the team responsible for the “Building Blocks for Planning Language-sensitive Teacher Education” project completed a further cornerstone of their project. The Teacher Competence Profiles are at the heart of a Building Block that offers teacher educators, as well as (future) teachers, opportunities to reflect on the professional competences underpinning language-sensitive education.

The Profiles competence areas such as methodology, digital competences, and language competences, but also collaboration, career-long learning, language awareness and, last but not least, a set of core principles and values. The Profiles themselves can be used as a set of instruments in their own right.

However, the main aim of the Building Block is to illustrate the various competences to be focused on in planning teacher education curricula, courses, and teaching practice, as addressed in the other Building Blocks.

The competence dimensions are inspired by a number of ECML projects concerned with teacher competences, including the Guide to teacher competences for language in education, Promoting excellence in sign language education, and Developing teacher competences for pluralistic approaches.

The most innovative aspect of the Building Block Profiles is the way in which they illustrate, through common and subject-specific illustrative examples, where the specific language-related competences needed by teachers of different languages and other subjects overlap, and where they may differ.

The project team: Lukas Bleichenbacher (project coordinator), Nataša Pirih Svetina, Richard Rossner, Anna Schröder-Sura

• Project website Building blocks for planning language-sensitive teacher education (English – German): www.ecml.at/languagesensitiveteachereducation

On 14^th-15^th February 2023 the Building Blocks for Language-Sensitive Education project team led a very productive workshop in Graz. 36 delegates from a wide range of ECML member states participated and shared their experience of and expertise in language-sensitive education. The main aim of the workshop was to present drafts of the six Building Blocks for language sensitive teacher education developed by the project team. Following this, the participants in discussion groups shared invaluable feedback with the team, offering many suggestions for further developing the Building Block resources during the second year of the project. In addition, several participants offered brief presentations and documentation on the impressive work that is being done on language-sensitive education and teacher education, for example in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany and Ireland.

The next steps are revision and further development of the Building Blocks in the light of the feedback received and then piloting of the Building Blocks with teacher educators and teachers. Several workshop participants have already offered to conduct piloting in their respective national contexts. The project team members were very grateful for the interest, and enthusiasm shown during the workshop and for the resulting discussions.

Clearly, language-sensitive education spanning the whole curriculum and all phases of education is seen as a very important topic and a key means of enhancing the quality of education for all learners, as well as of fostering plurilingualism and positive engagement with diversity.

Richard Rossner

• Project website Building blocks for planning language-sensitive teacher education (English – German): www.ecml.at/languagesensitiveteachereducation  

*****

Angeregte Diskussionen und wertvolles Feedback führen zu weiterer Zusammenarbeit zur Entwicklung von Bausteinen für die Planung sprachsensibler Lehrpersonenbildung

Am 14. und 15. Februar 2023 hat das Team des Projekts Bausteine für die Planung sprachsensibler Lehrpersonenbildung einen sehr erfolgreichen Workshop in Graz durchgeführt.
36 VertreterInnen aus zahlreichen Mitgliedsstaaten des EFSZ haben daran teilgenommen und ihre Erfahrungen sowie ihre Expertise im Bereich der sprachensensiblen Bildung miteinander geteilt. Das Hauptziel dieses Workshops war es, die ersten Fassungen der sechs vom Projektteam entwickelten Bausteine für sprachensensible Lehrpersonenbildung vorzustellen. Anschliessend haben die Teilnehmenden in mehreren Diskussionsrunden wertvolles Feedback mit dem Team geteilt und vielfältige Vorschläge für die Weiterentwicklung der Bausteine im zweiten Projektjahr gemacht. Darüber hinaus gaben Teilnehmende aus Belgien, Deutschland, Frankreich, Irland und Österreich Einblicke in ihre beeindruckenden Arbeiten im Bereich der sprachensensiblen Bildung und Lehrpersonenbildung. 

Die nächsten Schritte im Projekt werden die Überarbeitung und Weiterentwicklung der Bausteine unter Berücksichtigung des erhaltenen Feedbacks sein sowie die Pilotierung der Bausteine mit Lehrpersonen und Ausbildenden von Lehrpersonen.
Mehrere Workshop-Teilnehmende haben sich bereit erklärt, Pilotprojekte in ihren jeweiligen nationalen Kontexten durchzuführen. Das Projektteam war für das Interesse und die Begeisterung, die während des Workshops gezeigt wurden, sowie für die inhaltlichen Diskussionen sehr dankbar.

Sprachensensible Bildung, die sich als Querschnittsaufgabe über das gesamte Curriculum und alle Bildungsphasen erstreckt, wird eindeutig als ein bedeutsames Thema und ein wichtiges Mittel zur Verbesserung der Bildungsqualität für alle Lernenden und zur Förderung von Mehrsprachigkeit sowie eines positiven Umgangs mit Vielfalt angesehen.

Richard Rossner

Übersetzung: Anna Schröder-Sura

• Projektwebseite Bausteine für die Planung sprachsensibler Lehrpersonenbildung (Englisch – Deutsch): www.ecml.at/languagesensitiveteachereducation

In late May 2022, the “Building blocks” project team were fortunate to be able to travel to Graz for their second expert meeting. Two days of intensive work were devoted to discussing and improving the first drafts of what will become the project outputs. While these will mainly be concerned with the language-related elements that are too often missing in curricula for initial and in-service teacher education, the team members agreed on the importance of also aligning teacher education with the language-related specifications in national or state curricula for learners.

The planned building blocks, which will include texts, graphics, and links to existing projects and resources, will cover a range of sub-topics that are relevant for planning teacher education with a language-specific focus. These topics include references to key European policy recommendations, an accessible definition of language-sensitive education, and tasks to raise the target audiences’ awareness of language-related learner competences in curricula. At the core of the output, there will be practical tasks and recommendations for enriching teacher education curricula and selected modules of pre- and in-service education, as well as observation and teaching practice, with a (greater) focus on language-related issues across subject boundaries. In addition, teacher educators will be offered model profiles of language-related teacher competences for different categories of teachers, containing some dimensions that overlap these categories, and others that are needed for specific kinds of teaching.

The first building blocks will be made available for piloting and feedback after summer, in preparation for the main workshop, which will take place at the ECML on 14-15 February 2023.

Authors: Lukas Bleichenbacher, Nataša Pirih Svetina, Richard Rossner, Anna Schröder-Sura

• ECML project website “Building blocks for planning language-sensitive teacher education” (2022-2023, available in English and German) www.ecml.at/languagesensitiveteachereducation

This new two-year ECML project was launched in January 2022 at an online expert meeting of the project team. The aim of the project is to devise a set of products aimed at teacher educators and curriculum planners, to assist them in the planning of language-sensitive teacher education across all subjects.

At the meeting, the team members drafted a definition of language-sensitive education that will inform the project work and compiled a shortlist of relevant European and national resources that will provide the background for developing the building blocks. The building blocks will include recommendations for reviewing existing teacher education curricula and courses by, for example, adding various modules and activities aimed at developing (future) teachers’ language awareness and language competences. Sample hands-on tasks for initial and in-service teacher education will illustrate these recommendations. The building blocks will also stimulate debate about the language-related competences required by all teachers, and about those which are needed by teachers of specific subjects including foreign languages and the language(s) of schooling.

First drafts of the building blocks will be shared with members of the project network as of early summer 2022 and revised for discussion at a project workshop early in 2023.

Lukas Bleichenbacher, Natasa Pirih Svetina, Richard Rossner, Anna Schröder Sura

Project website available in English and German: www.ecml.at/languagesensitiveteachereducation

*****

« Matériaux pour une formation des enseignant·e·s sensible à la dimension linguistique » : lancement du projet
Première réunion en ligne de l'équipe de projet (12-13 janvier 2022)

Ce nouveau projet de deux ans du CELV a été lancé en janvier 2022 lors d'une réunion d'experts en ligne de l'équipe de projet. Son objectif est de concevoir un ensemble de produits destinés aux formateurs d'enseignants et aux concepteurs de programmes d'études, afin de les aider à planifier une formation enseignante sensible aux langues dans toutes les matières.

Lors de la réunion, les membres de l'équipe ont rédigé une définition de l'éducation sensible aux langues qui servira de base au travail du projet et ont compilé une liste de ressources européennes et nationales pertinentes sur lesquelles s'appuiera le développement des modules. Les modules comprendront des recommandations pour réviser les programmes et les cours existants pour la formation des enseignants, par exemple en ajoutant divers modules et activités visant à développer la conscience et les compétences linguistiques des (futurs) enseignants. Des exemples de tâches pratiques pour la formation initiale et continue des enseignants illustreront ces recommandations. Les modules stimuleront également le débat sur les compétences relatives aux langues, requises pour tous les enseignants, ainsi que sur celles nécessaires aux enseignants de matières spécifiques, notamment de langues étrangères et de la/des langues de scolarisation.

Les premières versions des modules seront partagées avec les membres du réseau du projet au début de l'été 2022. Elles seront révisées en vue de la discussion prévue dans le cadre de l'atelier du projet qui se tiendra au début de 2023.

Lukas Bleichenbacher, Natasa Pirih Svetina, Richard Rossner, Anna Schröder Sura

Site web du projet disponible en anglais et en allemand : www.ecml.at/languagesensitiveteachereducation

In January 2022 the ECML launched a new 2-year project entitled “Building blocks for planning language-sensitive teacher education”. This project responds to the need in member states to strengthen languages awareness in teacher education programmes.

The purpose of the project is to develop resources in the form of building blocks for teacher educators and curriculum planners working with teachers of different languages and subjects. The building blocks include guidelines to help ensure that a focus on language-sensitive education is built into teacher education curricula and courses. The aim is to enable practising and future teachers to help their students to meet their language and communication needs. 

This project is coordinated by Lukas Bleichenbacher, PH St. Gallen (Switzerland). More information is available on the project website.