Embracing Language Diversity in Your Classroom - 2021 Edition

Teachers often face a number of complex challenges linked to the increasing language diversity experienced in many classrooms across Europe. Free movement across intra-European borders as well as increasing migration into Europe has made the language situation in Europe increasingly diverse over the last decades, and many teachers are struggling to find the most suitable way of approaching this situation.

The term “teacher language awareness” (TLA) refers to “the interface between what teachers know, or need to know, about language and their pedagogical practice” (Andrews 2008). Although TLA is mostly referred to in the context of language teaching, it is also highly relevant to teachers of others subjects who are working in multi-lingual environments. While many teachers are already language-aware, many others are not conscious of the fact that linguistic diversity cannot only be perceived as a problem, but also as a very valuable pedagogical resource.

Aims and Learning Objectives

The aim of the “Language-aware teacher” MOOC is to enhance teachers’ awareness about the language competences of their students and how to benefit from them as well as to provide them with different tools and resources to support them to deliver curricular subjects in different languages.

This MOOC is especially valuable to teachers who are new to working in bilingual and CLIL projects or have little experience of these, and it will serve to provide participants with various tools and resources they can easily integrate in their lessons for a more efficient and innovative teaching and learning. This MOOC focuses on raising awareness about the advantage of having students from diverse nationalities and speaking different languages in the same classroom can actually be used as an asset providing a benefit and added value to their classrooms. Besides, the MOOC will serve to help teachers to build learning scenarios for Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) in a framework of 21st century skills.

Module 1: The importance of language awareness

Module 2: Turning language diversity into an asset for your teaching

Module 3: Content and language integrated learning

Module 4: Multilingual classroom projects