Young migrants
Supporting multilingual classrooms

In the recent Communication "Strengthening European Identity through Education and Culture - The European Commission's contribution to the Leaders' meeting in Gothenburg, 17 November 2017", language learning has emerged as one of the European Commission's priorities. Over the last years, the Commission has worked together with the Member States to identify successful strategies for language learning in multilingual settings and to facilitate the sharing of good practices in the field.

A Lunchtime debate about how language learning should be promoted in schools will take place in Brussels on 6 February 2018, 12:00-14:00. The session will be opened by Kristina Cunningham (Multilingualism Policy, Directorate General for Education and Culture of the European Commission), who will discuss the role of languages in the European Education Area. It will be followed by a presentation of two new reports that offer a comprehensive view on literacy and language learning and that take into account the challenges and opportunities facing schools and teachers, including the need to accommodate increasing linguistic diversity in the classrooms:

• Rethinking language education in schools
• Language teaching and learning in multilingual classrooms (presenting many examples of ECML projects)

From the EC contract partner ECORYS, François Staring and Laurie Day will help present the reports. Three external experts, Dina Mehmedbegovic, Kristin Brogan and Deirdre Kirwan will be asked to comment and kick off the discussion. In the past years, Kristin and Deirdre have been involved in several projects, think tanks, training and consultancy initiatives and/or conferences of the European Centre for Modern Languages of the Council of Europe.

The event is open to staff from other DGs of the European Commission and it will be web-streamed.

Find out more

• EC web section dedicated to multilingual classrooms
• ECML training and consultancy “Young migrants – Supporting multilingual classrooms”

Related ECML projects and thematic collection

• A Framework of Reference for Pluralistic Approaches to Languages and Cultures: Competences and Resources (FREPA) (2012)
• Collaborative community approach to migrant education – A virtual open course for educators (EDUCOMIGRANT) (2015)
• Content-based teaching + Plurilingual/-cultural awareness (ConBaT+) ( (2011)
• Language skills for successful subject learning – CEFR linked descriptors for mathematics and history/civics (Language Descriptors) (2015)
• Majority language instruction as basis for plurilingual education (MARILLE) (2011)
• Teaching the language of schooling in the context of diversity – Study materials for teacher development (Maledive) (2015)
• Thematic collection on Migration and language education

With the increasingly diverse linguistic and cultural composition of classrooms around Europe, this topic has become a central issue in language education.

This one and a half day event will bring together several renowned experts in the field of pluralistic and pluricultural approaches to discuss progress that has been made in this field in recent years, giving special emphasis to how projects initiated under the auspices of the ECML have supported the development and expansion of this important area. 

At the core of this colloquium will be the contribution made by the Framework of Reference for Pluralistic Approaches (FREPA) and its impact on different aspects of language education throughout Europe.

This colloquium will be of particular interest to those who are engaged in pluralistic education, whether as teachers, teacher educators or curriculum designers, and aims to support their efforts in facilitating change in this area. The contributions from experts from different European countries will provide valuable insights from various European perspectives.

The event takes place in cooperation with the European Commission, within the framework of the EC-ECML "Innovative methodologies and assessment in language learning" joint action and in particular its "Supporting multilingual classrooms" initiative.

• Costs: no attendance fee; participants will be expected to cover their own travel and subsistence costs.
• Registration: 50 places in total will be available and these will be allotted strictly on a first-come, first-served basis.
• Draft programme: English – French
• Background information and online registration: English – French

Linguistic and cultural diversity is now the norm in European classrooms. What does this mean for teachers, both language teachers and teachers of other subjects? How can teachers adapt their methodology to ensure that this linguistic and cultural capital becomes a rich resource for learning? This seminar aimed to encourage teachers to question their own beliefs as they discover for themselves the answers to these questions and the wide range of free resources developed by the European Centre for Modern Languages of the Council of Europe (ECML) in support of an inclusive, plurilingual and intercultural approach to teaching and learning.

A recording of the  seminar involving Sarah Breslin, Executive Director of the ECML, and Terry Lamb, Co-coordinator of the ECML-EC Training and consultancy activity “Supporting multilingual classrooms” is now available on YouTube.