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Digital citizenship through language education

The project seeks to help learners become digital citizens and develop the capacity to use digital media critically, creatively and autonomously in several languages. The project will build on recommendations and guidelines from the Council of Europe and other international institutions as well as on national policies in order to develop a pedagogical framework and resources for use by language teachers.

Working languages of the project: French, English
Project term: 2020-2022
Shortcut: www.ecml.at/elangcitizen

Digital literacy for the teaching and learning of languages

Main idea and objectives

The digital democratic society, which is characterised by a high degree of cultural and linguistic diversity, requires new skills and attitudes from citizens. It requires the development of multiple literacies (digital, plurilingual, intercultural) to be a citizen who is

aware of the challenges that digital technologies and plural societies bring;
a responsible and autonomous participant in the pluralistic digital society;
creative and a player in the digital world.

This project is a pioneering initiative for the development of digital citizenship through language education. It meets the request of the Council of Europe's "Education for Digital Citizenship" project to develop concrete activities in the different school subjects.

Approach

The project will build on the socio-interactive approach developed by the e-lang project on the basis of the CEFR's action-oriented approach. The project approach will integrate a strong inclusive (targeting multilingualism and interculturality) and creative dimension. It will also focus on motivation and provide motivating activities by critically taking into account the gamification of education.

The project will give particular attention to “Real World Tasks” (cf. e-lang, ECML). These tasks allow learners to be language users on the Internet and experience:

communication in target languages or even multilingual communication;
digital participation and creativity, including through the use of multimedia;
the creation and dissemination of information on participative websites (travel guides or participative encyclopedias, forums...).

These tasks thus provide a motivating way to develop language competence and digital citizenship by allowing students to (inter)act "for real". Learners are indeed led to act as citizens and to reflect critically on their experience.

Target groups

The project addresses

decision-makers (inspectors, official programme managers, etc),
language teachers (L1, L2, L3, etc) and
language teacher educators.

It indirectly targets learners through pedagogical activities that language teachers can implement in their classes.

Flyer

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In cooperation with

Moscow State
Linguistic University

Webinar “Fostering digital citizenship through language education”

What is a digital citizen?
How does digital citizenship education link up with language education?
What type of digital language tasks can support learners to become digital citizens?

If you have ever asked or tried to answer any of these questions, this webinar, which took place within the activities of the current European Centre for Modern Languages’ project “Digital citizenship through language education” (e-lang citizen), will be of interest to you.

Primarily targeted at language teachers and teacher trainers, the webinar proposes a profile of a digital citizen as a user of languages and digital technology, based on the analysis of around one hundred recently published texts containing a definition of the “digital citizen” or identifying elements constituting digital citizenship.

The links between digital citizenship education and language education – social interaction and communication skills, plurilingual competences and mediation– have been explored during the event.

Within the project, the coordinating team, from 5 different countries, aims to establish a database, providing concrete and practical learning activities and tasks for developing digital citizenship in the language classroom. The webinar offers a look into the initial materials created. Interested experts will also find out how they can further engage with the project.

Recorded 22 June 2021

Webinar in English and French: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxlN4n4fmTQ

Envisaged project outputs

For decision-makers (inspectors, official programme managers, etc.), the project will review and summarise educational policy texts related to literacy/digital citizenship published by the ECML member states and the Council of Europe and other supra- or international institutions. It will identify priorities and educational policy orientations for the development of digital citizenship in the field of language education.

On the basis of these priorities and educational policy orientations, the project will develop a pedagogical framework for the development of digital citizenship that will be useful for decision-makers, language teachers and language teacher educators.

For language teachers and their trainers, the project will develop suggestions for concrete and practical activities (lesson plans). They will be elaborated on the basis of the orientations identified in the initial review and the pedagogical framework.

The project will deliver two information/training webinars for its target audiences, in particular language teachers and their educators.

Envisaged outcomes

The activities designed by the project team will enable L1, L2 and L3 (or even Ln) teachers to enhance their professional skills in order to help learners starting at level A2 (or A1) to

evaluate the information published on the Internet in a critical and autonomous way;
understand how the participatory web works, how information is created and disseminated;
become critical, creative and responsible actors in the participatory web;
become citizens of an inclusive (multilingual and multicultural) society.