Volume 8, Issue 1 -

In an increasingly globalised world, English-medium tertiary education has become increasingly prominent and sought after. However, non-native speaker (NNS) school-leavers entering an English-medium university, whether as NNS local students or as international students, not only encounter those challenges faced by all freshmen students, but often also soon realise that there is a gap between the English language skills with which their school education had equipped them and those needed for effective English-medium tertiary study. Their lack of competence in academic writing presents perhaps the greatest challenge. This paper will examine data relating to NNS students’ experience as freshmen writers. These data are derived from a longitudinal study aiming to understand the language-related challenges faced by first and second year NNS students in an English-medium higher education institution in Hong Kong. The paper concludes by proposing two collaborative initiatives whereby English language teachers work with content subject teachers with the aim of providing language enhancement support that is relevant to the student’s programme of study and integrated into their content studies. With a global increase in the number of NNS students studying in English-medium universities (Murray 2016, Standards of English in higher education . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), the challenges and possible ways of addressing these that are discussed in this paper are potentially directly relevant to universities in whichever country they operate.

Résumé Les soirées cinéma-débat (« Le Droit dans le cinéma/Recht im Film ») organisées par la faculté de droit de l’Université bilingue de Fribourg (CH) sur des thématiques transversales – la liberté en 2016, la révolution en 2017 – ont amené l’équipe d’enseignants du programme « bilingue plus » à compléter leur dispositif de formation en langue de spécialité afin de mieux répondre aux finalités fixées par le rectorat de l’université, à savoir le renforcement du bilinguisme français-allemand et de l’interdisciplinarité. La rédaction d’un Dossier regroupant des écrits de nature variée – conçus dans une posture analytique, critique mais aussi réflexive, à partir de supports aussi variés que la caricature, le film, le roman ou la table-ronde – s’est progressivement imposée comme la macro-tâche articulant tous les savoir-faire nourrissant le programme. Cette réorientation du programme est sous-tendue par des changements importants aussi bien sur le plan méthodologique que sur celui des stratégies d’apprentissage : l’enseignant est tenu d’évoluer entre les différentes perspectives en langue de spécialité et l’étudiant est amené à progresser entre les langues et les disciplines de façon non linéaire, sur le mode de la digression. L’article propose un état des lieux de cette expérience d’enseignement-laboratoire interdisciplinaire, donnée autant que possible en mode tandem .

Today the Framework for 21st Century Learning developed by the Partnership for 21st Century Learning (P21) is widely recognized and has been used in the U.S., Canada and New Zealand. P21 defines and illustrates the skills and knowledge students need and states that critical thinking is fundamental for twenty-first century success and essential for success in an academic context. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) also values the importance of cultivating critical thinking. However, critical thinking is not a part of the EFL curriculum in Japan, and lessons are not focused on the development of meta-cognitive strategies. How do we help students learn foreign languages and twenty-first Century Skills at the same time? Active learning and content and language integrated learning (CLIL) offer such a learning environment where learners enhance their cognitive skills and gain knowledge while they are learning content and language. This paper reports on a study that explores how active learning with CLIL instruction helps Japanese EFL learners to develop critical thinking skills. In the author’s student-centered instruction based class, critical thinking was stimulated with questions based on the revised Bloom’s taxonomy to develop lower and higher order thinking skills while various scaffolding activities were provided. Pretest-posttest results from the Critical Thinking Disposition Scale (CTDS) and the Cornell Critical Thinking Test (CCTT) Level Z were compared to determine to what extent, if any, EFL learners developed critical thinking disposition and skills through active learning in CLIL classes. The results of the CTDS and CCTT suggest that active learning has value for increasing critical thinking.

This article reports on research that questions the existence and use of translingual practices in higher education. On the one hand, the increase of mobility in Tertiary Education leads to the presence of various individual repertoires in the classroom and, on the other hand, the use of scientific texts, usually published in English, is more and more common. These two factors impose a language choice on professors. In some cases, they may choose to use a single lingua franca, most often English, or in other cases, they may choose to undermine the English language’s hegemonic role by using what García refers to as translanguaging. This study sets out to analyse a case study in a Language and communication policies course at the University of Algarve, in Portugal. The course attendees were half local students and half Erasmus students. The professor of this course let students use their various linguistic repertoires, by using several languages during the lessons, in order to achieve a collective comprehension of the content, which in most cases was in English. In this manner, they reached what (García, Ofelia & Li Wei. 2014. Translanguaging: Language, Bilingualism and Education. Houndmills . Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan) define as the “co-construction of knowledge” in a “co-learning classroom environment”. Furthermore, the professor asked the students to take a structured multilingual final exam, in three languages, in order to stimulate and develop their multilingual competence.

The growing number of internationally mobile students who present Italian L2 language certificates on entry has led the University of Padua Language Centre (CLA) to reflect on whether it should maintain an online placement testing as a means of placing students in the relevant classes (Fratter, Ivana & Altinier. Micol 2015. Gli apprendenti di italiano L2 all’Università e le loro abitudini tecnologiche. In Francesca Helm, Linda Bradley, Marta Guarda & Sylvie Thouësny (eds.), Critical CALL – Proceedings of the 2015 EUROCALL Conference , 177–180. Dublin & Ireland: Research-publishing.net.). As of Academic Years 2014–2015 and 2015–2016, a research project has been underway at the CLA, involving the experimentation of a new integrated system of assessment comprising self-assessment and placement testing. An initial review of the placement test results carried out at the CLA combined with an examination of language certificates presented by the students has raised some critical issues related to incongruous data among the various tests/certifications. Other situations have shown different results regarding language skills within the same test, which has underpinned the decision to introduce a system of self-assessment so as to grant greater autonomy and responsibility to the students when choosing their class. This study sets out to analyze whether exchange students at the CLA are in a position to assess their own level of competence in L2 Italian, and then choose the Italian language class most suited to their language needs, thereby making class formation procedures easier. To this end, two different self-assessment tools were assigned to the students who, in turn, revealed the difficulties they encountered when self- assessing their language level without guidance. This has led to a new approach for self-assessment. This study highlights the process and initial results of research carried out in two phases of experimentation involving a new self-assessment proposal with integrated tools.

In today’s world, individuals should be able to maintain their expertise amidst constant changes. Thus, this type of agency should be supported in higher education. One approach for a teacher-researcher to examine supporting agency and how it manifests itself in higher education courses is through the learning design. In this article, learning design is defined as the planned course path and the way in which that path is enacted in the course in a real-life setting. Thus, the learning design of a blended EAP course is examined, with a focus on the course assignments in two different groups in two consecutive years. Different types of agency were assumed through the tasks and those types of agency were expressed in the learners’ completed texts. For example, tasks in which learners were positioned as traditional “students” presented problems in terms of the learners’ agency. Instead, tasks fostering the learners’ position as experts, their initiative and accountability to draw on their life-worlds were deemed to support the type of agency necessary and valuable for academic graduates. Design-based research strategy was employed to allow a cyclical process of developing the design based on the results of the previous cycle. It is hoped that the insights gained through the research might inform the planning of higher education language courses.

This article deals with a learning environment survey conducted among University of Helsinki students and language teachers in the university’s Language Centre (LC). The survey was designed to acquire information for the development of a practical strategy for the digitalization of language learning and teaching by the local LC. The article presents the central results of the survey by systematically comparing the student (N=219) and teacher (N=39) data, and it also considers more general implications. The investigated areas include attitudes towards and experiences of out-of-classroom (language) learning environments in general and digital environments in particular. Special attention was in the possible differences and similarities of the response groups’ views and experiences in order to point out possible gaps as specific challenges within the local context. One of the most central findings is that while there may be challenges, particularly in designing pedagogy for online environments, no huge generational gaps exist in attitudes towards online tools.

A considerable body of research has grown up on learners’ perceptions of computer-assisted language learning, clearly a key consideration for curriculum designers and teachers involved in the planning and deployment of technology. This article aims to contribute to this work by focusing specifically on learners of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) (n=20) in light of their experiences with a blended learning course (classroom + Moodle). Analysis of semi-structured interviews suggests generally positive attitudes towards the experience, and yields insights into the specific aspects of the course which were valued by students and which were less so.

This report describes the opportunities, challenges and limits of evidence-based quality improvement in university language teaching. Using treffpunkt sprachen – Centre for Language, Plurilingualism and Didactics at the University of Graz as an example, it provides a brief explanation of the centre and then presents the prioritization of content in teaching and research. In the process, it is necessary to investigate the supply and demand for courses and to use statistics as evidence. In addition, research strategies to promote young researchers are presented whose realization documents the development of the language centre into a centre of research on university didactics. Next, an analysis is made of effective quality assurance measures that are able to be determined in the purposeful application of research findings. Finally, opportunities and potentials in teaching and research are scrutinized and their positive implications for the centre are explained.

This report illustrates the context and development of the Intercultural Learning module, provided by the Modern Language Centre (MLC), King’s College London. The Intercultural Learning Module is a one semester undergraduate course mostly attended by visiting study abroad students. The module aims to enhance students’ intercultural awareness and skills through an interdisciplinary approach comprising Cultural Studies, Applied Linguistics, Anthropology, Psychology and Research Methods. Throughout the course students carry out an ethnographic project on a cultural topic of their choice, for which they are assessed. The principles and tools of ethnography are deeply embedded in the module content as a process of cultural observation and discovery. Over the past three years, students’ feedback has been very positive and participant numbers have increased consistently. Four parallel classes (2 per semester) run per academic year. Resulting from the increasing popularity of the course and from the internationalisation strategy of the College, the MLC is currently offering a number of ad hoc training sessions on intercultural awareness and communication to different departments and members of the public. Training sessions differ from the module in depth and scope, but they are underpinned by the same reflection on intercultural theory and practical examples tailored to the audience.

In this report, we present certain teaching activities employed at the University of Calabria and at the I.T.C. C. Mortati high school. The former were conducted within the English for Basic Academic Skills courses, the latter in the Spanish as a Foreign Language classes for students in the last two years of high school. The grammar and linguistic knowledge required for writing and gap filling letters, emails and short messages are often problematic to students struggling to learn a foreign language. The teaching experiences illustrated show, on the other hand, how formal and informal letters can be presented to pupils by combining conventional writing practice with other creative techniques such as Total Physical Response, in order to make the lessons more dynamic and entertaining in a relaxed environment. More specifically, letters will be re-assembled in a jumbled style, through a cut and paste technique. Pieces of text will then be given to students at random in order to create a reasonable collage. Special attention will also be given to the specific contexts of action research.

With the advent of web 2.0 and the ease of use of many hand-held devices, access to the internet has never been easier. This has been accompanied by a growing range of sites available for learning an L2. These sites offer lessons, explanations, exercises, corrections and feedback. It now becomes time once again to question whether physical bricks and mortar language centres are necessary any longer, or whether the language centre can now be held in the palm of our hands. With special regard to English, this paper reports on a survey carried out at a university language centre in the south of Italy, where students are regularly involved in face-to-face lessons, but whose courses also involve guided use of websites and independent use of websites outside of the confines of the language centre. The survey is designed to investigate how students react to these different EFL learning scenarios and what they feel the future holds in store for us concerning the use of language centres. Finally, by uniting the strands of the student’s perspective of one particular case and ideas from the literature, this paper attempts to give a clear picture of what a language centre contributes to academic life, with the aim of contributing to the discussion of what the future holds for these centres.