Overview
Design a Language Station to help teachers plan, adapt, and deliver multilingual education, enabling students to leverage their multilingual backgrounds and fully engage in higher education.
The Problem
Multilingual students often face barriers in largely monolingual education systems, even as higher education becomes increasingly internationalized and requires instruction in multiple languages. Multilingualism is widely recognized as a key cultural and societal asset in Europe, yet practical tools for planning and delivering multilingual learning are still lacking. Teachers need solutions that support multilingual instruction, make key terminology accessible, and help students engage in multilingual learning environments.
What You'll Build
Design a Language Station tool or service that supports multilingual teaching and learning in University of Eastern Finland's degree programmes. The solution could process teaching materials and institutional resources, identify key terminology, adapt content for diverse language skills, produce multilingual glossaries, and raise awareness about translanguaging practices. The goal is to make teachers better prepared for multilingual teaching, save time on planning and preparation, and improve students' experience in multilingual learning environments.
Prizes
- €1000
Detailed Information
Target group
This challenge is open to students, researchers, developers, designers, educators, and innovators interested in multilingual education and learning technologies. Multidisciplinary teams are encouraged, and both technical and non-technical participants are welcome.
The challenge
Multilingualism is recognized in Europe as a key cultural and societal asset. At the same time, education systems often still operate largely within a monolingual framework. This can hinder the participation of multilingual students and slow the development of multilingual learning pathways.
In higher education, the internationalization of teaching increases the need to deliver instruction in multiple languages, particularly in Finnish and English. Teachers need practical tools that help them utilize existing materials, identify key terminology, and adapt content for different linguistic needs. At the same time, teaching should support students’ multilingual competence and their integration into international professional life and Finnish society.
We need solutions that support multilingual pedagogy, internationalization of education, and the everyday work of teachers. Help us design and build the Language Station – a scalable and transferable toolkit for multilingual classrooms.
The Language Station is a modular toolkit designed for everyday learning settings. It helps make language(s) visible, flexible, and operational. The station helps disrupt the monolingual mindset and develop critical linguistic awareness. While designed for serious things, the station embraces the playful and the artistic. The station combines digital and analogue tools.
What you’ll build
Design a Language Station tool or service that supports multilingual teaching and learning in University of Eastern Finland’s degree programmes.
The solution could, for example:
- help process offered teaching materials and institutional academic resources such as UEF publications, theses and dissertations, curricula, study plans
- identify key terminology and create definitions
- identify and highlight linguistic requirements
- support planning by considering learning objectives and students’ skill levels
- adapt study materials to students with diverse language skills
- produce multilingual glossaries (e.g., Finnish–English)
- help teachers create bilingual or multilingual teaching materials and support multilingual pedagogical approaches
- strengthen teachers’ language awareness
- raise awareness about translanguaging teaching practices that allow students to use their full linguistic repertoire in learning
- help integrate teaching across courses
- help engage students in the process of learning a new language over the long term
The goal of the solution is to make teachers better prepared for multilingual teaching, save time spent on planning and preparation, and therefore improve students’ experience by giving opportunities to participate effectively in a multilingual learning environment.
Design considerations
When designing the solution, consider the following:
- Environment: UEF degree programmes and formal learning contexts
- Users: focus on teachers, but potentially also students and educational organizations
- Multilingual pedagogy and translanguaging: the solution should support the use of multiple languages simultaneously in learning. Note that Finnish and English are official study languages, but students’ linguistic repertoires are more diverse than that
- Functional teaching methods: the pedagogical starting point is language as a tool for interaction; in other words, the approach to language learning is functional. Therefore, the recommended teaching methods should support and strengthen students’ active agency in learning.
- Internationalization: the solution can support the development of English-language programs and students’ language skills
- Integration: the solution can help international students also develop Finnish language skills, and English skills for Finns
- Equity: consider linguistic diversity, social justice, and gender equality
- Scalability: the solution could be applied in diverse programmes and institutions
- Modality: AI-powered digital solutions are welcome. Non-digital solutions will also be considered. The challenge is open to non-technical teams
Resources
We encourage you to use the following resources to develop your solution.
- Digital teaching and learning environments used in UEF
- The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR)
- The European Language Portfolio
You may also use other resources not mentioned in this list
Useful literature
For inspiration, refer to literature about translanguaging and Kumashiro’s 4 approaches to social justice education.
Evaluation criteria
- Potential impact on multilingual teaching and learning
- Relevance of the solution to the challenge
- Feasibility and readiness of the solution
- User-friendliness and usability of the solution
Sponsors
This challenge is sponsored by KATEKO project and Otsakorven Säätiö
Contacts
Contact Persons: alicja.fajfer@uef.fi, mari.honkanen@uef.fi
Judges: Mari Honkanen, Alicja Fajfer, Elina Heimala
Links: