9.30 - 10.00

Arrival and welcome coffee

10.00 - 10.25

Welcome by the Belgian EPALE Coordinators & Guy Ribant, Storyteller who will lead us through the day

Keynote: Europeana Collections - How to inspire language learners with digital culture

Europeana Collections provides access to over 50 million digitised items – books, music, artworks and more – with sophisticated search and filter tools to help you find what you’re looking for. Their dedicated thematic collections on art, fashion, music, photography and World War I contain galleries, blogs and exhibitions to inform and inspire.

The European Year of Cultural Heritage 2018 spotlights digital cultural heritage as a part of people’s everyday lives and, in particular, as an unexploited learning resource for young and old. The seminar will highlight the strong potential of digital cultural heritage in education and will introduce teachers to Europeana, Europe’s platform for digital cultural heritage, which currently gathers over 55M records for everybody to work, to enjoy or to educate.

Isabel Crespo develops partnerships with relevant players in education, including MoEs, industry and non-profit organizations in order to promote the reuse of digital culture in formal and informal settings. She possesses a BD in Political Sciences, a MA in Cultural Management and a MSc in Corporate Communications. She’s been working as a consultant for the Administration and in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Barcelona, where she was involved in several educational projects.

Keynote: For a World without "Grenzen"

Languages define the human experience. At their best, languages are the way in which we communicate our thoughts and feelings to others. Through language, we form connections and share our lives with those around us. But at their worst, languages divide, isolate, and constrain us to only being able to speak to people like us. In his talk, Alex Rawlings, author and blogger, will point out that since time immemorial, and certainly long before the invention of social media, monolingualism is the most dangerous echo chamber known to humankind. Drawing on extracts from his latest book From Amourette to Żal: Bizarre and Beautiful Words from Europe, he will show the colour and joy that speaking multiple languages brings to people’s lives, and argue that if we want to live in a world without 'grenzen' or 'frontières' (borders), only speaking one language just won’t do.

Alex Rawlings is a British-born polyglot who has learned 15 different languages, an Oxford University graduate in German and Russian, and published author ('How to Speak Any Language Fluently' and 'From Amourette to Żal: Bizarre and Beautiful Words from Europe'). He became known for his linguistic ability in 2012, the year in which he was named “Britain’s Most Multilingual Student” in a nationwide competition featured on the BBC. His passion for languages is driven by a passion for people, and a desire to be able to communicate with anyone, anywhere, regardless of whichever language they speak.

Lunch - Free exchange between participants - Market for languages teachers

Visitors have the opportunity to participate in two workshops:

1. Theatrical improvisation activities in language classes

The aim of the workshop is to show some reusable theatrical improvisation activities in foreign language classes because this discipline, in addition to promoting the use of language, teaches values ​​like self-confidence, repartee, listening, developing the imagination, creativity and artistic sense, and helping one another.

Emilie Letertre is a former Wallonia-Brussels reader in Romania (2006-2009), where she learned to work with theatrical improvisation.  Then she taught in the three European institutions (2010-2013) to finally arrive at the school EPFC (adult education).  There she taught FLE (French as foreign language) at all levels and introduced a weekly theatrical improvisation workshop with the final goal of making a public match between two teams. She works with students of different levels and backgrounds and also trains colleagues.

2. Brussels in dialogue - Challenges and opportunities for language teachers

‘Brussels in dialogue’ is a methodology for bringing people from many different backgrounds together. It allows them to have a meaningful exchange while increasing their sense of mutual understanding. It is put into practice all over Brussels, in partnership with other organizations, by Foyer vzw, an NGO based in the popular borough of Molenbeek. The example of ‘Brussels in dialogue’ is an inspiring methodology for language teachers who want to improve the communication within their learners’ groups as it stimulates people to talk and exchange ideas. The workshop will be part presentation and part workshop. The example of ‘Brussels in dialogue’ is an inspiring methodology for language teachers who want to improve the communication within their learners’ groups as it stimulates people to talk and exchange ideas.

Widu De Ridder has a background in education and works for ‘Foyer vzw’,  a Molenbeek based NGO active in the fields of diversity, interculturalism and social cohesion.

3. Guerrilla literacy learners

Guerrilla literacy learners make unorthodox connections to create mistakes. After a very short introduction of the MOOC that discusses the theoretical backgrounds and the methodology of a mistake-driven language learning approach, we listen to a rap introducing the mathematician, do-gooder, creative mixer, link these to mistakes our students make and rap a few new lines. The session combines a short presentation of the Guerrilla MOOC with an interactive workshop based on a world café and the use of creative languages to discover new examples. As a group, we create our own Guerrilla rap.

Patricia Huion, E-du-novator, is a senior researcher and European project writer and manager at UCLL. MA in Germanic Filology (KULeuven) and an MSc in Educational Sciences (KULeuven). She enjoys working on the interface of disciplines exploring their interconnectedness and the emerging opportunities for innovation. andtknowledge creation using improvisation and storytelling.

4. Learning English through folk dances and speaking activities

The objectives of this interactive workshop:

-to see communication as a whole (verbal and non-verbal elements - 93% is non-verbal);
-to provide an optimal learning environment by meeting the affective and cognitive needs of the students;
-to promote an engaging learning approach;
-to develop and stimulate creativity and imagination.  

Marie Palm is an English teacher and online-course developer. She teaches in a teacher-training college (level B1 to C2-CEFR) using ICT in her courses as well as online material.

Keynote: Making language learning the best it can be

Highlights form the EPALE discussion - European Day of Languages

Together with the audience Andrew will dwell on the questions 'How do we make language learning the best it can be?' and 'How do we best meet the needs of different groups for language learning?' Andrew found inspiration in contributions to an online EPALE discussion in which language teachers from across Europe shared their experience in teaching languages to adults and exchanged tips and challenges they have faced. He also puts the spotlights on the most interesting case studies, thought-provoking blog posts and helpful resources on the topic of languages and adult education that can be found on the EPALE-platform.

Andrew McCoshan is an adult learning policy expert and EPALE’s European thematic coordinator for the theme of quality in adult learning.