Abstract:

Following the trend of recent years, many Language Centres in Finland have been developing new online solutions for language learning in higher education. The state-funded project Kielivarannon vahvistaminen korkeakouluissa ('Reinforcing language availability in higher education institutions'), or KiVAKO, launched in September 2018, aims to create new learning pathways for less widely studied languages in Finland by developing cooperation both at a national and a regional level. This oral presentation gives two concrete examples of study paths currently developed under this national initiative, one in Chinese and the other in French.

Although both languages belong to the same project, the Chinese and the French development teams face very different challenges. Chinese is a growing language in Finland, but resources are limited. The two-person Chinese team will have to design a set of courses that fulfil the needs of a large number of students while still allowing them to provide the necessary guidance and feedback. Their current priority is to acquire the adequate digital skills to update pre-existing materials and implement new technologies and virtual classroom applications such as online quizzes and videos. The key objective is to adapt the existing courses to a larger public and to a more open platform.

With eleven members, the French team will aim to produce a comprehensive study path from A0 to B2. However, enrolments into French courses have been declining in recent years. The digital approach will have to support student retention by offering more flexibility and by catering to a variety of preferences and needs. In higher levels, the courses will encourage students to approach learning as a social activity through co-learning and collaboration, with a strong focus on working-life skills and interdisciplinary communication.

In spite of those differences both teams, along with the Estonian, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Finnish Sign Language teams, will share the same opportunities: testing new teaching tools, sharing best practices and ensuring the transition from educators to facilitators and co-learners.

Keywords:

Digital literacy, digitalisation, language learning, higher education.