Coda – opportunities and challenges in language learning and professionalization in higher education: the road ahead

In considering theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical perspectives for preparing language learners and teachers in/for the 21st century, the preceding chapters have sought to highlight how research findings could/should inform curriculum, instruction, and professional development in higher education so as to promote language learning and sustain its link to professionalization in today’s and tomorrow’s society. Language learning and professionalization have been explored here through researches focusing on: university students who need to learn to communicate in one or more foreign languages to both interact as global citizens and increase their chances of employability; professionals who, on their lifelong learning journey, study foreign languages to enrich or develop (new) skills for a variety of reasons, including the need to meet evolving work requirements and adapt to an ever changing society; and (pre-service) language teachers who need to learn how best to meet the needs of learners. In this brief coda, we synthesize the major points from the chapters included in this book and highlight the opportunities that exist and the challenges that must be addressed if we want the opportunities not to remain just that.

Questioning the notion of ‘professionalisation’: LANSOD contexts and the specific case of a musicology undergraduate programme

In Chapter 3, Aude Labetoulle addresses the challenge of designing courses that meet the needs of learners whose major is not languages in French universities – a sector usually referred to as ‘LANSOD’ (LANguages for Students of Other Disciplines). University language requirements are typically related to the increased importance of ‘mobility’ and ‘employability’. Yet, French universities seem to struggle with the design of language courses that are relevant to the future professional needs of learners. To explore this issue, Aude Labetoulle first investigates how ‘professionalization’ has been progressively defined and implemented by French universities and stresses the tensions underlying the various interpretations of the ongoing movement toward the ‘professionalization’ of university courses in France. She then analyzes the specific case of a LANSOD undergraduate course at the University of Lille (France) and demonstrates how complex it can be to design an undergraduate English curriculum relevant to learners’ future professional needs when learners have different disciplinary backgrounds and professional aspirations. This study provides LANSOD course designers with an approach to curriculum design and evaluation that addresses these challenges and offers transferable tools to, generally underprepared, LANSOD teachers.

Language learning in the 21st century: current status and future directions

In Chapter 1, Betül Czerkawski and Margherita Berti focus on the challenges higher education faces when coping with new realities. How do learners acquire the skills necessary for effective cross-cultural communication? What professional learning opportunities do universities offer to language learners? What are some present practices found in universities today, and how are these practices shaping tomorrow’s FL language education? The key issues raised in this chapter center on the need to go beyond just language and focus more broadly on technology-supported communication in multicultural settings, the importance of better language teacher preparation, the necessity of FL curricula so they foster 21st century skills and lifelong learning, and the importance of instructional design to develop meaningful learning experiences that help people navigate complex realities and constantly evolving environments. The authors offer possible ways in which these issues can be addressed and end with a discussion of future trends.

Needs analysis for the design of a professional English curriculum: insights from a French lifelong learning context

In Chapter 2, Naouel Zoghlami draws on needs analysis as a fundamental approach to inform the design of a professional English curriculum at the Cnam, a unique French research institution of higher education dedicated to lifelong learning. While needs analysis is still not widely used in the development of English for specific purposes programs in French higher education contexts, this study attempts to fill this gap by revealing the kinds of tasks adult professional learners studying at the Cnam say they need to perform in English at work. One of the strengths of this study thus lies in relying on data provided by domain insiders rather than assumptions held by the researcher-teacher about what adults need to learn to inform a professional English curriculum. Study data provide the information needed to improve the existing syllabus and the basis on which to build relevant pedagogical tasks.

Introduction – language learning and professionalization in higher education: where we are, where we need to be, and how we get there

Language learning for professional purposes is here explored through themes related to postsecondary students’ experiences and professional integration, (multimodal) communication, and (online) instructional design principles, and language teacher education. Each chapter seeks to focus on how research results could/should inform training design in higher education (research-based recommendations, implications for pedagogy) so as to promote learning and sustain the link between FL education and professionalization in today’s and tomorrow’s society.

Informing language training with multimodal analysis: insights from the use of gesture in tandem interactions

In Chapter 7, Camille Debras explores face-to-face tandem interactions between undergraduate university students who are native speakers of French and English and the role multimodality plays in these. Drawing from linguistics research on the multimodality of tandem interactions, four multimodal interactional linguistics studies based on the annotation and/or qualitative analysis of data from a corpus made of audio- and video-recorded face-to-face tandem interactions provide evidence for the crucial communicative functions of gesture during exolingual interactions. Findings underscore the need to involve the nonverbal dimension in language learning and teaching and professionalization in higher education, so as to prepare L2 learners for the (international) workplace.

Graduate student teacher voices: perception of and apprenticeship in multiliteracies-oriented teaching

In Chapter 4, Tara Hashemi examines Graduate Student Teachers’ (GSTs’) perceptions of their professionalization in FL programs which have adopted a literacy-based approach to teaching French in the United States. Findings show that while some clear efforts are being made by language program directors to provide GSTs with a large panoply of tools, GSTs wish they had more opportunities for direct and personalized feedback on their teaching as well as more demonstrations of concrete lessons in which the concepts of the literacy-based framework are instantiated. It cannot be expected that GSTs will understand and apply complex notions of the multiliteracies framework and multiliteracies pedagogy without relevant, adapted, and ongoing professional development.

Digital storytelling for developing students’ agency through the process of design: a case study

In Chapter 5, Elyse Petit compares two case studies that illustrate the potential of using a multimodal project (i.e. digital storytelling) in the FL classroom to enhance students’ 21st ccentury skills and support their understanding of how their selection and orchestration of semiotic resources construct layers of meaning, promote multiliteracies, and foster language use and appropriateness. Findings suggest that students’ selection of semiotic resources and the ways in which they arrange them reveal their ability to face and find solutions to circumvent challenges brought on by language and culture to convey their stories.

The social dimension of learner autonomy in a telecollaborative project: a Russian course for apprentice engineers

In Chapter 8, Elsa Chachkine explores the social turn in autonomous learning through a telecollaborative project based on teletandems and the use of social media in a self-study Russian course whose aim is to familiarize future engineers with the Russian language and culture and to develop their autonomy as learners before their work placement in Russia. This research contributes to our understanding of the ways in which the social dimension manifests itself and its potential role in the development of autonomy, language and culture, and other skills valued in the world of work.

Telling stories multimodally: what observations of parent-child shared book-reading activities can bring to L2 kindergarten teachers’ training

In Chapter 6, Pauline Beaupoil-Hourdel presents multimodal and plurisemiotic analyses of storytelling activities in adult-child dyadic interactions at home in France and analyzes the extent to which this context can inform the professionalization of teachers in the 21st century. Findings show that spontaneous adult-child interactions during storytelling and shared book reading at home provide valuable insights for kindergarten and primary school teachers to teach an L2, as well as new multimodal perspectives on fostering linguistic, narrative, and communication skills in young children at school.