Description

 

This dimension is central in the professional skill of the tutor because it includes the declarative knowledge on teaching and didactic approaches and the procedural knowledge that concerns the ability to implement Trainings to IC. This dimension concerns the field of information, planning, of didactic realization, evaluation and reflection on the developed work around the IC, including all the work realized through ICT.

Appropriate knowledge on IC as part of pluralistic approaches

Expand one’s professional knowledge including the calling in question of one’s conceptions on teaching of languages and cultures

The tutor in IC accentuates his knowledge in didactic of languages (DL) on the pluralistic approaches, in particular on IC to integrate these approaches in his practices (see for example Redinter [13], Galapro [14]). It will commit also to open the repertoire of targeted languages in his teaching program.

Know the notions of linguistic profile and intercultural and plurilingual skills

The tutor in IC understands the key-concepts that allow a work around the intercultural and plurilingual skill (see the Platform of resources and references for an intercultural and plurilingual teaching [15]).

Know the pluralistic approaches to languages and cultures and more precisely the IC approach

The tutor in IC must know the declarative knowledge on the pluralistic approaches, especially on IC, cf. CARAP_F.pdf [16].

Know the theoretical presuppositions, the didactic principles and the results in research of IC

The development of actions in IC training has to be based on strong knowledge of theoretical basis coming research. Bibliographies, reading sheets and works available online (suggestions are available for example on Redinter [13], Galanet [17], Galapro [18], Cinco [19]).

Know the teaching purposes of IC (linguistic, cultural, communicative, political and inflected)

The planning and the management of training plans must be lead by the knowledge of teaching purposes of IC, in its various dimensions (see for example the book published by AUF and the Union Latine (Latine Union); The intercomprehension of the new challenges for Romance languages, langues_romanes_ULat2011.pdf [20]).

Elaborate an intervention project in IC

Analyze one’s context of intervention in order to see the potential area for a didactic project in IC

The IC is an emerging approach; the tutor is often bringing to create an intervention area. To this purpose, he will examine his context to find support to his project of plurilingual teaching (multicultural audiences, project of internationalization, collaboration between languages teachers, school project…).

Seek actively partners and create situations of exchange and collaboration

The teacher can seek partners on his own institution (teachers of other languages or other disciplines) and set up an international network of partners for modes of educative online collaboration in IC and/or interdisciplinary (for example on platforms Miriadi [21], Galapro [22], Lingalog [23], eTwinning [24]) or in a project of international mobility.

Conceive training processes to IC regarding the audience’s contexts and interlocutors and the chosen plans (in class and/or at distance)

The tutor is able to take into account linguistic and teaching situations to identify the needs of training, establish the purposes and the priorities of intervention and negotiate a teaching project in collaboration with his partners mobilizing his teaching, didactic and communicative repertoire.

The IC can also be a plurilingual entry to disciplinary or professional contents (intermar, prefic). It is about organize and develop activities or teaching integrated projects (languages-disciplines).

Organize the curriculum integration process of IC in the intervention context

It is about organize time, areas and modes of participation for the training module (for example define the calendar taking into account the timetable available, make sure of the availability of a multimedia room for the online communication…).

Search, analyze and select the plans and the didactic materials in IC, in class and/or at distance

The tutor should know how to look, select, analyze and calibrate the didactic resources to upgrade the IC in the appropriate linguistic learning approaches to the development of the linguistic repertoire of the subjects in training (cf. redinter.eu).

Realize a didactic intervention in IC

Analyze the diversity of repertoires of the subjects involved (linguistic, cultural, strategic, digital, the level of their skills in IC, etc.) and their needs of contextual learning

The presence of various linguistic and cultural repertoires require from the tutor an ability of analysis, of management and of valorization of the diversity and the complexity of the learning and communicative types to regulate the teaching-didactic situations built from the features of the subjects, their attempts and their needs.

Handle situations of interaction in IC at distance

Situations of interaction at distance in IC involve technical, digital and methodological skills in different learning environments and modes of communication. It is necessary to handle the diversity of codes, cultures and tools; negotiate and realize mediations between subjects that have different views; coordinate tasks and share them; stimulate the participation and the motivation: promote the examination and the reflection.

Mobilize and develop linguistic-communicative, cognitive, emotional and metacommunicative repertoires of the learners

The tutor in IC knows how to create educational situations that take into account the processes and the various repertoires, making sure of the mobilization and the spread of knowledge, of the development of abilities and attitudes involved in communicative intercultural and plurilingual situations. In that manner, the tutor should be able to stimulate the reasoning and the linguistic learning process and promote positive attitudes toward the cultural and linguistic diversity, ensuring to maintain the motivation.

Develop strategic skills of learners in situations of languages contact

The tutor will give for thought on the processes and the strategies of access in the meaning used spontaneously by the subjects, then to guide them to develop their strategic repertoire, their autonomy in organization and on the transfer of knowledge and capacities (cf. Skill Reference Data: Strategies of written/speaking understandings and interaction).

Maintain the taste of languages and the motivation to learn in IC

In his practices, the tutor in IC is able to build a positive vision of the linguistic and cultural diversity, particularly in its sentimental and aesthetical dimensions (the pleasure to discover new stones, interesting cultural practices…).

He fosters the skills already acquired, enhances the discoveries and the results obtained and suggests strong supports as well as situations of exchanges involving the learners in their subjectivity.

Evaluate the training process and enhance the results

Evaluate according to the different methods the didactic work developed around IC

The tutor in IC observes and evaluates the process of training and the results of process. According to the aims and the criterions established, he can offer different practices of inflected and summative evaluation. The evaluation can be on the following points: linguistic knowledge, strategic metalingustic and metacommunciative skills in IC; active participation in plurilingual communication and the achievement of collaborative tasks…

We will refer to three levels of skills in IC (A, B, C) proposed in the Learning Skill Reference Data.

Besides, the auto-evaluation continues (ex: learning journal) and the regulation in peers can reinforce the awareness of the learner about his/her learning process and the results obtained: he/she can understand his/her difficulties and re-orientate his/her work.

Accentuate the obtained results individually and the collective achievements

The valorization of the knowledge intervenes at different levels of process: in an ongoing learning process, the tutor can see the performances, even partial, of the participants to support their self-confidence. At the end of the process, these knowledge will be the subject of a certificate to insert in one’s portfolio of skills (cf. http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/education/elp/default_EN.asp [25]? ) and one’s resume (cf. europass). We will stimulate the learners to consider the social contexts where they could use these new skills.

At an institutional and social level, we can spread the following approach organizing events to present the products coming from the plurilingual and intercultural collaboration.

Think about one’s training practices at IC, in class and/or online

Beyond one’s understanding of one’s professional skill, in terms of didactic, teaching and digital knowledge, to perform this skill, the tutor in IC should be available to observe his training practices, analyze them and evaluate to decide what to do in order to improve his own process of professional development and the training process for which he is responsible.

Bibliography

ANDRADE, A.I., GONCALVES, L., MARTINS, F. & PINHO, A.S. (2012). Développement professionnel: quelles articulations possibles entre formation initiale et formation continue dans un projet de formation à la didactique du plurilinguisme ? In Causa, M. (org). Formation initiale et profils d'enseignants de langues : enjeux et questionnements. Bruxelles: De Boeck, pp79-312 (ISBN 978-2-8041-7129-2).

ANDRADE, A. I., PINHO, A. S. & MARTINS F. (2011), Formar para a intercompreensão: micro-políticas curriculares. IN A. S. Pinho & A. I. Andrade (org.) Intercompreensão e didática de línguas : histórias a partir de um projeto. Aveiro: Universidade de Aveiro. Cadernos do LALE. Série Reflexões (ISBN 978-989-96794-9-8), pp 9-32.

BAZARRA, l., CASANOVA, O. & GARCÍA UGARTE, J. (2004). Ser professor y dirigir professores en tempos de cambio. Madrid: Narcea, S.A. De Ediciones.

BERNAUS, M., ANDRADE, A. I., Kervran, M. & Trujillo Saéz, F. (2007). La dimension plurilingue et pluriculturelle dans la formation des enseignants de langues. Strasbourg : Conseil de L’Europe.

FERRARI, A. & PUNIE, Y. & BRECKO, B. N. (eds). (2013). DIGCOMP: A framework for developing and understanding digital competence in Europe. Luxembourg: European Union .

JONES, E. (2010). Enhancing professionalism through a professional practice portfolio. Reflective Practice: International and Multidisciplinary Perspectives, 11: 5, 593-605, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14623943.2010.516970 [26].

LONGUET, F. & SPRINGER, C. (2012). Développer et évaluer les compétences professionnelles des enseignants de langues à l’université : une mission impossible ? In M. Causa (dir.). Formation initiale et profils d’enseignants de langues. Enjeux et fondements. Bruxelles: De Boeck, pp 247-278.

MARTINS, F. (2008). Formação para a diversidade linguística um estudo com futuros professores do 1º ciclo do ensino básico. Aveiro: Universidade de Aveiro (tese de doutoramento).

PERRENOUD, Ph. (2000). 10 novas competências para ensinar convite à viagem. Porto Alegre: Artmed (trad)

PERRENOUD, Ph. (2002). As competências para ensinar no século XXI a formação de professores e o desafio da avaliação. Porto Alegre: Artmed Editora (trad)

PINHO, A. S. (2008). Intercompreensão, identidade e conhecimento profissional na formação de professores de línguas. Aveiro: Universidade de Aveiro (tese de doutoramento).

PISHVA, Y. & Thamin, N. (2011). Pratiques de formation aux approches plurielles: approche réflexive et intercompréhension. Revista: REDINTER-Intercompreensão, 2, pp 249-268.

RIOS, T. (2003). Comprender y enseñar. Por una docencia de la mejor calidad. Barcelona : Graó (trad).

TARPINIAN, A. (coord.). (2007). Donner toute sa chance à l’école. Treize transformations nécessaires et possibles…Collectif école: changer de cap. Lyon: Chronique Sociale.

This skill Reference Data wish to contribute to the development of the tutors’ training able to include intercomprehension (IC) at their teaching activities in class or at distance. This document represents a tool to conceive and to put into practice training processes to IC and an evaluation system (including auto-evaluation) with professional skills (knowledge, attitudes and abilities) necessary to the introduction of the IC in the areas of contact of languages and intercultural communication (communicative situations in class or online).

The IC is a possibility of training to help teachers to promote a linguistic and democratic teaching and to open communicative areas between the subjects who belong to different cultural and linguistic communities, considering thus new methods to be and to have social skills for a tutor in/of languages.

This general purpose in terms of social skills is realized in this Skill Reference Data by descriptors of knowledge skills as well as the know-how that allow the tutor to be engaged into the development and the application of skilled projects. This choice corresponds to the willpower to take into account the ethical and political dimensions in a pragmatic viewpoint of educational intervention.

Linked to the teaching Skill Reference Data, This training Skill Reference Data intends to answer to social needs in terms of trainings to plurilingual and intercultural teaching. It is about making available skills descriptors to conceive trainings based on IC, in order to help teachers /tutors to spread the IC as an educational and communicative practice. Thus, this Skill Reference Data follows the same principles than the teaching Skill Reference Data:

• Transparency of the inflected issues;
• Clarity of the aims, the contents and the methodology of the IC;
• A participation of the educative actors at the construction of the training process based on the IC.

The document is outlined on three constituent dimensions of the tutor’s professional skill whose aim is educate to plurilingualism with a reflexive approach:

1. Ethical and political
2. Linguistic and communicative
3. Educational and didactic

Each dimension presents first its general aims and then its skills descriptors illustrated in explanatory notes.

This Skill Reference Data offers training tools as part of a teaching approach that considers the following processes as fundamentals:

• The acquisition of new knowledge, by activities of research of information as well as the re-elaboration and co-construction of knowledge;
• The testing on the field, including the planning phases, the implementation and evaluation phases so as to take part in teaching situations that we want to extend;
• The commitment, the opening and the responsibility in the promotion of plurilingualism by the participation in different areas and formats of communication.

The permanent thought on the activated processes, the plans ongoing and the results obtained by the subjects is an essential aspect in the training of tutors: it allows doing assessments of process and to think about the possibilities for a lifelong education and training.

Authors: Ana Isabel Andrade, Filomena Martins and Ana Sofia Pinho (University of Aveiro)

Revision of ICT: Maria José Loureiro

In collaboration with Maddalena De Carlo and Mathilde Anquetil

 

Description

This dimension concerns the development of the communication skill and the plurilingual and intercultural learning process of the tutor.

We consider here the teacher/tutor himself engaged in the learning of languages and cultures in IC. The aim is to push forward one’s own linguistic and cultural repertoire and develop one’s capacity to handle situations of multilingual and intercultural communication. This dimension takes into account the languages representations and the cultures and includes a metacommunicative dimension, namely the capacity to analyze and to think about the situations of multilingual and intercultural communication, including the interactions at distance. We will also see the learning Skill reference Data for a detailed description of these skills.

Develop a linguistic and cultural repertoire

Be aware of one’s linguistic and communicative repertoire and analyze it

It is to think about one’s repertoire of communication identifying at the same time the strong and weak points of one’s plurilignual and intercultural skill because the awareness of one’s communicative limits is an important basis of the professional development.

Call up one’s linguistic repertoire in multilingual and intercultural situations of communication especially through ICT

The development of linguistic repertoire is made in situations of multilingual and intercultural communication and the ICT forms an opportunity of linguistic improvement by the experimentation of new situations of languages contact.

Acquire knowledge on languages and cultures, especially on their specific features

The professional knowledge of the tutors can include a preliminary knowledge on one or several languages-cultures but especially the ability to cultivate and stimulate the taste for other languages and other linguistic learning processes (cf. Skill Reference Data on learning: Languages and cultures [38]).

Commit to push forward one’s plurilingual repertoire and one’s capacity of intercultural communication

The commitment to auto-training is one of the most important aspects of the professional development including the commitment to linguistic and communicative development (cf. Skill Reference Data on learning: The written comprehension [39] and The oral comprehension [40]).

Analyze the representations on languages and cultures in order to adopt open attitudes compared to the plurilingual and intercultural communication

The representations on languages and cultures influence the relationship to the languages of the social subjects. The tutor has to reach a level of awareness on the stakes of linguistic diversity in order to play a role as an intermediary.

Develop one’s teaching skills in IC

Use resources of information and communication including the digital resources with a view to professional development of one’s communicative skills in IC

The tutor enrolls himself to identify the available resources (material, tools of reference) and the accessible learning contexts (digital platforms, course in class), (cf. Skill Reference Data on learning: The plurilingual subject and the learning process [41]).

Think on one’s didactic, teaching and digital knowledge in preparation of a work in IC in class, hybrid and online

The tutor is invited to develop a certain thought to be acquainted as a didactic teacher, social actor, plurilingual speaker and learner of languages. He has to be aware of his possibilities and limits to be able to continue to develop his professional point of view, ensuring to improve and increase his knowledge, in order to organize and galvanize better the situations of training of IC.

Commit in linguistic trainings and in languages didactics particularly in IC and in plurilingual teaching

The tutors can reach the trainings on IC because they are now available in class and online, with indications for auto-evaluation (for example the training sessions on the Galapro [22] platform).

Develop one’s communicative skills in IC

Call up strategies of communication in new situations of plurilingual interaction

The development of the intercultural and plurilingual skill is made by the understanding of the functioning of the linguistic communication. The application of strategies such as reformulations, tagalong, recourse to the help of interlocutors, allows to locators to interact in plurilingual situations (cf. Skill Reference Data on learning: The plurilingual and intercultural interaction [42]).

Develop skills of mediation in plurilingual and multicultural communicative situations in IC

The transition from the learner role to the tutor role requires knowledge of mediation and remediation processes considering the variety of communicative contexts.

 

Description

This dimension leads to the ability to understand the IC as a form of democratic participation in a world within a diversity of languages and cultures. This dimension implies the commitment of the tutor in the promotion of an intercultural dialogue as well as the “linguistic justice” with a view to ensure the effective recognition of the equal value of all languages and cultures. Thus, the IC is considered at a macro-social level as a political and ethical stake and at a micro-social level as an opportunity of the teaching to plurilingualism and to interculturality.

Enlist in the respect of the linguistic rights

Situate one’s educational intervention with the possibility of a wider linguistic justice and equity in communication

The tutor of IC has to be able to analyze teaching situations to identify the possible areas of construction of linguistic and didactic processes that favor the voice of all the projects thanks to the diversification of languages, in circulation, as well as the access to information and to communication, The Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights of the UNESCO (http://www.unesco.org/cpp/uk/declarations/linguistic.pdf [48])

Understand the relevancy of the IC compared to the respect of the linguistic and cultural rights

The tutor recognizes the IC as a process to ensure the linguistic democracy in some contexts of communication by the acceptance and the improvement of languages/cultures in contact.

Act ethically and responsible in front of the linguistic and cultural diversities in the plurilingual exchanges

The tutor enhances the linguistic biographies (including the dialectal varieties) of all the participants, learners and colleagues.

During the exchanges, he ensures that all the idioms have their rightful place; he makes a shoring to facilitate the reception of the less disseminated languages and asks a collective participation to the construction of the meaning of the word of another.

Fight against prejudices and stereotypes on languages that are obstacles for the concrete recognition of the linguistic rights

The tutor is ready to enroll himself to work against the prejudices broadcasted on the value, the beauty, the performative utterance of languages (ex: the capacity or not of some languages to express abstract concepts, their lexical richness; the value associations linked to their sonorities, to the alphabet used…). In order to do this, he promotes the taste of languages including for example the cultural and aesthetic events in which all languages find expression.

Enlist in a democratic and linguistic teaching

Enlist in actions of promotion of plurilingual teaching and highlight at the same time the role of language and of different languages in communication between people and groups

The IC’s tutor supports plurilingualism because he knows that the verbal language is decisive in the relationship to the world of human groups, in the transmission of culture and knowledge, in situations of multimodal communication (oral, written and digital) between subjects and groups with different processes and different linguistic biographies as well as the access to work opportunities with full social inclusion (http://www.unesco.org/new/fr/indigenous-peoples/cultural-and-linguistic-... [49]).

Highlight the subjects as intermediary of their languages-cultures

The tutor puts the subjects at the center of the teaching/learning process and helps them to be aware of the value of their linguistic and cultural heritages. The expression in mother tongue or in the language chosen by the subject becomes then a resource of discover and learning for all the participants at the training in IC (cf. http://en.unesco.org/events/international-mother-language-day-celebratio... [50] ). Then, the communication in IC becomes a powerful means to fight against the linguistic sense of insecurity of the locators legitimating their expressions whatever is the linguistic type that they want to use.

Fit the IC into the global linguistic and integrated teaching framework

The tutor can be inspired by the concept of Linguistic Democratic Teaching (cf.: éducation_linguistique_Costanzo, giscel.dieci-tesi-leducazione-linguistica-democratica) to include IC in the teaching of languages where the verbal abilities are linked to socialization, to conceptualization and to the symbolic expression. The linguistic and cultural heritage of the subject forms the starting point for an opening to diversity.

Promote the intercultural dialogue

Think about the reasons and the purposes of an intercultural work about IC

It is about to understand the educational purposes of IC, not only in the teaching/learning field of languages but also for the intercultural education, the education in citizenship, the education to peace, the IC is a way that allows to work in and through the contemporary complexity.

Participate actively in multilingual, multicultural and multidisciplinary teams in preparation of the promotion of an intercultural dialogue

The work in teams more and more diversified means a capacity to build a consensus negotiated in the intercultural dialogue areas. This work requires the construction of links between languages and modes of expression and communication on different subjects, namely the capacity to solve eventual misunderstandings or conflicts, with an assistance practice and the enhancement of everyone.

Identify fields/themes that allow engaging thoughts that call out the numerous identities of the participants in training situations

The IC can be used in various fields (linguistic, social, cultural) and themes (immigration; real or virtual mobility; linguistic majority or minority; main languages and cultures; linguistic repertoire, history of languages, etc.) which give the opportunity to the educational actors to choose their own processes and modes of communication in interdisciplinary themes. The tutor ensures that a non essentialist conception of the cultural identities is spread.

Work towards the evolution of representations and stereotypes on languages and cultures in the intercultural communication

The tutor in IC takes into account the representations (images, beliefs) on languages, cultures and theirs values that influence the motivation to learn, to communicate and to collaborate at the individual level as well as at the relationships level between groups. So he works to push forward in a critical manner these representations toward alterity.

Contribute ethically to the creation of welcoming communication areas, with a responsible and proactive participation that favors a safe and communication atmosphere

To ensure the communicative well-being, prepare it ensures to maintain a participative and secure atmosphere. It applies mediations between the different types of work that can be owed to individual features, to different educational cultures and to the institutional stakes of the training in each one’s contexts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Skills Reference Data of multilingual communication in intercomprehension1 (i.e. REFIC)2 forms a guide for the programming of the trainings and a basis for the evaluation of the acquired skills as part of the multilingual groundwork for the languages’ learning process such as intercomprehension, namely a groundwork that gives priority to the receptive skills in order to read, listen or interact each in our own language. This Reference Data is completed by the Skills Reference Data of multilingual in didactics of intercomprehension (i.e. REFDIC) that for its part, offers elements of didactic skills enabling to build a training process to didactics of the intercomprehension.

These two documents speak specifically to the tutors3 with two different aims. The descriptors of the first (REFIC) concern the knowledge, the skills and the attitudes and the more efficient strategies for a tutor4 in intercomprehension who wish to develop with his/her audience on training; he has to learn by himself beforehand. The second one (REFDIC) develops the knowledge, the skills and the attitudes and the strategies required to a tutor to promote a didactics of intercomprehension in his/her professional practice.

The specific aims of the Skills Reference Data of plurilingual communication in intercomprehension (i.e. REFIC) are:

• Define attitudes, knowledge and competences in intercomprehension that facilitate the plurilingual and intercultural communication;

• And, in that way, promote the curriculum integration process of intercomprehension and its spreading as a teaching and communicative practice.

The two teaching resources have been conceived to be consulted in an easy and direct way by the tutors; we have then matched to each descriptor concrete examples, practical suggestions, and sources of information easily accessible. We will not find here either comprehensiveness or the systematic nature of other documents, for example the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/Source/Framework_EN.pdf [64] ) or the Framework of reference for pluralistic approaches to Languages and Cultures (FREPA, http://carap.ecml.at/Accueil/tabid/3577/language/en-GB/Default.aspx [65] ) but rather a practical guide of the didactics programming. Likewise, the classification of the descriptors can prove to be less thorough than the two documents quoted above because we have decided to realize some social skills by skilled descriptors of knowledge and know-how that will allow to the learner, in our opinion, to enroll in a learning process in intercomprehension.

A first read of the Skills Reference Data of plurilingual communication in intercomprehension will lead to think that the skills and knowledge aimed are only for adults or older teens, because of the metalinguistic and metacognitive effort of thinking involved. We will remember that there are many projects as part of the pluralistic approaches, and especially in intercomprehension that offers activities quite feasible with children.

The language awareness’ approach5, for example, widely experimented in many countries6 is conceived to develop to very younger learners, at their levels:

• “Metalinguistic abilities to observe and to reason;

• Useful know-how for the learning of languages;

• Attitudes of openness to the linguistic and cultural diversity;

• Knowledge related to languages and to their variety” (Candelier and De Pietro, 2014: 179).

In the specific framework of intercomprehension, we can name projects such as Euro-mania7 and Itinéraires romans8 that are specifically addressed to school audiences between 8-9 years old and 11-13 years old.

In fact, each child is able to think about his/her linguistic repertoire and to identify the languages present in his/her environment; or recognize words of his/her mother tongue and in other unknown languages that will not necessary be a purpose of a systematic learning; all that is needed is to adapt the tasks to accomplish and the presented contents to the learners ‘age to succeed in reaching the targeted aims.

Why a skills reference data in intercomprehension?

In 2006, the Language Policy Unit of the Council of Europe has elaborated a document9 to remind the main steps in the evolution of the language educative policy in EU, over the last 50 years. The document underlined the fact that from the European Cultural Convention of 1954 the signatories committed to promote the linguistic diversity by the learning process and the teaching of their respective languages. Until this first commitment, 50 years of linguistic policy of the Council of Europe passed and aimed at the promotion of “the plurilingualism, the linguistic diversity, the mutual understanding, the democratic citizenship, the social cohesion” (Council of Europe, 2006; 4). One of the crucial steps of this process is represented certainly by the official launch of the Common European Framework of References for Languages (CEFRL) in 2001 upon the European Year of Languages. The definition of the plurilingual skill that we offer becomes a point of reference for all didactic teachers that work for a languages’ education with a plurilingual and an intercultural purpose in mind. In particular, the difference between the multilingualism and the plurilingualism that has proclaimed a change of paradigm in the teaching of languages:

“We can simply arrive at multilingualism diversifying the offer of languages at school or in a given educational system, […]. Far beyond, the plurilingual approach puts emphasis on the fact that, as and when a linguistic experience of a person in her/his cultural environment expands from the home language to the language of the social group and then to the language of other groups (whether learnt at school or on the field), she/he does not classify these languages and these cultures in separated compartments but rather as a communicative skill for which each knowledge and each experience of languages contribute and in which languages are linked and interacts. In different circumstances, a locutor can appeal to different parts of this skill, with flexibility, to communicate easily with a given interlocutor. For example, partners can go from one language or dialect to another, each one exploiting the competence of one another to speak in a language and understand the other one. No one can appeal to his/her knowledge of different languages to understand a written or even oral text, in a language a priori “unknown”, recognizing disguised words belonging to an international common stock” (CECR, 2001: 11)10. These remarks of the CECR mention some of the principles of the intercomprehension and constitute then a prestigious source in support of its diffusion, although “it still remains to settle and translate into actions all the consequences of such a reversal of paradigm” (Id.). In that sense, the European Language Portfolio (ELP) was created as a tool to allow to learners to think about their linguistic and cultural repertoires acquired in formal and informal contexts and to give them a wider visibility. This is the same with the, “European framework of references that gives not only a grading scale to the evaluation of general skill of a given language but also an analysis of the use of the language and the linguistic skills that will facilitate, for the practitioners, the definition of the goals and the description of the levels reached in all the possible skills, depending on the various needs, on the features and the resources of the learners” (Id.). However, despite the stances showed on the document, several specialists have noticed the lack of the concept of plurilingualism in the descriptors (Delouis, 2008)11. Few years later, in 2007, this emptiness was filled by the Framework of Reference for Pluralistic Approaches to Languages (FREPA) that has established specific descriptors defining knowledge, know-how and social skills necessary to a plurilingual communication.

How is our thought positioned inside the view briefly outlined? Our effort was to design descriptors ad hoc for the acquisition of communication skills in intercomprehension from the heritage of what was produced in the field of the languages didactic and plurilingualism during theses last years, choosing in particular the contents that we thought were relevant in an intercomprehensive and plurilingual prospect, which is ours. In this context thus, the two Skills Reference Data made as part of the MIRIADI project, theSskills Reference Data of plurilingual communication in intercomprehension (i.e. REFIC) and the Skills Reference Data in didactics of the intercomprehension (REDFIC), are addressed at each tutor who wish to expand his/her didactic prospect and set coherent teaching with a broad-based vision of the disciplines.

Competent or inexperienced teachers, of languages (L1, L2, Lx…) languages of school, classical languages) or of other disciplines (history, geography, mathematics, science) could read the descriptors of the Skills Reference Data of plurilingual communication in intercomprehension upstream the process of teaching-learning as all the parameters to take into account on the development of their teaching program. This use may include a using afterwards, where each descriptor can be a point of reference for the evaluation of the affected results from the learners.

The main organizers

The areas of expertise and the learning goals. 12The intercomprenhesive didactics and the other pluralistic approaches are characterized by the full integration of the global nature, unsegmented, heterogeneous to the pluriligual skill; by the recognition of the dynamic nature of this skill that allow to mobilize and to reorganize the repertoire of the subjects; by the enhancement of all the languages of the plurilingual repertoire that alternate with each other in an inter-linguistic circulation (cf. Coster, 2002).

Consistent with these key concepts, the descriptors elaborated study on:

1. The metalingusitic13 and metacognitives14 strategies: they are at the core of the experimental researches in IC that offer to clarify the functioning of a “grammar of intercoprehension” namely the rules that determine the mechanisms of intercomprehension. So the descriptors are focused on the ability to rely on the language(s) known to reach other languages15, to operate the similarities between the languages of the same family (or not)16, to resort to the processes of inference, to discover in an autonomous way the functioning of the linguistics systems by the observation of analogies, of the links between the written forms and the sounds, of the lexical transparency. The descriptors are less focused on the knowledge or the isolated skills than on the abilities of their connections.

2. The linguistic and communicative activities: first, the written comprehension, the most accessible communicative activities in intercomprehension and the most studied as experimental researches. It is about developing strategies of receipt in order to understand the global meaning of texts, calling up especially the process of interference, accepting at the beginning an approximate understanding and exploiting similarities and regularities between languages genetically related. A detailed understating is progressively developed based on these methodological presuppositions. The oral comprehension and the interaction (written and spoken) are also concerned as well as production, understood here as an interproduction (Balboni, 2009: 197), namely as the ability to adjust one’s own production in first language17 to an addressee of another language, including in the contexts of Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC).

3. A linguistic and cultural knowledge and an intercultural tendency. The possibility to have contacts with interlocutors of different languages-cultures (not limited to the great languages of communication and teaching) but also with written texts, oral and audio-visual products in a social context with different linguistic communities, allow an opening on the linguistic/cultural differences, the awareness that sounds exist as well as grammatical structures, pragmatic rules, cultural references, a different lexical and grammatical division. These coincidences stimulate also the share of experiences, and the exchange of knowledge and expertise.

The dimensions take into account

The fields of skills outlined apply a change of paradigm in the education of languages that comes from a deconditioning of the learner (and, a fortiori, of the teacher) compared to some of his/her preceding learning in a monolingual approach and with representations that he/she can have on the languages’ status and on the linguistic diversity, on the learning process and his/her goals, on the value of the partial skills…

We do not find here grammar tables, lexical forms, lists of communicative deeds; the fields of skills mentioned, which learning process need to be tackle, are stated around five dimensions : the first two particularly are procedural and metalinguistic and the other three are communicative :

1. The plurilingual subject and the learning

2. Languages and cultures

3. The written comprehension

4. The oral comprehension

5. The plurilingual interaction.

The person trained is the protagonist of her/his own learning, the first sphere to take into account (the plurilingual subject and the learning) concerns the development of her/his linguistic cultural repertoire as well as the metacognitive strategies related to management, to organization and to the evaluation of his/her learning process. First, it is to bring the subject to become aware that even partial knowledge, fractioned, in languages sometimes less legitimate socially (languages in minority, dialects) at heterogeneous levels of skills is a cultural and linguistic resource not insignificant. From this thought, the learner could then watch around him/her to discover and enjoy resources of his/her environment, to get her/his knowledge, convictions and beliefs together with other subjects and might be aware of the weight of these factors in communication in a multilingual context.

The second dimension (Languages and cultures) is about the sphere of knowledge related to languages and cultures in a plurilingual and intercultural perspective. It is not about forming specialist of comparative linguistics but to make essential concepts regarding the spoken languages worldwide available to the learners and also make available statuses, their diffusion, their evolution, their relations, their functioning, so that they become aware of the issues of plurilingualism. This is a dimension that has earned a certain important as part of pluralistic approaches, a field of languages didactics that has led to the writing of the CARAP. According to Candelier and De Pietro “The processes like language awareness integrate such objects of knowledge in their aims, precisely with the hypothesis that knowledge can found the opening and the acceptance and thus could be used as a basis to “plurilingual culture” that matches better with the linguistic realities of our era” (2014 : 186).

The three dimensions related to the linguistic activities considered: written comprehension, oral comprehension and plurilingual Interaction (written and spoken) are developed in two times: first we summarize the descriptors referring to strategies and basic know-how, already known and described in didactics of foreign languages for the skills in reception and in interaction, but completing and clarifying them by descriptors with specific skills of the plurilingual intercomprehensive approach.

Thus, first the descriptors for general skills are presented, such as “anticipate the meaning based on the extra-textual context” to facilitate the understanding or “identify the interactive deeds” to get accustomed to the interactive dynamic. Then, more specific descriptors will focused for example on the “ability to rebuild rules of symmetry from one language to another and proceed to interlinguistic transfer” in order to understand a text sharpening the intercomprehensive process. The specific situation of the plurilingual interaction requires general communicative skills and particularly to have also, for example, an “ability to seek other languages, to free failures of communication and to adjust one’s production to the interlocutor of another country with another language”.

As regard the formulation of the descriptors proper to written and spoken, the choice made by the authors privileged the clarity, sometimes with the risk of repetition. Indeed, the comprehension of oral texts and written texts present a great number of common features beside of the specific features. From the effort to make the descriptors autonomous one of each other while keeping the logical connections between each others, we have decided to repeat whenever it is necessary the concepts or the didactic processes valid for the two types (written/oral), limiting at the most the returns to other parts of the text. The skills reference data doesn’t follow systematically an advance order because many aims have to be taken in parallel and the progression doesn’t follow a linear order according to the subjects and the languages in presence, but when it seemed appropriate, the descriptors come one after another in gradual order outlining a didactic process with sequential phases.

The evaluation objects

The various definitions of intercomprehension, proposed by the specialists of this field (Capucho 2010, Jamet 2010, Jamet-Spita, 2010, Ollivier, 2013), show the entire context in which the approach started and was used: For the most part it is about European projects with specific goals for chosen audiences generally regarding the scope of intervention of researchers. Contextual constraints have also influenced the evaluation’s criterions regarding the skills to acquire. Indeed, if the aims of an intercomprehensive teaching for the company professionals (CF. PREFIC-Cité des Métiers project) or of the Marine mercantile (Cf. INTERMAR project), are focused on the abilities and the pragmatic skills; in school or in university contexts, the factors of more general cognitive, metacognitive and ethic orders are more emphasized. The evaluation of skills in intercomprehension fits also into the variety of approaches. This variety is far to represent an incoherent fragmentation and demonstrate an effort of constituent contextualization of each educational deed. The didactics field formed now needs to have an evaluation recognized institutionally, at a supranational level. The objects of the evaluation as well as the methods chosen will then be compatible with the different audiences, their specific needs and the goals targeted, the REFIC offers a basis to work on this direction.

Thus, an institutional evaluation, necessary to the process wished for the recognition of intercomprehension, needs the definition of the identified and shared criterions regarding the levels reached in languages present in the learning processes. Besides, the strengths of the intercomprehensive approach can be found in the development of interdisciplinary skills: cognitive abilities of the knowledge’s transfer, the interlinguistic analogies, intercultural skills as well as the criterions that enhance the change of the learners’ attitude regarding their own learning processes, their own languages and the speakers. A certificated evaluation will necessary include a certificate of linguistic and pragmatic skills and also have other modes of qualitative evaluation such as portfolios, logbooks, auto-evaluation and evaluation between peers.

The same worry should concern the object of evaluation: the skill in one or several language(s), including that/these ones previously known and/or that are a learning process already targeted, but also knowledge or interdisciplinary know-how as for example those considered by Lenz and Berthele (2010: 6):

• “Communicate orally in multilingual contexts, for example, participate in a dialogue in many languages; use the code-switching and the mix of codes as functional tools as regards the communication and the context;

• Draw in many sources of different languages in order to accomplish tasks of production or interaction in one dominant language;

• Use a linguistic skills’ profile developed unequally in several languages […];

• Do mediation between languages, for example translate and interpret; explain with simple words in language B the meaning of a reading text in language C;

• Use all the knowledge learned from a former learning process of a language in order to understand texts from languages of the same family (intercompehension, for example, between Romance languages, Slavonic languages, Germanic language)”.

The tutor will choose according to his/her goals and context of intervention and will chose also the learning contents to develop and evaluate. We offer hints at mark III.4. of the REFIC: Evaluate the training process and enhance the results .

The progression of the learning processes

The researches in intercomprehension (Jamet 20120; Capucho 2014; Campodonio, Janin, Ploquin, 2014 to name a few) have emphasize a functioning quite different compared to the advancements considered in the learning process of a targeted language. The criterions take into account by the specialists for example; the complexity involved by the linguistic activity itself: the listening is without a doubt more difficult to understand than the writing, aside from the factors of a textual and linguistic nature; the simultaneous presence of several languages can appear as a serious complexity according to their number and diffusion, even though this one could be a serious difficulty to face as well as being a resource to use for the interlinguistic circulation that is ongoing.

The choice made in the framework of the Skills Reference Data to consider an eventual advancement is based on the teaching and fundamental presupposition that in each learning process the access to new knowledge is possible only from knowledge and skills that a learner already possessed. Yet, when we are confronted to an unknown language we try spontaneously to find recognizable elements thanks to similarity and analogy with our first language and all the other languages known, using also everything that we already know on the functioning of communication, on the organization of the linguistic systems, on the relational dynamics and finally on our encyclopedic knowledge.

During this process some elements will be more “transparent” for us than others, namely recognizable spontaneously by an immediate interference. The concept of transparency is at the heart indeed of the intercomprehensive processes, in particular regarding the lexicon and this, for several reasons. First, the words are the first access to the language in comprehension and in production; this is corroborated also by the researches on the linguistic acquisition of a second language (RAL) in a spontaneous context: the analysis of the inter-language of theses learners show that the first strategy on the access of a new language is organized around key words (the key word strategy); the lexicon is the first resource really linguistic used by the learner, the other resources are pragmatic, gestural, prosodic or relational. Indeed, even with a very low knowledge of the morphology, we can approximately understand what our interlocutor is talking about if we understand (and guess) the radical meaning of the words he uses, if we notice their lexical field and their thematic.

In intercomprehension also the learner leans more on the lexicon to understand the texts of unknown languages, so it is the “transparency” between the words of the different languages involved that we are going to work to learn to decrease the opacities.

But what is a transparent word? If this is true that we have to take into account subjective factors, as Dabène says: “the closeness is a lever for the learning process only when it is perceived and identified as such by the subject18” (1996: 397), it is also possible to define the levels of transparency and opacity more or less important within more objective basis.

The first element from which the learner gets in touch with the form of words, as Bogaards recalls: “to which the learners are confronted at first sight to the forms and not the meanings but the forms are first and only lines of letters and sounds” (Bogaards 1994: 166). The more they look alike known words19, the more it will be easy to make hypothesis on their meanings. If there is a semantic similarity to this formal similarity (namely if the word has a meaning very close to the meaning of a word very alike for its form), we can talk about formal transparency and semantics. Then, the link transparency-opacity is interpreted as a continuum where the learner can be confronted with different degrees of accessibility (which the false friends, where a strong formal similarity is opposed to a total semantic non similarity, are only possible scenarios and not the most usual).

In an intercomrpehensive didactics, the words – or any other linguistic element – perceived as transparent by the learner forms so the starting point of all the later learning processes. First it is about exploiting the spontaneous ability of each speaker/learner and build the meaning of texts on the basis of analogies between the new language(s) and the known language(s) and then guide her/him step by step to effect the necessary adjustments to find similarities that are less obvious. Moreover, other non transparent elements necessary to communication will be learnt contextually during the reading and listening activities thanks to a didactic device that was built around this approach (grammars of reading, comparative tables, punctual translations, etc.). References to these tools of reduction of opacities are given in the clarifications of the descriptors. An intercomprehensive learning process is not limited to accept the spontaneous hypothesis of the learners, by staying with an approximate comprehension, but it represents an entry into the languages that is constructed around the cognitive and metacognitive activity of the learners, to build together an acceptable comprehension and have elements that will allow them to proceed in their future learning processes autonomously to come up to a more satisfying comprehension and to a more efficient plurilingual interaction.

It is in the light of these considerations that we can understand how a progression in intercomprehension interprets the relationship simple-complex in a specific manner because it is added to the continuum opacity-transparency. The specialized texts or the registers more elevated, for example, generally considered as complex, can be more accessible for Romance language-speaking20 learners who know the specialized field because the lexicon comes from a Greek or Latin basis and it is shared by each Romance language with few modifications; it is due also to the textual gender in use and the issues ongoing in the disciplines tend to look alike in an international community of specialists of one matter. Thus, if we teach first in a language class the more used daily words and the available words21 of the targeted language, in intercomprehension the teacher can choose to start by texts with less used daily words but that are potentially more transparent for the learners. In this perspective, the levels established by the creators of the Common European Framework of References for Languages (CEFRL) can be not much operational. For example, Capucho remarks (2014: 367) that: “the descriptors in reception (written and oral) of the CEFRL are not adapted to the IC tasks. If the advancement, as considered by the CEFRL, goes from simple to complex, from the level of the word or the sentence at a textual level, it may be possible in IC to understand the global meaning of a complex text (especially a specialized text in the same filed as the one of the learners) without catch the details; it may be possible also to not understand a simple message if this one is not surrounded by iconic or a situational circumstances”.

In a didactic of intercomprehension the learner will seek the formal transparencies first on the basis of which activate the processes of interference, using also the contextual indications and her/his encyclopedic knowledge. The semeiological approach (from the form to the meaning) and the onomeiological approach (from the meaning to the form) are also integrated in a continual back and forth between global comprehension and analysis of the known lexical items.

Three levels of advancement

In our intercomprehensive approach, we have thought about three fields where we can find advancement on three levels (see the table below). The first field is about the learner and the growing degree of her/his autonomy in his/her learning process. It is about highlighting the evolution of her/his attitudes in particular toward his/her learner’s situation, her/his representations regarding the learning methods within an intercomprehensive vision, her/his thinking and auto-evaluation and her/his intercultural sensibility. From the cognitive abilities viewpoint, we will especially notice the progresses in the transfers of knowledge and the interlinguistic analogy.

The second field leans on the acquisition of textual skills, in particular, the types and gender of texts and their discursive functioning. The third field is focused on the knowledge and the know-how specifically linguistic: syntax, lexicon, morphology. For these two fields, the advancement follows a process - first with the help of the teacher and then in a more and more autonomous way - that goes from the most transparent to the less transparent, of a more spontaneous comprehension (thanks to the choice of the teacher’s document) to a more controlled comprehension that calls in the progressive acquisition of linguistic and strategic knowledge. Likewise for interaction, it is about to observe how the interactive dynamic spreads out to understand the functioning of it and then to acquire progressively skills allowing to participate effectively to a plurilingual interaction. We wish to state that the learning contents proposed in each field represent more a set of examples to suggest the type of knowledge and of know-how considered than a real program.

Each of the three fields grow on three levels of advancement; I. Consciousness rising, II. Training, III. Improvement. Inside each level, it will be possible to contemplate the different degrees according to the contextual conditions and the goals of the training action. Thus, at a first level, is it possible to raise awareness among the audience on its own linguistic and cultural repertoire, or to make the audience discover in practice the possibilities offered by the linguistic closeness for the understanding of texts with close languages but never studied? These punctual aims can be offered and reached on a day of initiation to intercomprehension for all kind of audience.

The levels II and III require obviously having temporal resources and the set-up of wider and organized educational devices. In each case, it will be about proceeding progressively, combining commitment and attention, multiplying the occasions to spread a new method to conceive the teaching of languages.

The level III could be equivalent to the level B2 of the CECR in reception, because beyond that level the learner’s/speaker’s skills put immediately their skills in a practical use for their own social and professional goals or in a skill-development process of one or more targeted languages of their choice which means a common practice at each reception of texts, in mother language or in languages less and less foreign. The approaches and the strategies acquired in intercomprehension will continue however to form a support for the learner to go forward in her/his future linguistic and communicative learning processes.

The indications of level have been occasionally indicated in the explanations of the descriptors but here are few elements of the description of the levels mentioned in an overview [66] (link (visible also in this table [67]).

Twenty times on the profession…

A last word on the future of the Skill Reference Data. The two texts - The Skills Reference Data of plurilingual communication in intercomprehension (REFIC) and the Skills Reference Data in didactics of the intercomprehension (REFDIC) - are the result of a collaborative work that has been carried on during three years during the MIRIADI’s plan: debates, confrontations, proofreading, proposals of texts have succeeded between the members of the work package in charge of the development, face to face or online. Moreover, throughout the project, other teams and partners have used the Skills Reference Data in different teaching and training contexts, their considerations have established an occasion to think and have made a reason for new changes. Stimulated by this dynamic, we have continuously changed the texts and have updated them on the platform forming the work area of the project. This process is not finished and it is not conceived in this purpose. Indeed, this is a true laboratory evolving all the time that we wanted to set up. As soon as the Skills Reference Data will be analyzed, commented, experimented22 later by the users, it could be improved and enriched thanks to the flexibility of the digital support. You can find the current version of the two Skills Reference Data here: http://www.miriadi.net/deux-referentiels [68]

 

Be aware of one’s linguistic profile is a first step in the plurilingual approach: the learner here reconstructs her/his own linguistic history (How many languages he/she speaks, when he/she learns them, how he/she uses it, etc.) and explores the linguistic and cultural diversity that surrounds it in all the fields: private, academic, professional and social (quarter, city/village, region, country).

Know how to enhance one’s linguistic profile and know one’s linguistic and cultural environment

The intercomprehensive learner-user will be more efficient if he/she is able to paint her/his own linguistic self-portrait: languages known and levels of control, needs, learning aims, etc. The process called “portfolio” and also the tool “portfolio” allows the learner to develop skills to become autonomous in the management of her/his own learning process.

Enhance one’s linguistic profile

• Identify the languages that we use and determine the different contexts of communication in which we use them, to be aware of the plurilingual and pluricultural dimension of one’s profile.

The tutor can ask to the learners what language(s) they use in these fields: private, social, professional and academic. We could call to visual metaphors (flowers, diagrams, self-portraits of languages, icons, representing different fields used, etc.) that will allow to the learner to have a whole vision of her/his linguistic uses.

• Organize and present partial skills of languages in one’s profile (comprehension, production, interaction, mediation) highlighting experiences of languages training in school contexts or extracurricular contexts, including during the multilingual and multicultural contacts.

Thanks to a linguistic biography (models present in the European Languages Portfolio validated by the Council of Europe and available in many languages: cf. portfolios), the subject could specify her/his level of skills for each language of her/his repertoire and make differences according to the linguistic activities (speak, read, write…). The tutor will have to insist on the legitimacy of each linguistic knowledge/skill, acquired in a formal, informal or in continuing education context, and on the interest to acquire others. In a way, the tutor will have to provoke a linguistic, mutilicultural and multilingual surveillance.

Know one’s linguistic and cultural environment

• Recognize languages and cultures present in the environment on which we live, in one’s family, at school, at work, in the mediatised sphere.

The tutor will begin asking to learners what languages are around them, in their quarter, their city in order to acquire a whole vision of the languages with which they are in contact. A more active approach of the notion of linguistic landscape, that involves organizing a survey on the field from the learners that could observe the languages present in the public display (advertisement and institutional communication) in the places of the social life (markets, restaurants, transports…).

Organize one’s learning process in Intercomprehension

The autonomy is a long-term aim that the learner of languages has to acquire all through her/his school education and during her/his training extracurricular experiences. In IC the organization abilities and the management of her/his own learning process are also enhanced: learn to learn.

In IC, a majority of the available tools are digital and give access to resources and features like training modules autonomously. Moreover, ICT allow communicating online with interlocutors worldwide.

Organize autonomously one’s learning process

• Define doable aims, regarding one’s needs of communication and learning process, taking into account that the specifications in IC change according to: the degree of closeness between the involved language(s) and her/his referent language(s), the type of texts, the contexts of communication.

The tutor will guide the learners to become progressively aware of the aims that they can reach thanks to IC and according to their profile, their needs and on the basis of an initial assessment or a discovery activity (see the sheets BAI/IAB (Interactive Activities Basis of Miriadi).

In self-learning process, the subject will be guided by teaching existing materials.

• Define a process: choose a work method, locate the available resources (material, tools of reference) and the available contexts of learning (digital platforms, courses in class) and define a schedule.

An important number of tools exist for the intercomprehensive approach to which the learner can have resort to reach their aims. They are differentiated by the audience (children, teenagers and adults); the different families of languages targeted (Romances, Slavs, Germanics, “beyond the languages”); the linguistic activities at stake (comprehension, oral and written interaction). Here is a (non exhaustive) list, on the website Galapro, of IC projects: Proyectos, Intercomprension, Galapro.

Adopt reflexive learning processes

• Adopt cognitive strategies (spread, association, classification, transfer of knowledge, inference…) and learning approaches (notes taking, memorization, summary and translation) according to the situation and the learning goals.

Each people have their own way to learn. This learning style constitutes a basis resource on which develops deliberately strategies and explicit methods.

• Take advantage of the previous learning experiences.

The learner beneficiates of the previous learning experiences to anticipate the difficulties and organize her/his work. Otherwise, the intercomprehensive method means also some deconditioning compared to the learning/teaching methods focused on one language.

• Self-regulate one’s learning process: change one’s aims and choice according to the situation, the intercomprehensive method, the successes and the eventual difficulties.

It is important to know how to change one’s own way to act over the training facing eventual difficulties, unforeseen, changes of aims, to continue one’s process and not be discouraged. This implies to do regular assessments during the training.

• Evaluates one’s learning process (efficiency of one’s approach, difficulty of the task, progress realized, levels reached).

Learn autonomously means know how to make a final assessment, the tutor will guide the learn to find her/his bearings toward a kind of assessment that is in accordance with the settled aims at the beginning of the process

Take advantage of the ICT (Information and Communication Technology) for online intercomprehension

• Participate to the collective writing of a plurilingual document on a wiki

Many scenarios forecast the collective realization of plurilingual documents that enhance all the work of interaction. The wiki is a tool particularly efficient for the implementing of collaborative tasks of writing.

• Participate to a chat or a plurilingual forum

The online communication requires the knowledge of some codes of intercomprehensive communication including accept to express yourself in different languages, make the effort to make comprehensible a written message and to understand the message of another (cf. the plurilingual an intercultural interaction). For the observation of the functioning of the online written interaction, examples are accessible in the forums of the Galanet platform www.galanet.eu [81], the Galapro platform www.galapro.eu/sessions [22] and de Babelweb platform www.babel-we.eu [82].

• Produce an audio or a video document: know how to register with favorable conditions to the comprehension of another (ensure the quality of the recording and the image, to sound environment, the position of the face, etc.)

The oral comprehension in IC can be about the continual comprehension of an oral document realized by your own means. Thanks to the given technology i.e. smartphones, technical means are now available to the largest number possible of non professional users. However, it is necessary to make the document clear and comprehensible so that the listener that doesn’t understand the language can understand it. You will find some examples of videos in the self-training area on the Galanet platform. We could begin a video self-presentation of the participants at an exchange.

Develop one’s availability in front of languages and cultures and in front of their learning process

To be confronted to languages that are not necessarily in the range of the most known languages at an international level stimulates the curiosity of the learners and call upon them to be more opened to the linguistic and cultural diversity. The descriptors of this subsection aim to the development of attitudes of thought on one’s own representations and attitudes of valorization of partial viewpoints.

Open up to the linguistic and cultural diversity

• Identify and make an evolution on one’s presentations about languages and cultures; be aware of the resulting means by the cultural and linguistic ethnocentrism.

A set of descriptors regarding the social skills is available in part A (Attitudes) of the CARAP (CARAP, social skills). In IC the tutor can offer activities in which the learners are confronted to the linguistic diversity to arise their individual and collective representations (for example, Eu e as linguas romànicas).

The tutor ensures that theses representations evolve by specific interventions: we can follow for example the way in which the representations on a language/culture have been transformed in a given context at different eras; confront the divergent perspectives on the same theme in a group culturally and linguistically mixed.

These thoughts will help the learners to put their own systems of reference into perspective and to waver about the nature of universality (cf. The autobiography of the intercultural meeting published by the Council of Europe and especially the Representations of Another. An autobiography of the intercultural meeting through the visual media and for the young learners).

• Be involved in the comprehension of the whole languages and the varieties of languages present in the communicative situation without being limited to languages of one’s choice.

To bring the learner recognizing the value of all the languages-cultures beyond their institutional and political statutes, the intervention of the tutor is sometimes necessary to ensure the artistic, scientific and cultural heritage that is expressed in languages and the less spread varieties (songs, poems, biographies of emblematic figures…). We can invest on the aesthetical pleasure and on the fun approaches.

Accept one’s learner’s position in IC

• Accept to be temporarily in an insecure linguistic situation: accept that you will not understand everything, do not be blocked in front of difficulties

The tutor can underline that the comprehension of messages is never total in a communication in first language. In IC, it is about reach an acceptable level of comprehension according to the purposes that we offer. For example, at an initial level the learner can simply recognize the nature of a text and grasp the main theme. We will make the difference between not understand everything and understand nothing to enhance the fragmented or approximate comprehension and not the literal one (cf. Levels of progression in textual skills).