24 April
Seminar
Languages and Cultures in Education (LaCiE)
This group unites researchers studying the role of languages and cultures in educational contexts across all levels, including a focus on second and foreign language education and assessment (Danish, English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish), plurilingualism, interculturality, and the interplay between language and content learning.
Drawing on a range of theoretical approaches from disciplines such as linguistics, Second Language Acquisition (SLA), language pedagogy, and language policy, we seek insight into language teaching and learning in education through empirical studies, theory development, and national and international research cooperation.
Projects within the research group focus on language learning and use in different educational contexts, including language planning and evaluation. This includes a focus on modernization of language programs through the transformation of the interface between language, culture, and intercultural competencies, including Content and Language Integrated Learning/EMI and emerging cross-languages approaches such as translanguaging and plurilingual education.
Our research and dissemination support our position as a stronghold in the development of languages in education, both in Denmark and abroad, through continued cooperation with schools, university colleges, and ministries.
The focus areas have been identified through a bottom‑up approach and reflect the research domains in which the members of the group are actively engaged:
- The role of languages in teaching and learning at all educational levels
- Transitions across educational stages (primary, secondary, tertiary)
- The interaction between language, culture, and society in educational contexts
- Plurilingual education, translanguaging, intercultural education
- CLIL, EMI, and language for specific purposes/domains
- Literacy development, with focus on both reading and writing
- Foreign-language acquisition, learning processes and the use of digital media and digitally mediated communication, including artifical intelligence (AI) and online text corpora in language learning and teaching
- Language testing and assessment, including a focus on literacy
- The role of language anxiety in language learning and maintenance
- Teacher and student cognition
- The development of research-based teaching proficiency in Danish, English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish
- Teaching of functional grammar
- Follow-up research in the field of foreign language instruction in Higher Education, funded by the Danish government since 2022 and scheduled for renewed funding from 2026 (both links in Danish)
Our research interests are continuously evolving, as reflected in our current research and development projects, which are funded, among others, by the Carlsberg Foundation, the Independent Research Fund Denmark (DFF), the ECML, Horizon Europe, and 4EU+:
- AI and the University - Towards a sociolinguistics of literacy and voice in the age of generative language technology
- CLIL in Languages Other Than English – Successful Transitions across Educational Stages
- Diversity, Democracy, and Citizenship in Foreign Language Education in Scandinavia
- Framework of Reference for Pluralistic Approaches to Languages and Cultures (FREPA/CARAP)
- Heritage language education in Europe: Legislative and educational challenges
- Implementation of the UCPH language policy
- Language instruction i French, German, Italian and Spanish in Higher Education (in Danish)
- Models for teaching language as an additional competence (MUST)
- Multilingual Language Awareness in the European Digital Society (MultiLAwa)
- Online intercultural exchanges across languages in higher education (in Danish)
- Orality in French in the transition between primary, secondary and tertiary education (in Danish)
- TOEPAS (Test of Oral English Proficiency for Academic Staff) – validation and further development
- Towards a new model of communicative competence in multilingual higher education (in Danish)
- Developing young learners’ intercultural competence using picture books – the attitudinal dimension and empathy in primary English teaching
- English as a Relationship-building Resource Among Young Danes
- Exploring language anxiety in German and French heritage speakers – a comparative study
- Exploring Problem Sources of Disfluency in Second Language Production in Consecutive Interpreting
- Integrating digital information literacy in a FL writing test: Implications for teaching and assessment
- Language ecology in the classroom
- Language Learning Strategies of Multilingual Students in Denmark
- ‘Vi skal på floor i aften’: A Digital Ethnography Project on Social Media Use and its Effect on the Linguistic Norms of Danish Gymnasium Students
- Academic literacy in a bridge-building perspective (in Danish)
- A cross‑linguistic and cross‑level database: CLIL‑based teaching materials (in Danish)
- Developing Early Foreign Language Learning and Teaching in the Nordic/Baltic Context
- German language learners’ cognition (in Danish)
- Language instruction in French and German in Higher Education (in Danish)
- Learning Foreign Languages at an Early Age – A New Approach with Emphasis on Plurilingualism (in Danish)
- Online intercultural exchanges across languages in higher education (in Danish)
- Spanish as a foreign language in Denmark. A needs analysis of the subject's further development in a bridge-building perspective (in Danish)
- Teachers' literacy in language testing and evaluation (in Danish)
- Teachers of German across educational levels – a needs analysis (in Danish)
- The Language Strategy – More Languages for More Students
- Transnational Alignment of English Competences for University Lecturers (TAEC)
Previous PhD projects
We have established a collaboration with teachers/researchers and management at upper‑secondary schools and Higher Education institutions, and we collaborate with, among others, the following national and international institutions:
- Børne- og Undervisningsministeriet (BUVM)
- Consortium for language and subject matter didactics in primary and lower secondary school
- Council of Europe
- Danish Language Associations
- Dansk Universitetspædagogisk Netværk (DUN)
- Bias Aware Teaching and Learning (BATL)
- Teaching and Learning in the International Classroom (TLIC) - European Association for the Teaching of Academic Writing
- European Association for Language Testing and Assessment (EALTA)
- European Centre for Modern Languages
- Integrating Content and Language in Higher Education (ICLHE)
- International Language Testing Association (ILTA)
- Styrelsen for Integration og Rekruttering
- The Danish National Centre for Foreign Languages (NCFF)
- Uddannelses- og Forskningsministeriet (UFM)
- University College Absalon
- University College Copenhagen
In addition, members of the group engage in editorial activities for journals including Sprogforum and theNordic Journal of Language Teaching and Learning (NJLTL).
- CLIL across educational levels (see padlet from the symposium)
- CLIL-based teaching materials for primary and secondary education (in Danish)
- CLIL in Languages Other Than English – Successful Transitions across Educational Stages
- Developing Early Foreign Language Learning and Teaching in the Nordic/Baltic Context
- Digital series of talks on plurilingualism and interculturality
- Implementation of the UCPH language policy
- Learning Foreign Languages at an Early Age – A New Approach with Emphasis on Plurilingualism (in Danish)
- Plurilingual education – Teaching materials for primary and lower/upper secondary education (in Danish)
- Symposium on strengthening language skills across higher education (in Danish)
- Teachers’ literacy in language testing and assessment (LiSE)
Researchers
| Name | Title | Phone | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Behnke, Lars | Teaching Associate Professor | ||
| Daryai-Hansen, Petra | Professor | +4535334482 | |
| Dimova, Slobodanka | Professor | +4535328173 | |
| Flanagan, Marian | Associate Professor | ||
| Goodchild, Samantha | Postdoc | +4535331049 | |
| Hartling, Simon | Teaching Associate Professor | +4535330026 | |
| Holmen, Anne | Professor Emeritus | +4535328174 | |
| Jelby, Kasper Engholm | PhD Fellow | ||
| Jespersen, Dea | Enrolled PhD Student | +4535326624 | |
| Kirkeby, Johanne | PhD Fellow | +4535323917 | |
| Larsen, Sanne | Associate Professor | +4535328448 | |
| Lindschouw, Jan Juhl | Associate Professor | +4535328432 | |
| Lomeu Gomes, Rafael | Assistant Professor | +4535321219 | |
| Morollon Marti, Natalia | Teaching Associate Professor | +4522212578 | |
| Mortensen, Janus | Professor | +4535334020 | |
| Nielsen, Stine Maria | Teaching Associate Professor | ||
| Olesen, Jonas Munck | PhD Fellow | +4535321192 | |
| Schimpff, Annika Milena | PhD Fellow | +4535326458 | |
| Skov, Marianne Haugaard | Enrolled PhD Student | +4535325469 | |
| Strudsholm, Erling | Associate Professor | +4535328437 | |
| Tiongson, Marella Therese Alejandro | PhD Fellow | +4535327917 | |
| Viala, Eric Louis Hippolyte | Teaching Associate Professor | +4535328898 | |
| Yessenova, Aisara | PhD Fellow | +4535325762 |