Learning modern foreign languages in the European Union: Initial Teacher Education and mobility in lower secondary education

Résumé En

The European Council resolution of 14 February 2002, on the promotion of linguistic diversity and language learning, prompts European Union (EU) member states to promote innovative teaching methods through teacher training and to encourage teachers to participate in transnational mobility so as to enhance their knowledge of the language they teach.The fourth edition of the Eurydice Report, Key Data on Teaching Languages at School in Europe (2017) gives a comparative look at the developments in systems and practices for teaching foreign languages in 37 European countries since 2003.Regarding Initial Teacher Education (ITE), a master's degree is required to teach in the majority of cases, and the teachers of modern foreign languages (MFLs) at ISCED level 2 are specialists in their subject matter.In the 2013 TALIS survey, only 27% of all EU teachers at ISCED level 2 declared that they had been abroad for professional reasons, whereas 57% of European MFL teachers had done so. Among the latter, language learning was quoted as the first purpose for their travel (60%).Lastly, although European MFL teachers declared that they travelled abroad more than teachers taken as a whole, they didn't apply more, on average, for support from transnational mobility programmes – be they European, national or local.