Action-oriented inclusive plurilingual sign language education: Mediation - Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR)

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CEFR WEBINAR SERIES 2021 | NUMBER 8

The eighth webinar of CEFR Webinar Series 2021 entitled "Action-oriented Inclusive Plurilingual Sign Language Education: Mediation” took place on 10 December 2021. It was organised in co-operation with Humboldt University Berlin.

The webinar was designed for sign language professionals (teachers, curriculum developers, assessors etc.). The participants were expected to familiarise themselves with the core concepts outlined and elaborated in the CEFR Companion volume (2020) and with ProSign2 resources (2020) and consider ways in which they may be integrated into sign language teaching, learning and assessment practices. It was organised as a workshop where participants discussed on sign language-related activities and issues in sub-groups.

The webinar was moderated by Prof Christian Rathmann. Prof Rathmann is the Head of the Department of Deaf Studies and Sign Language Interpreting at the Institute for Rehabilitation Studies at Humboldt University Berlin where both full-time programs are offered: BA Deaf Studies and MA Sign Language Interpreting. His research areas cover sign language linguistics, deaf communities, interpreting & translation, language acquisition, learning, processing and assessment (L1 and L2). He was one of core members of the ProSign team at European Centre of Modern Languages of the Council of Europe (ECML) from 2011 through 2019. ProSign played an instrumental role for the systematic introduction and implementation of CEFR for Sign Languages in the Council of Europe member states.

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Online 10 December 2021

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The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, teaching, assessment – Companion volume broadens the scope of language education, reflecting academic and societal developments since the CEFR publication in 2001. It presents the key aspects of the CEFR for teaching and learning in a user-friendly form and contains the complete set of extended CEFR descriptors, replacing the 2001 set. These now include descriptors for mediation, online interaction, plurilingual/pluricultural competence, and sign language competences. The illustrative descriptors have been adapted with modality-inclusive formulations for sign languages and all descriptors are now gender-neutral.

This publication marks a crucial step in the Council of Europe’s engagement with language education, which seeks to protect linguistic and cultural diversity, promote plurilingual and intercultural education, reinforce the right to quality education for all, and enhance intercultural dialogue, social inclusion and democracy.

The new version updates and extends the CEFR 2001, which was designed to provide a transparent, coherent and comprehensive basis for the elaboration of language syllabuses and curriculum guidelines, the design of teaching and learning materials, and the assessment of foreign language proficiency.