Luxembourg: A multiplurilingual space for language education. How can teacher education respond to the linguistic and cultural diversity of a given place?

The aim of the present communication is to share the main findings of a collaborative research
project developed in 2013-2014 between a high school and the University in Luxembourg.
Collective multilingualism and individual plurilingualism, defined as multiplurilingualism
by Ehrhart (2010: 221), form the linguistic environment of Luxembourg. Luxembourg, a small
country in Europe with a high rate of immigration (46, 7%, STATEC, 2016), has three languages
(Luxembourgish, French and German) and a trilingual education system. Fluency in the three
languages is considered to be essential to facilitate social cohesion and professional success
(OECD, 2006: 1010), and language teaching occupies a central position in the education system.
Nevertheless, language learning programmes are quite inflexible and very compartmentalized
(García, 2009; Gretsch, 2014). The multiplurilingual situation of the country challenges
the traditional view of language and requests teachers to adapt their practices to the new
circumstances.
One option for secondary schools to address this linguistic diversity are the classes d’insertion,
an innovative setting developed by the Ministry of Education, where recently arrived adolescent
students are ofered an educational track by means of a full-immersion program in a second
language (French, German or English).. Considering the teacher as a mediator and grounded in
sociocultural theory combined with an ecolinguistic approach, the present study observes and
describes the way that two teachers of these classes d’ insertion were teaching classes in French
to newcomer students (aged 11-12);. By means of classroom-observation, audio-recording, field
notes and photos we tried to understand what was happening in class during one academic
year. Through three semi-structured interviews conducted with the teachers, we gathered
information about their thoughts concerning their practices. The research data show the impact
of the teachers’ beliefs on their classroom practices and pedagogical decisions. However, their
representations do not fully correspond with the real practices observed in class. In order to
make those two ends meet, are planning to extend the reflection on an international level, in an
action-research-project with teachers developing their talent as researchers and reflecting about
their practices in order to propose new pedagogies and approaches to teacher education in
multicultural contexts.