Celebrate the European Day of Languages with us!

European Day of Languages 2021: 20 years celebrating linguistic and cultural diversity

Throughout Europe, 800 million Europeans are represented in the Council of Europe's 47 member states and all are encouraged to discover more languages at any age, as part of or alongside their studies. This stems from the Council of Europe’s conviction that linguistic diversity is a tool for achieving greater intercultural understanding and a key element in the rich cultural heritage of our continent. Therefore, the Council of Europe, in Strasbourg, promotes plurilingualism in the whole of Europe. 

At the Council of Europe’s initiative, the European Day of Languages has been celebrated every year since 2001 on 26 September - together with the European Commission.
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New in 2021 

Lara's language journey across Europe

Poster "20 things you might not know about Europe's languages"

20 event suggestions involving social distancing



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The secret agent’s language challenges app  2021 

The challenges and quizzes contained within this app encourage learners – future international agents – to take advantage of the plentiful opportunities available to practice or learn more about a language beyond a classroom context. By passing through a series of levels you can rise from a lowly agent in training to become a master secret agent. You can compete with friends in achieving challenges, identifying countries and languages and completing quizzes. The challenges go from the easy, such as, “count from 1-10 in 3 different languages within one minute” to ones that are a bit more demanding, “together with a friend, write the words to a song/rap in a foreign language.

The secret agent’s language challenges app  2021 

The challenges and quizzes contained within this app encourage learners – future international agents – to take advantage of the plentiful opportunities available to practice or learn more about a language beyond a classroom context. By passing through a series of levels you can rise from a lowly agent in training to become a master secret agent.

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Word of the day

Fiskevaer
Norwegian Good weather to go fishing (i.e. it is probably raining!)
Year: 2021
Previous Day

Activities

EDL's 20th Anniversary Great Bake-Off

This year, the European Day of Languages celebrates its 20th anniversary. And in order to share this special moment with all of you, we invite you to participate in our Great Bake-Off challenge! Will the recipe for your birthday dessert be one of the 20 chosen ones?

Click here for more information! 


EDL's international happy birthday video 

At the European Centre for Modern Languages we are very excited to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the European Day of Languages. To commemorate this very special day, why not add your voice in wishing "Happy Birthday!" in as many languages as you/your family/ friends/ schoolmates/ fellow students/ colleagues can manage in this 20 second challenge? We are very grateful for your help in turning this occasion into the most multilingual birthday ever!

Click here to find out more!


EDL T-shirt competition


Send us your design/image/graphic and have your layout on the official EDL T-Shirt! Find out more

Poll: Most effective methods for learning a foreign language

What are the most effective methods you have used for learning a foreign language - in addition to formal education at school/university (choose a maximum of 3)? If it was none of these – let us know your suggestions!

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Poll: Most effective methods for learning a foreign language

What are the most effective methods you have used for learning a foreign language - in addition to formal education at school/university (choose a maximum of 3)? If it was none of these – let us know your suggestions!
 
Other
 

Which language is it?

We all know this situation: on a bus, in a café, on the street we hear two people talking in a foreign language. And we wonder what language it is. Let's do some training here and next time this happens to you you will easily recognise it!
 
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Newest Events

24/9/2021 - 1/10/2021
ES
eTwinning project "I have a DREAM"
27/9/2021 - 2/10/2021
IT
ICS Padre Pino Puglisi - Scuola primaria Robbiolo
27/9/2021 - 28/9/2021
SK
ZŠ s MŠ Smolenice
28/9/2021 - 17/3/2022
PL
Szkoła Podstawowa im. Władysława Reymonta w Lipiej Górze
27/9/2021 -
HR
Budrovci Primary School
22/9/2021 -
ES
IES.Bañaderos-Cipriano Acosta

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- Statistics for 2021  -
 
1080 45 241840
events countries participants

 

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Myth or fact?

1. My mother tongue is all I need.

Myth   Fact
Skip

2. I’m not bilingual/multilingual. I can only speak one language.

Myth   Fact
Skip

3. Most people in the world use more than one language.

Myth   Fact
Skip

4. English is the only language children need.

Myth   Fact

5. Children get confused if they learn more than one language at the same time.

Myth   Fact

6. I can’t help a child to learn or use a language I don’t know (well enough) myself.

Myth   Fact
Skip

7. If learners don’t know the language of schooling, they’ll learn it best by being exposed to that language only - and by using that language only.

Myth   Fact
Skip

8. Continued use of the home language(s) will interfere with children’s learning of the language of schooling.

Myth   Fact
Skip

9. My job is to teach X as a foreign language and not to deal with other languages in my classroom.

Myth   Fact


ICT language tool of the week

Mendeley (PDF organizer, auto-insert citations)

A tool to find, organise, read and annotate research articles, books etc. Users can collaborate with others and share research material. Installation required. Data are automatically synced with all d... view details

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You can learn languages, too!


Download the brochure!

 

The EDL handbook of language challenges

  
The 51 challenges contained within the handbook encourage learners to go a little outside their comfort zone and take advantage of the plentiful opportunities available to practice or learn more about a language beyond a classroom context. Find out more

Did you know that...

The European Day of Languages is being supported and coordinated by the European Centre for Modern Languages of the Council of Europe? The Council of Europe is the continent's leading human rights organisation. It includes 47 member states, 27 of which are members of the European Union.



 

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Self-evaluate your language skills

The 'Self-evaluate your language skills' tool helps you to assess your level of proficiency in the languages you know according to six reference levels described in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR).

Start now!