The project focuses on German as an important European language, with an increasing demand in particular within Eastern and Southern European countries for learning and teaching the language due to its vital economic importance as well as because of a high number of migrants from those countries to Austria and Germany. It is based on the existing free e-learning website for learning the German language - deutsch.info, which was developed during two previous projects 2011-2017. The website is currently available in 19 languages and users can access all following materials free of charge: - Courses A1, A2, B1 and B2 with a total of 31 topics, consisting of 129 lessons, including interactive exercises; - Grammar section; - Media library, linked to built-in-dictionaries and a tool for morphological analysis; - Practical information for migrants about Austria and Germany; - Multilingual forums and applications for social media. The goal of the project is to extend the offer of deutsch.info for vocational language learning. Therefor four new courses will be developed: - Course for nursing/home care and health professions - Course for IT professions - Course for craftsmanship and technical professions - Course for professions in tourism and hospitality For workers and for VET students intending to move to or participate in mobility actions in Austria and Germany, but also for those staying in their own countries, such a free learning opportunity is very important. This is emphasised by the current user statistics of deutsch.info with more than 470,000 registered users only 4,5 years after the launch of the platform. Thus the project promotes access to new language learning resources and develops and disseminates new language learning materials and OER. After the project life-cycle deutsch.info platform will have new interactive and engaging courses, reading materials, audio and video tools, etc. and will be offered in 22 languages: Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, English, Esperanto, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Lithuanian, Persian, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Slovene, Spanish, Turkish and Vietnamese. New vocational language courses on the deutsch.info portal mainly target workers and learners in vocation education and training, who want to move or already live in Austria or Germany, but also those persons who need German for work in their own countries. We envision the following impact: Improved access to learning vocational German language for prosperous migrants and migrants, but also for persons working in the tourism and health sectors in other European countries.
The multilingual e-learning platform deutsch.info for learning German has been continuously developed since 2011 within the framework of various partnerships and funding programs of the European Commission. In this project, the online platform was expanded to include work-related language courses and content in the areas of care, crafts & technology, IT and tourism & gastronomy. Ten institutions from eight countries worked on the project for three years, contributing their respective expertise and know-how to developing new course content and thus further developing deutsch.info's highly popular online language learning offering. deutsch.info was already a particularly successful free German language learning platform aimed at self-learners, offering the opportunity to train and improve vocabulary and grammar and reading and listening skills by providing complete online courses at levels A1-B2. The 625.000 learners registered so far have the opportunity to see translations of texts, words, and exercises in their chosen language. In this way, self-learners remain motivated at a basic level and receive support in the learning process. The online courses incorporate specifics of life in Germany and Austria and cover different German language varieties as spoken in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland to be as authentic as possible. The courses cover 31 topics, 129 lessons, and over 1187 learning units. A total of 35 downloadable lesson packages have also been developed for the teacher portal. It provides a link between offline school lessons and online courses. A teaching package consists of a workbook with texts, exercises, didactic explanations, and additional materials and audio files. This project focused on German as an important European language, especially in demand in Eastern and Southern European countries due to its great economic importance and the high number of migrants from these countries in Austria and Germany. The result is the expansion of the already very successful multilingual e-learning platform deutsch.info with - four new work-related language courses on the topics of care, crafts & technology, IT and tourism & gastronomy with a total of 682 exercises and texts; - a new grammar course with 123 exercises to consolidate what has been learned; - 109 new contents for the media library with job-specific context; - an expansion of the portal's internal dictionary. All content is available in 22 languages: Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, English, Esperanto, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Lithuanian, Persian, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Turkish and Vietnamese. That number means an addition of 3 languages. It should also be emphasized that in connection with the immigration of specialists, important Asian languages, namely Chinese and Vietnamese, have been added. The new language courses on the multilingual portal deutsch.info are primarily aimed at professionals and learners in vocational education who want to move to Austria or Germany or already live here and at people who need German for work in their home country. Self-study with the new courses can provide better chances for employment in the labor market. As such, it can contribute to counteracting the worker shortage occupations in Germany and Austria but also for the general tourism & gastronomy industries and care abroad. Since deutsch.info has also been used by many learners who wanted to move to Germany and Austria, mainly from other European countries, the new work-related language courses provide them with important additional language preparation and support that was not available before. Especially for learners living outside large cities, such courses are rarely available. While the pandemic has helped to increase the availability of virtual courses, these courses are often not affordable for people from less developed regions of Europe. Therefore, the project makes an important contribution to meeting the needs of a large number of learners of German.