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This study examines the perceptions of pre-service English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers of their skills to face emergency remote language teaching (ERLT) situations, and to determine whether these vary according to gender, age, university, or course. A cross-sectional survey model was used with 332 pre-service EFL teachers studying in two Spanish universities, an onsite institution, and a distance university. After analyzing the results, it can be said that participants' ERLT skills are moderate, and they vary significantly according to age, course, and type of university, but no statistically significant differences are found regarding gender. The results can guide teacher trainers and researchers, as they reveal the needs of pre-service EFL teachers to teach effectively in ERLT situations.

Emergency Remote Language Teaching is a new term coined after the concept of Emergency Remote Teaching (Hodges, et al., 2020), which emphasizes that teaching that is being done during emergencies and crises, as the pandemic caused by COVID-19, is neither distance nor online teaching properly. This paper explores the attitudes and perceptions of pre-service bilingual primary teachers at the University of Córdoba (Spain) regarding the design of socially and culturally responsive learning materials in a real Emergency Remote Language Teaching context. Due to the nature of this exploratory research, this study was designed to perform a qualitative analysis. To analyze the data, the grounded-theory scheme was followed to establish different categories and topics, then content analysis was applied, and finally, a manual SWOT analysis was created. Participants showed positive attitudes towards the design of materials for Emergency Remote Language Teaching, emphasizing the feeling of real teachers, the design of resources with a meaningful purpose, and the importance of 'thinking outside the box.' They also found challenges derived from the new, complex situation, and the lack of experience designing materials for distance teaching. Recommendations are proposed for teacher training and materials design in Emergency Remote Language Teaching contexts.

Bilingual programs have become more common in higher education around the world in an attempt to provide learners with the education they need to face today's world. These programs can provide academic, linguistic, intercultural, and professional benefits to students. Consequently, countries like Spain have developed bilingual education to help students become proficient in foreign languages and develop essential competences for their professional futures. Research has analysed how Spanish bilingual education is implemented, and how teachers are trained. However, few studies examine how bilingual programs impact graduates' employability, mobility, and intercultural awareness, and how graduates perceive their skill development. Moreover, little has been studied about bilingual graduates' work situation and whether participating in these programs has helped them find work abroad. This paper analyses whether a combination of participation in Spanish bilingual programs, employment, and experiences working abroad affects bilingual education graduates' self-perceived employability, mobility, and intercultural awareness. This study adopts a quantitative approach, in which 741 respondents participated. Findings show that bilingual graduates who are currently working have higher self-perceived employability and better perceptions of their mobility and employability competences than those who followed monolingual studies, even when they have not worked abroad.

The usefulness of ICT in language learning is unquestionable nowadays. There are many digital educational resources available for foreign and second language teachers, materials which are progressively acquiring an important role in the teaching-learning process. In order to respond to the increasing presence of such technologies in the classroom, teachers need to acquire digital and media competences, two key elements for lifelong training process. However, these are superficially addressed in teacher education. In this light, both in-training and in-service educators demand more skills and specific training to be able to teach students how to use technologies and, ultimately, help them develop their own digital and media competences. Following an exhaustive bibliographical revision of scientific literature in the field, this theoretical paper seeks to revise the concepts of digital and media competences as well as to reflect on how superficially they are addressed at universities and teacher-training centres. After this, the importance of both competences as key elements for teachers is brought to light, as well as some useful suggestions to help foreign and second language teachers acquire and develop them and, simultaneously, teach them to their students.

The profound evolution that Spanish language education has experienced since the passing of the first modern educational law in 1970 has led to improved students' proficiency. In this sense, traditional foreign language teaching has been gradually substituted by Bilingual Education in the country to promote language learning, intercultural competence, and mobility; however, reviews in the field have not examined language education in all the Spanish regions but rather they have only considered isolated regions or compared some of them. This paper provides a historical analysis of Spanish language education, reviewing its evolution since 1970, and comparing the country's bilingual and monolingual regions. Findings show that differences among territories mainly concern the areas and number of hours devoted to foreign language teaching and teacher linguistic requirements. Content and Language Integrated Learning is the main approach to Bilingual Education followed, whereas English is the main language of instruction in all regions.

As in other countries, bilingual/multilingual education has become widespread in Spain. However, research either focuses on Spanish programs' implementation, students' performance or teacher training, but not on their contribution to graduates' self-perceived linguistic success (understood as a combination of intercultural competence, international mobility and employability). Therefore, this paper studies whether Spanish bilingual education results in higher self-perceived competences. An instrument examining these three elements is applied, and Facebook Audience Insights is used for sample targeting. Findings prove that Spanish bilingual education graduates have higher self-perceived intercultural competence and international mobility. In terms of gender, women who have participated in Spanish bilingual education show higher self-perceived intercultural competence, whereas men who have studied in these programs consider themselves more interculturally competent and mobile. Conversely, there is no evidence of more positive self-perceived employability than in monolingual education. All in all, participation in a Spanish bilingual program is demonstrated to be an influential factor in self-perceived global linguistic success, employability, and intercultural competence.

Up to now, research is limited when examining how gender identity and sexual orientation are addressed in the world's educational systems, and studies in this field have mainly focused on analysing the stereotypes and invisibility of LGBTIQ+ people in coursebooks, as well as on the remaining fights against discrimination. Consequently, little has been studied yet about pre-service teachers' attitudes. This quantitative study explores Spanish pre-service teachers' perceptions regarding the need to include LGBTIQ+ issues in their teaching performance. The results show that participants (n = 195) have positive attitudes towards the inclusion of LGBTIQ+ issues in their future professional career, although there are significant differences by gender and affective-sexual orientation, but not by educational stage. As a conclusion, helping pre-service teachers explicitly reflect on their attitudes, perceptions and experiences can enhance their competences and skills to help create more inclusive and safe education centres for LGBTIQ+ learners and their families. Teacher training is then essential, as research shows that even when pre-service teachers demonstrate positive views regarding the LGBTIQ+ community, their lack of awareness or experience with these issues may hinder their teaching practice. The results may strengthen educators' and researchers' convictions to continue fostering reflection on LGBTIQ+ issues.

European countries and their regions are trying to develop quality foreign language policies to help citizens become communicatively competent. The Spanish region of Andalusia has implemented Bilingual Education since 2005, whereas in the United Kingdom the take-up rates of languages in schools are low despite the linguistic demands that Brexit will pose to citizens. Scotland, however, seems keen on promoting the inclusion of languages into curricula. Analysing language policies may help understand differences between both contexts and, ultimately, build synergies between the educational administrations of these countries. Considering that corpus linguistic analysis of language policies allows identifying political ideologies permeating language policy and planning, this article studies and compares the use of language in Scottish and Andalusian language teaching policies. Although differences are identified in terms of the focus of the instruction and the language approach followed, findings show the efforts of Andalusia and Scotland to foster plurilingualism.

21st-century EFL teachers are assumed to be properly trained to help develop future generations' language proficiency and digital literacy. Moreover, with the impact that the current pandemic has had on education, technology seems to be the only possible way to guarantee the continuity of teaching and learning. Considering that English is the most studied foreign language in Europe, it is necessary thus to analyse whether EFL teachers believe they are prepared for such a task and whether studying at a distance university improves their training in this respect. This study examines the perceptions of pre-service teachers of English studying at the Spanish National University of Distance Education regarding their digital literacy. Through a quasi-experimental, quantitative design, findings show that participants value their digital skills positively but consider they have not worked enough on their digital literacy despite studying at a distance university. Men show more positive self-perceptions than women, while respondents with less years of university experience value their digital skills more positively. Furthermore, respondents acknowledge not knowing how to assess or improve their digital literacy. The results suggest the need for distance universities like UNED to strengthen teacher training in digital skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, learning and teaching processes cannot be understood without technology. Among all digital resources available for education, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) stand as great online tools that can facilitate the learning process of any type of content. In this sense, literature about MOOCs' implications in education has increased exponentially in recent years. This paper presents the results of a systematic literature review on MOOCs' origins and definition, their typologies and platforms, their strengths and limitations, the concept of specialization courses, and their didactic applications for Foreign Language Learning. The review followed a four-stage methodology for the analysis and synthesis of a total of 55 studies published between the years 2012 and 2019. Findings revealed that, although MOOCs have great potential for education, few studies have addressed neither the possibilities of these courses for Foreign Language Learning nor the potential of specialization courses. Main conclusions entail the need to face MOOCs' limitations to get the most out of them as well as more research on their potential for Foreign Language Learning and the possibilities of brand-new typologies such as nanoMOOCs.

Despite its numerous advantages, globalization, information society and the emergence of information and communication technologies (ICT) have caused quick changes in society, provoking the rapid obsolescence of knowledge and the appearance of new concepts. In this context, new professional demands for teachers are required to help students develop necessary competences for the 21st century. At this juncture, ICT, e-learning tools, and MOOCs have arisen as remarkable training resources for teacher lifelong learning with an undeniable potential; however, it seems relevant to study whether teachers agree in the usefulness of such tools. In this light, this article investigates and compares the perceptions of Spanish pre-service and in-service EFL teachers about ICT, e-learning and MOOCs, and the uses of these technologies. The results obtained allow the researchers to analyze whether the possibilities of these resources correspond to the real necessities of EFL teachers.