Artificial intelligence has entered language education faster than most of us expected, and much of the conversation about it has been about tools. The posts collected on this page ask different questions: what AI means for how we understand learning, knowledge and the teaching profession, and what it might mean to use it well. Many of them draw on my work coordinating the AI Lang project at the European Centre for Modern Languages.
I have grouped the posts by theme rather than by date (dates refer to the year when a post was created, although some of them have been updated since then). Each entry comes with a short note on when it might be useful. If you are new to these debates, AI in ELT: Two Possible Futures is probably the best place to begin.
Start here
If you only have time for three posts, these are the ones I would suggest:
AI in ELT: Two Possible Futures
AI is reshaping language education, challenging teacher agency, destabilising assessment, and exposing geopolitical biases. This post examines the stakes and argues for a humanistic, intellectually grounded ELT future.
Building an Ethical Framework for AI in Language Education: The AI Lang Guidelines
What does it mean to use AI well in a language classroom, not just effectively, but ethically? This post introduces the AI Lang framework: four principles, eight guidelines, and thirty-five competence descriptors for the ethical use of AI in language education.
Epistemic Vigilance in Language Education: Thinking with Machines
When a conversation with ChatGPT about blog analytics turned unexpectedly philosophical, it led me to reflect on epistemic vigilance ( i.e., the practice of questioning, testing, and refining knowledge) and its role in language teacher education.
Contents of this page
1. The big questions
- AI in ELT: Two Possible Futures (2024). Useful when you want a teacher-oriented summary of the British Council’s 2024 report on AI and English language teaching, followed by a critical reading of what it overlooks (teacher professionalism, the geopolitics of English, assessment) and a sketch of two possible futures for ELT: technocratic automation, or teachers as intellectuals.
- The AI ‘alignment problem’ in language education and applied linguistics (2025). Useful when you want to ask whether AI tools fit the values of our field. Drawing on an article by Curry, McEnery and Brookes (2025), the post looks at alignment in terms of knowledge, language and ethics, and at what this means for feedback, assessment and adaptive tools in language classrooms.
- AI in Language Education: Notes from an International Panel (2026). Useful when you want several perspectives at once. These notes from a panel on AI in English language teaching and translation are organised around five kinds of judgement (pedagogical, contextual, ethical, professional and institutional), and make the case for thoughtful use rather than shallow adoption.
2. Using AI ethically in teaching and teacher education
- Building an Ethical Framework for AI in Language Education: The AI Lang Guidelines (2026). Useful when you want to know what “using AI well” might mean in a language classroom. The post introduces the AI Lang framework (four principles, eight guidelines and thirty-five competence descriptors) and includes a collapsible outline of the whole framework, with reflection questions.
- Epistemic Vigilance in Language Education: Thinking with Machines (2025). Useful when you want to help student teachers or learners question plausible-sounding AI output. Starting from an exchange with ChatGPT, the post introduces epistemic vigilance and shows how it might work in teacher education and in an AI-assisted process writing lesson.
- AI-Assisted Teacher Reflection: Thinking Before, During, and After the Lesson (2026). Useful when you want to think about how AI can support reflection before, during and after a lesson, and what it cannot do. The post draws on Thomas Farrell’s framework and on work in the AI Lang project.
The AI Lang project
Artificial Intelligence in Language Education (AI Lang) is a four-year initiative (2024–2027) of the European Centre for Modern Languages of the Council of Europe, which I coordinate. It aims to help language teachers use AI in ways that are safe, responsible, purposeful and reflective.
The project is developing two main resources: a framework of guidelines for the ethical use of AI in language education, and a Moodle-based professional development course for language teachers.
3. Inside the AI Lang project
These posts follow the project as it developed, and are listed in the order they were written.
- Language Education in an AI-Driven World: Reflections from the ECML Coordinators’ Meeting (2025). Useful when you want to see where the project started: its team, its aims, and the first, six-principle version of the guidelines, with a later note on how the principles were streamlined.
- Advancing the ECML Guidelines for language education (2025). Useful when you want a short account of an early stage in developing the guidelines, and of their layered structure, from principles to competences.
- The Artificial Intelligence in Language Education (AI Lang) workshop (2025). Useful when you want to see how some forty experts from across Europe critiqued the draft guidelines and piloted the Moodle course in Graz, and what the team took away from their feedback.
- Empowering language teachers through AI and research literacies workshop (2025). Useful when you want to see how AI literacy and research literacy can be brought together in a one-day workshop for language teachers, run jointly with the ReaLiTea project in Larissa.
- From Mastery to Judgement: Rethinking AI Professional Development in Language Education (2026). Useful when you are designing professional development on AI. Reading participants’ reports from the Graz workshop, the post argues that what teachers valued was confidence and judgement, including about whether to use AI at all, rather than tool training.
Looking for more?
For classroom-facing posts on learners, young learners, multilingual classrooms and everyday practice, see Resources for Language Teachers.
To learn more about engaging with research as a teacher, see Resources for Teacher Research Literacy.
For the ideas behind language teaching, see Resources for Applied Linguistics in Language Education.
Explore the other resource hubs
- Resources for Language Teachers
- Resources for Applied Linguistics in Language Education
- Resources for Complexity in Language Education
- Resources for Teaching Refugee and Migrant Learners
- Resources for Teacher Research Literacy
- Resources for Research Methods in Language Education
- Resources for Academic Writing
By subscribing to this blog, you will receive occasional updates on topics relating to language education, including my ongoing work on AI in language teaching and learning. (privacy policy)
About me
Achilleas Kostoulas is an applied linguist and language teacher educator at the Department of Primary Education, University of Thessaly, Greece. He holds a PhD and an MA in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages from the University of Manchester, UK and a BA in English Studies from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
His research explores a wide range of issues connected with language (teacher) education, including language contact and plurilingualism, linguistic identities and ideologies, language policy and didactics, often using a Complex Dynamic Systems Theory perspective to tease out connections between them. Some of his work includes the research monograph The Intentional Dynamics of TESOL (2021, De Gruyter; with Juup Stelma) and the edited volume Doctoral Study and Getting Published (2025, Emerald; with Richard Fay), as well as numerous other publications.
Achilleas currently contributes to several projects that bring together his long-standing interests in language education, teacher development, and the social dimensions of language learning. As the coordinator of the AI Lang (Artificial Intelligence in Language Education) expert team at the European Centre for Modern Languages of the Council of Europe, he is active in developing principles and resources to help educators make informed, pedagogically grounded use of AI in their teaching. He also leads the University of Thessaly team of ReaLiTea (Research Literacy of Teachers), a project that supports language teachers to engage with, and contribute to, educational research. Alongside these, he contributes to LocalLing (Revitalisation of Linguistic Diversity and Cultural Heritage), a Horizon-funded initiative for the preservation of heritage and minority languages globally.
In addition to the above, Achilleas is the (co)editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Education and Language Review, and welcomes contributions that explore the dynamic intersections between language, education, and society.
About this post
This blog is a space for slow, reflective thinking about applied linguistics, language education, professional development, and the role of technology in language teaching and learning. Transparency about process, tools, and authorship is part of that commitment.
- I created this page on 24th September 2026. I will periodically revise it to ensure accuracy, so feel free to point out any issues that come to your attention.
- When preparing this page, I used artificial intelligence to support drafting, copy-editing and Search Engine Optimisation. I selected and organised the posts, and retain responsibility for analytical thinking, authorial decisions and wording.
- The views expressed here are personal and do not necessarily reflect those of the University of Thessaly, the AI Lang team and the ECML, or any other entity with which I am affiliated.