Kaisa Hahl is a senior university lecturer and teacher educator in foreign language education at the Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Helsinki. Hahl is the head of the international Subject Teacher Education Programme STEP at the Faculty. She is also Adjunct Professor in applied linguistics with specification in multiculturalism in language education (University of Jyväskylä). Hahl teaches in the Finnish-language subject teacher and class teacher education programmes and in the English-language STEP. She has extended experience in working in multiple international projects that aim at enhancing teacher competences and the quality of teacher education.
Laura Lahti is a university lecturer and teacher educator in foreign language education at the Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Helsinki. She has several years of experience in teaching language didactics to future foreign language teachers at both Tampere University and the University of Helsinki. In addition, she has led in-service teacher training projects and supervised the teaching practice of language teacher students.
With a background as a subject teacher in German, English, and French, Lahti has taught across a wide range of educational levels – from primary school to adult education. Her research focuses on various dimensions of language education and teachers’ professional development, with particular emphasis on foreign language teaching and learning, early foreign language education, language awareness, and multilingualism.
Anna von Zansen is a postdoctoral researcher working for the DigiTala project at the University of Helsinki. DigiTala research project (funded by Academy of Finland 2019–2023) develops applications that use automatic speech recognition (ASR) in order to assess oral language skills in the Finnish Matriculation Examination, which is a national high-stakes examination taken at the end of upper secondary school. During the computerization phase of the Matriculation Examination, von Zansen coordinated the development of computer-assisted language tests and collaborated with schools. As a result, her PhD dealt with new approaches to assessing listening. Her background is in teaching languages to adults. As a teacher educator she is specialized in educational technology.
computer-assisted testing
educational technology
foreign language teaching and learning
language assessment
listening comprehension
oral language proficiency
Raili Hilden's field of specialization is language assessment. She has extensive experience in various developmental and administrative projects and expert duties related to language curricula, subject teacher education and assessment. She also works for the Finnish Matriculation Examination Board.
Hilden's current research activities include the leadership of the projects DigiTala (Academy of Finland), and Digisvenska (Svenska Kulturfonden), and the role of a partner PI in the project PARVI (Ministry of Education and Culture). Hilden's literary work comprises dozens of scientific articles alongside handbooks and book chapters written in Finnish, English and Swedish for multiple audiences in the field of language education.