A school considering an AI tool should be able to explain how it serves the languages its learners use. A list of supported languages leaves the educational work ahead of it: deciding whether a particular explanation makes sense to the students who read it.
UNESCO’s 2025 Languages Matter guidance centres education in languages learners understand. It places multilingual education within the work of building inclusive education systems. Read Languages Matter.
The organisation’s earlier generative AI guidance also addresses linguistic diversity. Section 4.1 asks institutions to protect local and minority languages when adopting these systems. Read the 2023 AI guidance.
Language belongs in the review of an AI activity. The question for a proposed activity is whether learners can use the explanation to think about the subject and express an idea of their own.
Test meaning in a classroom
Consider a hypothetical mathematics task about comparing quantities. A translated explanation could use a technically acceptable word that children have never encountered at home or school. The teacher would need to decide whether to teach that term explicitly or introduce the idea through more familiar language first.
We would review a small set of complete activities with educators who know the learners’ languages. Reviewers should be able to mark a passage that is awkward and explain how it affects the task. A general rating of translation quality would leave the next teacher with little guidance about what to change.
Learners should also have an appropriate way to describe what they find confusing. That feedback needs interpretation: unfamiliar vocabulary may be part of the intended lesson, while an unclear instruction can prevent a child from beginning it. The review should state which problem a proposed change is meant to solve.
Let communities shape the material
Language review should give local educators a say in the examples used. A lesson about everyday measurement might draw on activities that a community recognises. Teachers could decide whether those examples support the concept being taught and whether an outside reader would need more explanation.
The people contributing that knowledge should be able to set terms for its use. A school could begin with material already approved for teaching and record who can authorize a revision. That would give reviewers a clear place to raise concerns about how a community is represented.
We would keep the review record beside the activity, with the language and learner group it covers. When the material changes, those details would help the school decide who should examine it again before another class uses it.