In my presentation, I would like to share insights from the context of Internationalization at Home, as practiced within the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree European Master in Migration and Intercultural Relations (www.emmir.org). In this program, we experiment with the idea that, in today’s globally interconnected society and superdiverse cities, students arriving for study mobility already carry with them place-based knowledge of the place they travelk to. They can act as intercultural mediators between minority communities living in the city and local students. In the Czech Republic, faculties of education remain among the least internationalized university environments, which creates a significant gap between teacher training and the realities that future graduates will encounter in their own classrooms, classrooms that will inevitably include students with migration backgrounds. Moreover, most students at Czech faculties of education have no personal experience with international mobility, such as a semester abroad via Erasmus, particularly those training to become civics teachers, with whom I have worked for over twenty years. This is why the presence and engagement of international students is so vital: when they work alongside local teacher trainees, everyone benefits. 

In my course at Charles University in Prague, where international students on semester-long exchanges study alongside local students, we jointly explore the following research question through a combination of experiential pedagogy, non-linear pedagogy (as developed by Rantanen and Chudoba), and place-based education: How can internationalization at home, framed through place based education and lived urban experience, empower foreign students as knowledge holders in superdiverse classrooms, and what pedagogical strategies support mutual learning between local and international students in the context of consumer spaces and everyday urban practices? 

This study applies qualitative research methods, as we use them in our classes, with a strong emphasis on research walks as a participatory and reflective tool to explore students’ embodied urban knowledge. The course design integrates elements of experiential learning and draws heavily on the framework of non-linear pedagogy, particularly the concept of spaces of emergence as developed by Rantanen and Chudoba (see bibliography). Rather than following a pre-structured sequence of instruction, the learning process is shaped by students’ lived experiences in the city, their spontaneous discoveries, and the informal knowledge they contribute. International students act as navigators of hidden layers of the urban landscape, commercial, cultural, and relational, while local students reinterpret their own environment through a newly decentered lens. To understand what is happening in your city (any city today, in our case it is Prague) you need to have students from Vietnam, Nepal and USA. We also make use of Geosemiotics which goes well with all mentioned principles.

In my course my course objectives are that students will learn to apply the methods of experiential learning and place-based education. They will experience the city through the lens of diversity, gain a foundational understanding of urbanism, and develop the ability to apply theories of cultural humility. Furthermore, they will cultivate sensitivity to different lifestyles and situations that characterize life in a global superdiverse city. In my paper presentation I will include examples from Fall 25 and Spring 26 classes and I expects to demonstrate that international students in superdiverse urban contexts possess valuable, embodied knowledge of the city particularly in areas such as consumer culture, food, spatial navigation, and informal social norms. When pedagogically activated through experiential and place based methods, this knowledge not only enriches classroom learning but also reshapes traditional power dynamics between international and local students.

Crul, M., & Lelie, F. (2023). The new minority: People without a migration background in the superdiverse city. VU University Press. Harfitt, G., & Chow, J. M. L. (2020). Employing Community-Based Experiential Learning in Teacher Education. Springer Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6003-3 Christ, R. C., & Clifton, A. C. (2020). Culturally responsive investigations of communities: Honoring funds of knowledge and community spaces. In Teaching for citizenship in urban schools (Chapter 3). Information Age Publishing. Knight, J. (2003). Updated definition of internationalization. International Higher Education, (33), 2–3. https://doi.org/10.6017/ihe.2003.33.7391 London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Cities. (2023). Young Researchers-in-Residence: A model for investigating and designing urban spaces with young people [Report]. LSE Cities. Lovett, K. (Ed.). (2020). Diverse Pedagogical Approaches to Experiential Learning: Multidisciplinary Case Studies, Reflections, and Strategies. Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42691-0 Moya Pellitero, A. M., & Hunter, V. (2020). Somatic landscapes and urban identities: Mapping emotional engagements through site, dance and body connections in Raval, Barcelona, a case study. Athens Journal of Architecture, 6(3), 249–272. https://doi.org/10.30958/aja.6-3-3 Rantanen, A., & Chudoba, M. (2023). Experimenting with complexity: A pedagogical tool for evaluating and fostering ‘space of emergence’. In M. Chudoba & G. Griffiths (Eds.), Curious pedagogy: Reflections on urban planning education (pp. 227–246). Tampere University. https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978‑952‑03‑3007‑1