Section 1. Guidelines for reading texts on the use of English in European education

Due to its practical nature and flexibility CLIL can be incorporated in many ways, with different subjects, languages, types of schools and learners of different age. For example, it might involve university students having 2-3 periods of „language showers“ per week, in which they learn as much as half or more of all their assignments in the other language.

In Europeover half of the countries with a minority/regional language community resort to partial immersion as the preferred way of teaching both the minority and the state language. In the 1970s, a number of central and eastern European countries established a parallel system of bilingual schools aimed at pupils exhibiting high attainment. During the 1990s this system was made available to all pupils in the general education system. In the same period, several European Union countries launched initiatives involving CLIL.

CLIL involves teaching a curricular subject through the medium of a language other than that normally used. The subject can be entirely unrelated to language learning, such as computer technology being taught in English in a school in Sweden. CLIL is taking place and has been found to be effective in all sectors of education from primary through to adult and higher education. Its success has been growing over the past years and continues to do so.

Teachers working with CLIL are specialists in their own discipline rather than traditional language teachers. They are usually fluent speakers of the target language, bilingual or native speakers. In many institutions language teachers work in partnership with other departments to offer CLIL in various subjects. The key issue is that the learner is gaining new knowledge about the 'non-language' subject while encountering, using and learning the foreign language. The methodologies and approaches used are often linked to the subject area with the content leading the activities.

 

Text 1-17. CLIL TEACHERS’ TARGET LANGUAGE COMPETENCE

(Based on http://clilingmesoftly.wordpress.com/clil-teachers-tl-competence/)

Why thinking CEFR may distract from the real language issues in CLIL.

According to a recent OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) study (2009) teacher quality is one of the most important schooling factors influencing student achievement. The difference between having an effective versus an ineffective teacher is estimated to be equivalent to a full year’s difference in learning growth for students. Moreover, the impact of differences in teacher quality outweighs the impact of other educational investments, such as reductions in class size. This raises an important question in CLIL training and research: In which respects can the CLIL teacher’s foreign language competence be seen as a quality indicator of his or her teaching?

The starting point for reflections on the issue of language competence for CLIL teachers was the request for a review of a Spanish research project which investigated into the language competence of CLIL teachers in the Madrid region. The outcome appeared straightforward and clear. Train non-language teachers to pass a CEFR (The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages) level – mostly B2 or C1 – and half the CLIL battle would be won easily. However, given the linguistic complexity of any CLIL incident, this can lead to frustration and quality loss.

According to available resources (Eurydice) the following tentative (not comprehensive) picture for official language requirements for CLIL in Europe emerges:

§ Several countries such as Germany, Austria and Norway state that teachers have generally studied two subjects during their education. If they study a foreign language and a non-language subject, they are thus competent in the two types of subject targeted by CLIL. According to the Eurydice country report on Austria, school heads themselves decide whether teachers may teach their subject(s) in a language other than the normal language of instruction (German). In so doing, they may consider the following:

§ is the teacher also a teacher of the CLIL target language?

§ has (s)he spent a certain period of time in a country in which the CLIL target language is spoken, for example, studying or working there?

§ has (s)he had any specific linguistic and/or methodological in-service training in the field of CLIL?

§ is the teacher a native speaker of the CLIL target language?

§ has (s)he taken a proficiency examination in the CLIL target language?

§ is (s)he married to a native speaker of the CLIL target language?

However, only Hungary requires certified evidence of these two specific areas of specialisation. If teachers have no initial language qualification, they have to possess a B2-C1 level certificate. (Eurydice)

§ Poland has introduced teacher training standards where graduates have to master a foreign language and reach a level of B2 or B2+. If they choose the combination ‘non-language subject plus foreign language’, they have to reach level C2 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, in the case of the language subject. (Eurydice)

§ Italian CLIL teachers’ competence is B1/B2, according to Ludbrook, and in providing implications for CLIL content teacher training, she somehow vaguely states that CLIL teachers should have a level of general language proficiency that allows independent teaching.

§ France: CLIL is typically carried out within the SELO system (Sections europeennes et da langue orientale) with teachers being subject teachers rather than language teachers. In the first years of experimentation, the CLIL teacher was a subject teacher whose foreign language competence was certified by the regional inspector for the language concerned. Generally, this competence corresponded to a B2 level in the European Framework, although some activities were considered as needing a C1 level. In 2004, the Ministry set up a national certificate for teaching in a SELO, the certification complémentaire. Every year, the regional authorities, the Rectorat, organize a regional session open to all qualified teachers, and to initial trainees qualifying at the end of the year. Candidates must submit a paper giving their qualifications and motivations, and then take an oral exam before a jury composed of subject and language specialists. This certification is valid all over the country. (Bertaux).

§ The Netherlands: The Dutch education authorities recommend at least a B2 level. Schools introducing CLIL usually do so with their regular Dutch staff. Interested teachers are selected and trained during a two year period of in-service training courses. Most schools offer teachers’ courses ranging from classroom English to advanced English language programmes. Training is usually supported in-school by the English teachers. In addition, there are several institutions in the Netherlands that offer training for content and language integrated teaching, focusing mainly on the development of teachers’ language proficiency. (de Graaf et al)

§ Belgium: The requirements for CLIL teachers comprise a basic (sic) qualification obtained in the target language and/or certificate of upper secondary education obtained in the target language.

§ Spain: Sacramento Jaimez and Ana M. Lopez Morillas (2011), as proponents of the Andalusian plurilingual program in primary and secondary education, report that B-2 has been set as the minimum level a content teacher must have in order to apply for a definite bilingual post.

Following the Eurydice survey 2006 four main language criteria for the prospective CLIL teachers evolve. They should either:

1) be native speakers of the target language,

2) have completed a course or studied in the target language,

3) be undergoing in-service training on CLIL type provision, and

4) have taken a language test or examination.

Strategies associated with the last two categories are developed specifically for recruiting teachers. Those associated with the first two are ways of ensuring less directly that appropriate teachers will be selected for CLIL. In most countries, all such strategies are adopted on a voluntary basis. (Eurydice, 2006)

Needless to say that most of these language requirements for CLIL or any preparatory courses for CLIL go hand-in-hand with carefully elaborated and detailed statements on the methodology of CLIL, often suggesting various CLIL models and principles. Interestingly, some proponents would even go so far as to compensate foreign language deficits with more advanced methodological skills. Jaimez and Lopez Morillas (2011) consider methodological updating essential in the Andalusian bilingual education model “in order to compensate for the lack of confidence and competence in the use of the foreign language”. Metaphorically speaking, this could be compared to the idea of who is the best football coach? Someone with a personal international career or someone who spent the same time reading a lot about the “beautiful game” and all the psychological and sociological aspects connected to it?

Furthermore, CLIL pedagogies have been highly influenced by language acquisition theories which favour language teaching perspectives may also play an important role in the animated discussion on CLIL teachers’ language competence.

Summing the data up the following picture emerges. The diversity of opinions, the lack of authentic teacher data, and the linguistic complexity of any CLIL event seem to make an approach whose language requirements are (almost) exclusively based on CEFR scales strongly questionable.

 

Why the L4C Model may be more helpful.

A more elaborated model covers the linguistic multiplicity of CLIL and through this may allow better planning, preparation, and teaching of any CLIL incident.

The L4C model (languages four/for CLIL):

This model consists of four “languages” that merge to create an appropriate linguistic CLIL event.

1. General language: This comprises advanced general everyday language competence as covered by the CEFR scales, also comparable to Cummins BICS.

2. Academic language: This is language mostly reserved for schooling or academic purposes. Basically, this is language that will be used across various subjects or domains that are “school-focussed”. For example, words such as “analyse, evaluate, grid, pie chart, column, etc”. As for English it essentially embraces the academic word list as provided by Averil Coxhead – http://www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/resources/academicwordlist/.

3. Subject/Domain Specific Language: This is language that almost exclusively appears in relatively restricted areas/domains, such as “hibernation” in biology or “precipitation” in geography. Some researchers also use the word “technical terms” (Nation, 2001).

Various measures could be taken to ensure a satisfactory training in this language area.

a) Experienced subject teachers together with their language colleagues put up a bank or an inventory of domain specific key-vocabulary.

b) Shadowing of mother tongue teachers in the respective subject. For example, an Austrian history/CLIL teacher attends lessons in an English teacher’s history class doing intensive linguistic and action research.

c) Dialogic learning, which is teaching that centres around conversations with other teachers focusing on teaching and learning issues during which teachers examine their own beliefs and practices and engage in collaborative planning, problem solving and decision making.

d) Using and linguistically analysing information technology data to gather relevant subject specific language data.

4. Classroom language, or language to learn. This is language that is used for Cognitive development most popularly linked with Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking skills, strategy training (literacy skills, presentation skills etc), CLIL supporting learning styles such as collaborative learning, discovery learning, team-teaching, etc.

So at the end of the day this raises the need for some serious subject specific linguistic soul-searching, or in other words, collecting and evaluating data from CLIL teachers in action.