1.- CLIL
& CBI : WHEN LANGUAGE AND CONTENT MEET
Language
and Content Meet
In this
paper I will explore how CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) and/or
CBI (Content Based Instruction) could be identified as innovative approaches in
TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) in Argentina. Even
though the CLIL phenomenon and CBI are not new to the TESOL dimension, they
together have become a current topic of discussion and research in the EFL
teaching practices in Argentinian education.
With the
purpose of building a sound theoretical framework, I will first describe CLIL and
attempt to establish a connection with CBI, focusing on theoretical
underpinnings and multiples standpoints found in the literature. Secondly, I
will discuss whether such an innovation is more theory-driven, classroom
practices-driven, or a bridge constructed with contributions from both fronts.
Following
the theoretical discussion I will present examples of this innovation in my context
of professional practice and development.
One of the
first issues to explore is to determine whether CLIL and CBI are the same phenomenon
or whether the latter could be interpreted as a realisation of the former.
The term CLIL was first introduced in 1994 by David Marsh, who expanded its implications
in 1996 after Finland became a new state member of the European Union (EU)
(Lucietto, 2008:29). Marsh’s concept was most welcomed by the EU as one of their
crucial aims is to develop the plurilingual competence in their citizens.
Marsh (
On the
other hand, Dalton-Puffer (2007) restricts the scope of CLIL to educational settings
and classrooms where the environment provides opportunities for acquiring learning
as opposed to explicit practices. Her definition for the term under
consideration is [CLIL] refers to educational settings where other than the
students’ mother tongue is used as a medium of instruction. (2007: 1).
The CLIL
Project, far from being a mere definition (Lucietto, 2008:37), also offers a number
of dimensions which have been embraced by countries outside the EU (Bebenroth
and Redfield, 2004).
The Annual
Conference for Teachers of English organised by FAAPI (Federación Argentina de
Asociaciones de Profesores de Inglés) proposed the topic “Using the Language to
Learn – Learning to Use the Language” as the core issue of the 2008 event. Such
subject matter is closely connected to the realms of CLIL. The regional
association, APISE, which was in charge of organising this conference present
the CLIL dimensions1 (Table 1):
Table 1:
CLIL dimensions. Source: APISE, 2008
1 Also
available at http://www.clilcompendium.com/clilcompendium.htm. Last accessed
However,
it is in Europe where CLIL has been widely recognised as a tool to achieve the
plurilingual conscience the EU has established as a crucial aim among its state
members (Salatin, 2008:11-12). In her book on CLIL classrooms, Dalton-Puffer
(2007) gives a detailed account of how this approach has been applied at a
university level in Austria and the discourse features, academic language
functions and learning environment it produces. According to Dalton-Puffer and
Nikula (2006), Austria is not the only country where CLIL has been adopted.
They claim it has become a common practice in many European countries such as
Finland. In this context, needless to say, the rationale lies in the conviction
that learners, regardless of the CLIL settings, will develop their
communicative competence if they use the target language as a medium
for
learning since they will engage in building different communicative events and social
practices by working collaboratively and with a goal that goes beyond the
explicit linguistic knowledge. Another country is to consider is Italy, where
CLIL projects or models (Lucietto, 2008) not only use English, but also German
as a medium of instructions in subjects such as
Mathematics
and Geography (Fantin et al. 2008: 1731-83; Ambrosi et al. 2008:
191-264). In the literature review, Dalton-Puffer (2007:1) asserts that even
though there are many terms, which carry different implications, in use, such
as CBI, Bilingual Teaching, and English Across the Curriculum among others, the
term CLIL is now established in the academic and educational spheres. However,
Navés (2000) simply states that while CLIL is a term used in Europe, CBI is the
preferred choice in the USA and Canada, this latter being generally recognised
as the country where this trend originated in the 1960’s. We will see, however,
that this distinction is far from being clear-cut.
It is
worth noticing that the definitions advanced so far share the concept of
subject, content or instruction. If we bear in mind the Content Dimension
(Table 1) and its foci we can clearly see how CBI fits into such a dimension.
Therefore, we might say that Content-Based Instruction, also called
Content-Based Learning (Wolff, 1999:178-180),might be viewed as a branch
(Wolff, 2002:214) that has developed and evolved in its own right with
different underpinning principles. Brinton et al. (2003: 265) define CBI
as
teaching that integrates particular content with language-teaching aims,
with a goal to
develop use-oriented second or foreign language skills; concurrent
teaching of
academic subject matter and second language skills, following a sequence
determined
by a particular subject matter with a content-driven curriculum.
We clearly
see that, even though the main goal is foreign or second language acquisition,
the emphasis is not on learning the language (Davies, 2003) but acquiring content
in a context where language becomes a psychological tool, one which mediates
between the learners and the subject matter. This mediation and integration should
be a dual commitment (Stoller, 2002) made by teachers who truly believe that CBI
can offer a better environment for language acquisition. Consequently, it is expected
that learners when fully immersed in this cycle will benefit from both language
and content, since as they improve their L2 competence, they will be able to
learn more content, and, in turn, by acquiring more content knowledge they will
master the target language used as medium of instruction (Stoller, 2002). Not
only content knowledge
will
affect their performance in the L2 but it will also transfer to their mother
tongue as
they might
integrate new concepts in the traditional curriculum.
This
concern in content-based language teaching and learning is not recent; it is
rooted in the 1960’s when a French immersion project was implemented in Canada
in postsecondary education. This alternative model spread in the USA and developed
in another model termed LSP (Language for Specific Purposes) which aimed at
preparing learners for university level and the working domain (Brinton et
al. 2003:5-9; Swain and Johnson, 1997:1; Troncale, n/d:2). All these
programmes proved to be effective in achieving content and L2 literacy outcomes
in adults (Sticht, n/d).
In general
terms, CBI or CBL adherents (Woff, 1999:178-180) believe that this approach can
develop a higher competence in the foreign language since learners are exposed
to longer periods of input, when it is sustained in time (Murphy and Stoller, 2001:3-4),
and they are engaged in real meaningful interaction as the process is supported
by authentic materials which, together with an innovative instruction, will help
them develop strategies such as hypothesis building and testing. Eventually, learners
will gain subject and world knowledge which will enable them to interact in the
real world (Woff, 1999:180).
With the
purpose of establishing some founding principles in context, Brinton et al. (2003:1-4)
propose five different rationales. First, learners’ needs and potential uses of
the target language must be taken into account. Second, such needs should be
met by the use of relevant content as to promote subject and language development.
Third, this approach works best if it anchored in learners’ previous knowledge
of both subject matter and language. Fourth, the focus should be on the
macroaspects of language, that is, on discourse organisation rather than on the
sentence level. Last, even though it has been suggested that one of the
features of CBI is the use of authentic material, the input in the target
language should be understood by learners and offer the possibility to continue
improving their linguistic knowledge.
From its
incipient implementation to current trends, CBI has evolved in many different directions
and it might be better comprehended if we see it as a continuum (Shang, 2006;
Hernández Herrero, 2005; Brinton et al. 2003; Met, 1999) where language
is at one end and content at the other.
Met (1999) offers a clear continuum of
language-content integration (Table 2)
Table 2: Continuum of language-content
integration. Source: Met (1999)
It goes without saying that within this
continuum, varied models are found. Therefore,
I
propose the following CBI continuum (Table 3).
Table 3: CBI continuum
Beginning at the language extreme, CBI lesson
is a reduced perspective suggested by Peachey (2003). CBI is equated to a
lesson where its topic responds to learners’ interests ranging from their pop
starts to scientific issues. One of its features is that though it focuses on
content and collaborative work, it is not sustained in time. It is seen rather
as a lesson within the EFL syllabus.
Whitney (2002) proposes in his book Dream Team
3, textbook adopted by a large number of secondary schools in Argentina, a
section called English Across the Curriculum in each unit of the book. This
reading section is characterised by language within the range of learners’
grammatical competence though it presents new lexical items in a set related to
any subject. In my opinion it is close to the language extreme since it is
neither content-related to the school curriculum nor coherent as regards context.
Theme-based instruction occurs within the
ESL/EFL or any other target language course and though the context is given by
specific content areas, the focus of evaluation lies on language skills and
functions. A theme-based course will be structured around unrelated topics
which will provide the context for language instruction (Brinton et al. 2003:
14-15).
At the centre of the continuum, the adjunct
model (Met, 1999) combines a language course with a content course. Both
courses share the same content base and the aim is to help learners at university
level (Kamhi-Stein, 1997; Iancu, 1997) master academic content, materials, as
well as language skills.
The Language for Specific Purposes models, on the other hand, are aimed at preparing
learners to meet the demands coming from academic instruction as well as job
requirements. Although the focus is on content, materials can be structured
around microskills, functions and specific vocabulary (Brinton et al. 2003: 7).
Next in the continuum, the sheltered-content approach consists of a content
course taught by a content area specialist in the target language. The student
population consists of non-native speakers who are expected to master authentic
material and, most of all, the content course syllabus (Brinton et al. 2003:
15-22).
Last, total immersion programmes can be mainly
found in Canada and the USA at elementary and secondary levels. It has been
applied to second language acquisition, in settings where language is learnt
incidentally through content instruction and interaction within the classroom
context (Dalton-Puffer, 2007; Brinton et al. 2003; Grabe and Stoller, 1997:80).
Regardless of their location in the CBI
continuum, all these models share the view that language knowledge is best
acquired when situated in a context where content knowledge provides the basis
of instruction. However, it should be pointed out that the varied perspectives
described above seem to work best when learners already have some knowledge of
the target language.
These models are the product of both theory and classroom practice. Grabe and
Stoller (1997:5-21)2 provide a description of CBI research foundations. Their
contributions,which present evidence of the interplay between theory and
practice, could be summarised as follows (Table 4):
Table 4: Support for CBI: theory and
classroom-driven
The adoption of a content-based approach in my
professional practice began at a bilingual school in 2004 when my students
expressed the need to English as a medium of instruction. Consequently, I
proposed a syllabus to teach Literature using unabridged texts together with
authentic material about literary studies. The change improved my students’
communicative competence, particularly their vocabulary knowledge and their reading
skills.
A year later I designed a new course for my
upper-intermediate students who were in their last year of secondary education.
Once a week during a whole academic year, they were taught Critical Thinking
together with Literature.
In 2006, it was decided that different versions of CBI should be extended to
all EFL Courses in primary and secondary levels. At present, as regards primary
education, learners have, besides following a traditional EFL course, Computers
Studies and Science taught in English.
As for the secondary level, learners follow a traditional course with textbooks
which might be oriented to language skills and international exams such as FCE
(First Certificate in English) and CAE (Certificate in Advanced English). In
order to introduce CBI, we designed a programme (table 5) taking into account
learners’ level of English and curriculum content knowledge in Spanish. The
proposed subjects are taught in English by their English teachers once a week.
Table 5: CBI courses at Fundación Educativa
Esquel Bilingual School
In
I have also designed and taught some
theme-based lessons at the last year of secondary school at San Luis Gonzaga
School. At this school, English as a subject in the school curriculum is only a
two-hour class per week; however most of the students in the highest years
attend English private lessons.
Since 2006, English has become involved in the
subject Research Project which is taught in Year 5. Students are expected to
carry out research on a particular area within Chemistry, Biology, or Physics,
and produce at the end of the process a research paper for the community.
Though students write their papers in Spanish, abstracts are written in English
to familiarise them with scientific conventions.
Therefore, their first lesson (see Appendix 2)
in English is about Knowledge-Science-Education, and, by the beginning of the
second term, they have a lesson about Research Methodology, mainly focused on
how to organise their research papers and how to write an abstract. Students
have expressed that they can use English for real purposes and that it is a way
of acquiring specific vocabulary which they might need in university courses.
First, we
discovered the basis of CLIL and how it is realised into several dimensions where
content and second or foreign language acquisition in classroom settings interact
with one another with the purpose of providing learners with an improved context
for language learning. One of CLIL dimensions invited us to identify CBI as an innovation
in TESOL which is rooted both in theory and classroom practices. Accounts of
how CBI approaches can be implemented suggest that there is a whole continuum of
models teachers can adopt; from strong versions where content is cornerstone to
a weak version where content provides the context for language instruction.
Such assertions have been exemplified by national conferences, research and current
projects set in classrooms where learners have an intermediate command of
English.
In
conclusion, it might be said that CBI is an approach which can illuminate our
EFL curricula; however it is vital that teachers should be trained so as to
help them explore the horizons this innovation has to offer.
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and A. Zorzi (2008) ‘CLIL all’Istituto
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(ed.)…e allora…CLIL! .Trento: Editore Provincia
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the Language XXXIII FAAPI Conference
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An Experimental Study.’ Osaka Keidai Ronshu
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(2nd edition) Content-Based Second
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Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
Dalton-Puffer, C. (2007) Discourse in
Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL)
Classrooms. Philadelphia:
John Benjamins.
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‘Pragmatics of Content-based Instruction: Teacher
and Student Directives in Finnish and Austrian
Classrooms’. Applied Linguistics 27/2: 241–
267.
Davies, S. (2003) Content Based Instruction
in EFL Contexts. At
http://www.iteslj.org/Articles/Davies-CBI.html
(Date accessed 21st October, 2008).
Fantin, F., E. Fratton, and W. Paoli (2008)
‘CLIL all’Istituto comprensivo Centro Valsugana,’
in Lucietto, S. (ed.)…e allora…CLIL! .Trento:
Editore Provincia Autonoma di Trento-
IPRASE del Trentino.
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Approach to Content-Based Instruction’, in
Snow, M. and D. Brinton (eds.) The
Content-Based Classroom. White Plains: Longman.
Grabe, W., and F. Stoller (1997)
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Hernández Herrero, A. (2005) ‘Content-based
instruction in an English oral communication
course at the University of Costa Rica.’ At
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2005/archivos/oral.pdf (Date accessed 23th
October, 2008).
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A Case Study,’ in Snow, M. and D. Brinton
(eds.) The Content-Based Classroom. White
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Performance through Discipline-Based
Summarization-Strategy Instruction,’ in Snow,
M. and D. Brinton (eds.) The Content-Based
Classroom. White
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integrated learning: a framework for the
development of learner autonomy,’ in Little,
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Wood, N. (2004) Perspectives on Argument. Upper
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APPENDIX 1: Critical Thinking, sample syllabus
CRITICAL THINKING
SYLLABUS with BIBLIOGRAPHY 2007 (students will
have underlined material)
Set One
1- What is Critical Thinking? (Fisher, 2004:
1-14).
2- A perspective on argument (Wood, 2004:
3-20).
3- Argument style (Wood, 2004: 41, 47, 49-61).
4- The structure of an argument (Diestler,
1998: 3-11, 12-13).
5- Considering some issues 1 (Numrich, 1995)
- Give me my place to smoke.
- Gang violence
- Facing the wrong end of a pistol
Set Two
1- Logic at a glance.
2- The language of reasoning (Fisher, 2004:
15-32)
3- Assumptions (Diestler, 1998: 78-80; 47-50)
4- Deductive reasoning (Diestler, 1998:
80-100)
5- Inductive reasoning (Diestler, 1998:
101-222)
6- Considering some issues 2 (Numrich, 1995)
- Is it a sculpture, or is it food?
- Women caught in the middle of two
generations.
- What constitutes a family?
Set Three
1- The Toulmin Model: the essential parts of
an argument (Wood, 2004: 126-145;
146-151).
2- Types of claims (Wood, 2004: 159-196;
Fisher, 2004: 82-105).
3- Types of proof (Wood, 2004: 199-218, 220).
4- Fallacies (Wood, 2004: 231-237; Diestler
1998: 224-261).
5- Considering some issues 3 (Numrich, 1995)
- Green consumerism.
- Finding discrimination where one would hope
to find relief.
Set Four
1- Rogerian argument and common ground (Wood,
2004: 251-259).
2- Visual and oral argumentation (Wood, 2004:
394-411).
3- The power of language and the language of
power (Diestler, 1998: 264-307).
4- Suggestion in media (Diestler, 1998: 310-340; 341-353).
5- Writing a research paper that presents an
argument (Wood, 2004: 294-382).
APPENDIX 2: A lesson on
Knowledge-Science-Education, March 2008 (what follows is a sketch of what was
done in class)
1. Remind stu of booklet for this year
2. Introduce topic. Elicit answers by asking
What is knowledge? How has knowledge been
divided and put in black and white?,
brainstorm ideas, invite stu to write on the board.
3. Ask students to work in groups of three.
Answer these questions:
1- We generally divide sciences into two broad
groups. Which are they?
2- Give five examples of each category.
3- What are the features of each group? What
makes them distinctive?
4- Why do some people say that Natural
Sciences are more scientific and
factual even truer than Social Sciences?
5- What’s the difference between rationalism
and empiricism?
6- How do we imagine a typical scientist?
Personality? Appearance?
7- Why is it said that science and feelings
are incompatible?
8- What’s the role of education as regards
Science?
9- How can you ‘murder’ innocence in young
learners?
10- How important is imagination for you? And
for scientists?
11- Are you more logical that imaginative or
the opposite?
4. Plenary: compare answers and make general
comments.
5. Pairwork: listen to the song GOODBYE MR. A,
and edit the lyrics (handout). There are ten
wrong words. Then compare answers with another
group.
6. All together: listen again and correct. How
can you relate this song to today’s topic?
Goodbye Mr A (The Hoosiers, 2007) EDITED
VERSION
There’s a hole in your logic
You who know all the answers
You claim science ain’t magic
And expect me to buy it
Goodbye Mr A
You promised that you would love us
But you knew too much
Goodbye Mr A
You had all the answers but no human touch
If life is subtraction your number is up
Your love is a fraction it’s not adding up
So busy showing me where I’m wrong
You forgot to switch your feelings on
So so superior are you not?
You’d love a little bit but you forgot
(repeat chorus)
Goodbye Mr A
The world was full of wonder
Til you opened my eyes
Goodbye Mr A
Wish you hadn’t blown my mind
And killed the surprise
(repeat chorus)
© 2011 by Dario Banegas.
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