Methodology of the Lesson Plan
To overcome the language barrier, CLIL teachers need to plan their lessons to
include language support as well as content teaching. We now explore the strategies
that can be applied.
Teaching in L1
If you teach a subject in the first language (L1) of your learners – or in a language in
which they are fluent – there are some things which you normally feel you can count
on. I’ll mention two: basic language ability and academic language proficiency.
a) Basic language ability
Most teachers feel they can count on their learners being able to use the language of
learning; in other words that they can talk without struggling with vocabulary and
syntax; that they can listen with reasonable understanding to people talking at some
length about a topic; and that can read and write at least at a minimally skilled level.
In these respects teachers are normally right.
If you teach your subject in a second language (L2), you know that you normally
can’t count on these things. Some learners will indeed be fairly fluent, in which case
they will use the language reasonably well. But most learners in Content and
Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) programmes are not fluent. They are still
learning the L2; and they are learning it ‘just in time’: i.e. they are learning in the
same lesson the new subject concepts the teacher is introducing and the language
they need for expressing these concepts. So CLIL teachers normally know that their
students will probably not be able to talk in groups in L2 without help; that they will
find it hard to write sentences without making grammatical errors and hunting for the
right words to use; that they may have difficulty following all the details of what a
subject teacher says; and that they may read subject textbooks in L2 more
laboriously and less efficiently than in the L1.
b) Academic language proficiency
Another thing which most teachers also think that they can count on when they teach
in L1 is that the learners can use their general language skills for the purposes of
learning in school. In other words they have cognitive academic language proficiency
or CALP. Here, teachers are on less safe ground.
While it’s true that most learners who are fluent in a language can use it easily for
talking, reading and writing in informal social contexts, it’s probably not wise to
assume that they can use it for learning. Most learners – using their L1 – cannot
work through a problem in a small group and report their findings, without a lot of
practice. They may not be able to follow fairly complex teacher talk on an unfamiliar
topic without some difficulty. They might find it hard to read a fairly complex subject
textbook; and they may well have difficulty planning, drafting and revising a piece of
coherent writing about it. They may also have to learn from experience what it is like
to express school thinking processes in the L1 – to define, classify, compare,