Content and language integrated learning (CLIL) is generally recognised as a fruitful example of bilingual education. However, success in CLIL may not be straightforward and may require the establishment of coordination between content and language teachers. The aim of this study is to investigate if content and language teachers are able to plan a number of different types of coordination at the curricular level: between the foreign language (FL) subject and the content subjects, between the language subjects (L1 and FL) and between the content subjects. Lesson plans from 27 primary schools have been analysed paying attention to this three-level coordination to determine to what extent the objectives, contents and activities of the language and content subjects are common and, consequently, reflect these three types of coordination. Results show that teachers are aware of the potentiality of this three-level coordination, and that they easily coordinate objectives and contents but they find more difficulties in designing activities in a coordinated way. Results in this study thus suggest that teachers can plan effectively curricular organisation and provides useful recommendation on how this coordination should be made.
This chapter reviews the literature on materials development for EMI, providing keys for evaluation, adaptation, production, and exploitation of learning materials for English-taught higher education courses. It identifies the key assets in the coordinated application of materials development and EMI research, drawing on the prerequisites for coordinated language use and content learning. The key approaches for the development of interactive communicative materials are considered and analyzed to provide a deep insight on the rationale behind the main educational proposal—task-based content through language teaching (TBCLT)—that offers a number of indications to develop task-based EMI materials taking into account the potential of a text-driven syllabus that includes integrated project work as a staple diet of classroom dynamics.
Neural research points to a new direction in the study of the human mind and mental imagery seems to be a component of thought underlying every act of knowledge. In consonance with this evidence, some educational approaches are advocating the use of mental images in the classroom in order to aid in comprehension and recall. This new neural evidence presents an epistemological challenge both to the empirical and the theoretical realm, implying the promotion and development of research studies to check its applicability to different areas of learning together with the revision of the existent learning theories incorporating the new research findings. In line with this neural evidence, a cuasi-experimental study (n=223) was designed in order to analyse the incidence of mental imagery instruction on reading skill in a foreign language (English) and the degree of correlation to interest in the FL. The experimental group received treatment in mental imagery generation and manipulation, whereas the control group kept the traditional reading activities of the course. Different gathering information tools were used: reading part of the TOEFL, visual vividness imagery questionnaire, and a group of qualitative tools (questionnaires, interviews, and observation rubric). The UNIANOVA analysis shows a significant increase in the reading ability of the experimental group together with an increase in the interest measures on the experimental group.
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