This paper draws on Wenger's model of community of practice to present preliminary findings on how processes of negotiation of meaning and identity formation occur in knowledge construction, meaning-making and interaction in two secondary Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) science classrooms. It uses a multimodal conversation analysis methodology to provide detailed analyses of how teachers and students use talk-in-interaction and other semiotic resources to build and maintain their communities of practice. The data come from two CLIL classrooms in Spain in the same curricular area (biology) but which differ in geographical and sociolinguistic context (Barcelona and Madrid), and in terms of age, level of secondary education and pedagogical approach. The findings show the complex patterns of participation and reification as teachers and learners use different linguistic and other resources to make meaning. The paper argues that a combination of Wenger's meso-level practice model and micro-level multimodal conversation analysis is highly effective in elucidating how learning and identity formation are accomplished in CLIL classrooms. It also suggests that the efforts to understand classroom processes and language use in CLIL classrooms can be strengthened by forging links between CLIL research and the classroom discourse work across different disciplines.
This study investigated potential inequalities in a bilingual education program where secondary school students are streamed into two strands with different degrees of exposure to the target language based on their proficiency: high exposure (HE) and low exposure (LE). Drawing on classroom registers (Christie, 2005), appraisal theory (Martin & White, 2005), and sociocultural perspectives on classroom interaction (Gibbons, 2006; Lemke, 1989; Mortimer & Scott, 2003), researchers analysed interactional practices by teachers teaching the same content in both groups. Results show no major differences in distribution of classroom registers and teachers’ general pedagogical purposes across groups. Analysis of students’ language use across registers corroborates previous studies showing that translanguaging in content and language integrated learning is more common when the focus is on classroom management issues (e.g., Moore & Nikula, 2016). The most striking results relate to differences in use of pedagogical purposes and evaluative language. These differences entail more interactional engagement in higher order thinking skills by HE students and use of a wider variety of language resources in the second language (L2) to express these meanings, compared to LE students. This indicates that the division into strands in bilingual programs may lead to different perceptions of students’ academic capacities beyond L2 proficiency and reinforcement of social differences and inequality in bilingual programs.
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