Language attention in content-based instruction

Abstract

Subject-matter specialists teaching content via a foreign/second language in higher education often exhibit a meaning-based pedagogy, unsystematically attending to inaccurate language. This observational study examined whether two foreign-language-teaching-trained instructors teaching content in English in a Mexican undergraduate program would emulate these instructional patterns, or would attend to language favouring language-and-content-integrated pedagogy. In the study, over 400 instructional episodes, video-recorded during 18 hours of regular-classroom teaching, were analyzed using the COLT observation scheme (Spada & Fröhlich, 1995). Results showed that the foreign-language educators favoured content, erratically attending to inaccurate language during communication breakdowns. Language attention occurred reactively through word translations, lexical-gap scaffolding, and isolated explanations for non-target phonological forms. These instructional patterns may result from the language teachers’ newly assumed content-based instructional roles. To favour language attention during subject-matter teaching, language instructors need training and curricular support that helps them draw on their foreign language teaching experience as they deliver content.

Les tâches intégrées plurilingues nécessitant la compréhension en anglais dans des universités non anglophones : les perceptions et les pratiques déclarées d’étudiants ayant des profils académiques et langagiers variés

“…Les résultats d'études menées dans des contextes d'enseignement basé sur le contenu (Stoller, 2018) démontrent qu'il y a souvent un manque flagrant de ressources linguistiques pour ces étudiants (Arias et Izquierdo, 2015;Ballinger et al, 2017). Dans notre contexte, le fait qu'il soit attendu que les étudiants comprennent l'anglais dans le cadre de cours offerts en français, que cette compétence ne soit pas évaluée et que le soutien linguistique soit inexistant est inquiétant.…”