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CLIL in languages other than English
Successful transitions across educational stages

How to promote continuity in Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL)
from primary to secondary and tertiary education

CLIL in languages other than English –
Successful transitions across educational stages

Overview

Concepts and
background

Portfolio and formative assessment

How can the professional community promote continuity and face discontinuities in Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) from primary to secondary and tertiary education? This resource website presents recommendations to support CLIL in languages other than English across educational levels, both in the language classroom and in other subjects.

The recommendations are underpinned by guiding principles for CLIL and illustrated through examples of practice from various contexts offering a holistic view on curricula, teacher education, professional collaborations, teaching materials and formative assessment.

CLIL across the curriculum – making successful transitions

A challenge for teachers and those responsible for CLIL programmes, especially in languages other than English, is continuity. How can we make sure that initiatives in CLIL are integrated into the overall language curriculum, rather than being isolated events? This resource website illustrates how the professional community can promote continuity and deal with discontinuities in Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) from primary to secondary and tertiary education. The resources provide approaches to supporting CLIL in general, and especially in languages other than English (CLIL-LOTE). It examines ways of doing this across educational levels, in the language classroom and in other subjects.

The resources include:

scenarios illustrating ways of making successful transitions in CLI-LOTE
lesson plans in which learners are encouraged to reflect on their experiences with CLIL-LOTE
examples of curricula from different countries, relevant to CLIL teaching
recommendations about how approaches to CLIL can be included in teacher education programmes
examples of CLIL-LOTE in different subject areas, such as Maths and Civics
proposals for ways in which language portfolios can be adapted to include formative assessment of learners’ experiences with CLIL

The recommendations are underpinned by a holistic presentation of Guiding principles for CLIL and by references to previous ECML work on this theme. The resources consider CLIL as part of intercultural education, as a vehicle for promoting pluralistic approaches “The term ‘pluralistic approaches to languages and cultures’ refers to didactic approaches that use teaching/learning activities involving several (i.e. more than one) varieties of languages, e.g. by integrating both the target language and the language of schooling, or the target language and other foreign languages, minority or regional languages, instead of dealing with the target language in isolation.” Candelier Michel (coordinator), Camilleri-Grima Antoinette, Castellotti Véronique, de Pietro Jean-François, Lőrincz Ildikó, Meißner Franz-Joseph, Noguerol Artur, Schröder-Sura Anna, with the participation of Muriel Molinié (2012), A framework of reference for pluralistic approaches to languages and cultures, “Pluralistic approaches to languages and cultures”, available here.

See: Multilingual glossary of key terms in language education to language learning and as a means of epistemological decentring “[…] epistemological decentring means that students are presented with different epistemological traditions and learn to reflect on and to navigate across their perceived boundaries […]. In addition, decentring in this definition deals with relations between different ‘centres’, which I define as discursive formations (Foucault, 1969) or localities of conceptualisations and knowledge production. A crucial component of decentring is to take note of the dynamic and constantly modifiable power relation between these localities.”

(Bojsen, 2023, p. 27)
Bojsen, H. (2023). Translanguaging, Epistemological Decentring and Power: A Study of Students' Perspectives and Learning. I H. Bojsen, P. Daryai-Hansen, A. Holmen, & K. Risager (eds.), Translanguaging and Epistemological Decentring in Higher Education and Research (p. 24-48). Multilingual Matters. for languages, cultures and subjects, specifically through the focus on languages other than English and the different cultural and pedagogic traditions embodied in them.

From a conceptual point of view the resources bring together three thematic focal points:

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL)
Languages Other Than English (LOTE)
Transitions

Recommendations to support CLIL LOTE across educational levels

In 2021/22, 55 experts from 28 countries have formed eight working groups in order to illustrate the project’s recommendations to support CLIL in languages other than English across educational stages through examples of practice from various contexts.

The recommendations cover key areas of CLIL-LOTE pedagogics, especially in relation to transitions. These are explored at four levels:

	Support transitions in CLIL through

the national/ regional level (macro level)	institutions, e.g. schools, universities (meso level)	classes/ groups/ teachers (micro level)	learners as agents (nano level)

specific guidelines in the curriculum	collaboration between institutions of different educational levels	collaboration between teachers of different educational levels	collaboration between students of different educational levels
initial and in-service teacher education		teaching materials where transitions are taken into account	portfolios that follow the learner across educational stages
For the development of competences for life and work

Recommendations to support CLIL LOTE across educational levels

Resources

The resource website is structured according to the five thematic areas of the recommendations relating to different target groups concerned:

Curriculum – for curriculum designers and decision-makers

Teacher education – for teacher educators and decision-makers

Collaboration between institutions, teachers and/or students of different educational levels – for teachers and head of schools

Teaching materials – for teachers and teaching material designers

Portfolios and formative assessment – for teachers and teaching material designers

www.ecml.at/CLILLOTEtransitions

Cite this resource

Resources

	recommendations, curriculum guidelines and teaching materials
	illustrations of the recommendations through models and scenarios including challenges and responses from different organisational settings

Target groups

teachers
teacher educators
teaching material designers
curriculum designers
decision-makers

Thematic areas

	Content and language integrated learning
	Language of schooling
	Plurilingual and intercultural education

Project team

Petra DARYAI-HANSEN
Coordinator
Denmark

Satu KOISTINEN
Finland

Beate LINDEMANN
Norway

Caterina POGGI
Iceland

Evangelia MOUSSOURI
Greece

Supported by: Luca Agostino (France), Laurent Cammarata (Canada), Joana Duarte (Netherlands), Pierre Escudé (France), Ana Kanareva-Dimitrovska (Denmark), Marina Mattheoudakis (Greece), Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer (Germany), Danièle Moore (Canada), Anssi Roiha (Finland), Heike Speitz (Norway) and the CLIL LOTE network that was launched in June 2021.

View project pages

It is with great regret that we learned of the recent passing of our dear colleague Evangelia Moussouri. Evangelia was a member of the ECML project “CLIL in languages other than English – Successful transitions across educational stages”. The coordinator of the project, Petra Daryai-Hansen shared this sad and painful news with us. Evangelia was also a member of the association Education and Linguistic and Cultural Diversity – EDiLiC. Our thoughts are with Valia’s family and friends. The EDiLiC committee pays tribute to her below.

EDiLiC tribute

Key references

Glossary

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Please note: These definitions relate to this specific project. The same terms may be defined differently elsewhere.

Items in total: 14

CLIL

CLIL in other subjects

CLIL in the language classroom

foreign language

linguistic insecurity

lower secondary education

non-territorial language

pluralistic approaches

primary education

regional and/or minority language

state language

tertiary education

transitions

upper secondary education

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Programme 2020-2023