Master degree in Linguistic and Literary Perspectives on the Text Final assignment

LOOKING AT CLIL:
TEACHERS VIEWS, LEARNERS ATTITUDES AND

VOCABULARY OUTCOMES

Supervised by Rosa Mara Jimnez Cataln

By Mario Arribas Garca

2009/2010

Table of contents
1. Introduction.....2 2. Implementation of CLIL in Spain: The case of La Rioja....5 3. Objectives....9 4. Review of the literature...9 4.1. Working definitions..9 4.2 Evidence on the effect of CLIL...12 4.2.1. Beliefs, motivation and attitudes towards CLIL: empirical evidence.....13 4.2.2. Motivation and language achievement....13 4.2.3. Studies on attitudes towards language learning..13 4.2.4 Views and attitudes related to CLIL....15 4.2.5. Studies on the effect of CLIL on learners language competence..17 4.3. Conclusion..20 5. Research questions....21 6. Method..22 6.1. Informants..22 6.2. Data collection instruments....25 6.3. Type of research.....26 6.4. Procedures..26 7. Results...27 7.1. Students views on CLIL....27 7.2. Students attitudes towards English....28 7.3. Students vocabulary outcomes..29 7.4. Relation between students attitudes and vocabulary outcomes....31 7.5. Teachers..31 7.6. Discussion...35 8. Conclusion.....39 Acknowledgements...41 References.....41 Appendixes45

1. Introduction
Nowadays one of the trendiest terms in the European educational scenarios is CLIL, an acronym for Content and Language Integrated Learning that refers to the use of a second or foreign language as a vehicle to learn the content of a school curricula subject. Yet CLIL is only a relatively new term, which accounts for an old educational method. Mehisto, Marsh, and Frigols (2008) remark how some centuries ago Latin was the language used for instructional purposes at universities. But, as these authors note, the use of Latin was not CLIL in its purest form, since little attention was paid to vernacular languages, and the will to integrate vernacular and national languages in the school curricula is regarded as one of the main innovations of CLIL in comparison to old methodological approaches. Again, this idea is not new either since, in Canadian and USA schools, CLIL methodology had already been implemented by means of immersion programs as early as 1960, although under the label of Content-based language teaching (CBI). In the last decades CLIL has merged with force due to its attractive tenets but also due to the international climate enjoyed by Europe at the present time. As to the former, most proponents of CLIL mention the following (see Coyle et al. 2010, Marsh and Wolff 2007, Mehisto 2008, Mohan 1986): The language is regarded as an instrument to learn the content of a subject in the school curricula. The focus is on content (meaning) rather than on structures, functions or rules of grammar. The language is learnt in a natural way in the classroom setting. There is real purpose: to acquire subject knowledge Language ceases to be taught in isolation (Mohan, 1986: 18); it combines different concepts that have been treated as separate entities for a long time: CLIL is the point where language learning and subject learning converge (Coyle et al., 2010). It is learner-centred rather than teacher-centred: [T]he teacher pulls back from being the donor of knowledge and becomes the facilitator [] (Coyle et al., 2010: 6). Accordingly, CLIL empowers students to acquire knowledge while they develop their communicative skills at the same time that they activate their cognitive abilities (Mehisto et al. 2008).

It relates learning and language learning to the real world as maths, history or music are real things for learners: these are part of their lives through the subjects they have to learn in the school curricula.

It increases learners exposure to the target language in a dramatic way. CLIL prepares students for living in a society which is becoming more and more internationalised, increasingly global and multilingual. CLIL also aims to strengthen the respect towards other nationalities by means of learning other languages and cultures (Eurydice, 2006).

As said above, in the last decade, CLIL has experienced a great expansion in primary and secondary schools all over Europe. Several are the causes for its rapid spread. Firstly, it is the need of knowing languages to communicate with other citizens in Europe, a continent in which monolingual countries and regions are the exception rather than the rule. Secondly, it is the impact of thousands of immigrants coming to Europe; together with their motivation to find better job opportunities, they also bring their own home languages, which in turn, get in contact with vernacular languages. Moreover, in order to integrate in the new community, immigrants and, above all, immigrants children, need to learn the language of the community. This phenomenon has painted the European landscape in a complex but rich multilingual shade making a natural association with CLIL. Thirdly, there is the urge of improving the teaching of foreign languages and increasing learners competence in foreign languages. Classroom settings impose great limitations regarding exposure to the language, and CLIL is regarded as a way to mitigate this limitation. As Sylvn (2010) notes:
Many people argue that an effective way to achieve competence in another language is through the CLIL method, because when a language is learned as a separate subject, only two to three hours per week are devoted to it. By using CLIL, students are exposed to the target language to a much larger degree, which is vital for linguistic competence to develop. (13)

Last but not least, there is the idea of Europe as a union of cultural and educational concerns depicted by business transactions as well as by educational exchanges of ERASMUS students among European universities. In a multilingual Europe the need for understanding others languages is a reality, and some recent initiatives and projects have been created (Eurydice, 2006) in response to this reality.

They aim at helping European citizens to acquire at least two languages different from their mother tongues. CLIL is one of these initiatives; within it education is regarded as the natural scenario where multilingualism can be spread by means of using a dual-focused educational approach in which an additional language is used for the learning and teaching of both content and language (Mehisto et al. 2008:9). In 2006 The European Network on Education Systems and Policies published Eurydice, a report on the development of CLIL across Europe. According to this source, with the exception of Portugal, Iceland, Greece or Denmark, at present CLIL is found in a great number of European countries. In most cases a foreign language is learnt together with a minority language. English, French, and German hold an outstanding position in the ranking of foreign languages acquired by means of CLIL compared to the less predominant position of other languages such as Spanish, Italian or Russian. Most countries implement CLIL all along the compulsory primary and secondary education, few offer CLIL instruction in pre-primary or kindergarten education. CLIL in Europe is characterised by a great diversity in its implementation. Experiences differ among regions within a country but also along schools in a single town. According to Eurydices report, this situation is closely linked to the autonomy given to countries and schools. However, the diversity of experiences also has to do with the lack of regulation or official guides regarding its implementation, on particular as far as the following aspects are concerned: teachers language level competence, teachers training, language level to be achieved by learners under a CLIL program, and distribution of number of hours of CLIL allotted to each grade. For instance, in France, Poland or Hungary prospective CLIL students are selected on the basis of their performance on entrance exams both on the target language and on subject knowledge. In contrast, in Spain, Germany, Finland or Sweden, CLIL is opened to every single student. As a result, there are many differences as to how CLIL is put into practice. The purpose of this dissertation is to look at CLIL implementation in a school in La Rioja. We will do this by asking teachers and learners about their views on CLIL and by exploring learners attitudes towards this educational approach. In addition, we will look at the effect of CLIL on learners receptive vocabulary. There are few studies on learners and teachers views on CLIL or learners attitudes towards CLIL, let alone research on the effect of CLIL on the different dimensions of learners communicative competence. Particularly scarce are 4

the studies that look at the effect of CLIL instruction on learners lexical competence in the foreign language. However, vocabulary knowledge has proved to be a predictor of success or failure in language education (see Agustn Llach 2006, Agustn Llach 2007). The present study aims to contribute to research on CLIL and foreign language learning in the secondary education setting, as well as to vocabulary research in non-native languages. In order to provide the context for our research, we deem necessary to give an account of the situation of CLIL in Spain with particular attention to La Rioja, this is provided in Section 2.

2. Implementation of CLIL in Spain: the case of La Rioja

In our account we will follow one of the most recent and up-to-date books on this issue: CLIL in Spain, an edited collection published in 2010 by Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe that addresses the implementation of CLIL in different parts of Spain. In addition, in our review of CLIL in La Rioja we will fall back on Fernandez Fontecha 2009s and 2010s (in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010) accounts. As far as we know so far these are the only studies published on the issue on La Rioja community. Concerning languages, the main idiosyncratic feature of Spain as a country is its linguistic diversity. There are monolingual regions in which Spanish is the official language as for instance La Rioja, Murcia or Madrid as well as bilingual regions where Spanish coexists with the language of the community, as it is the case of Catalan, Basque, Galician or Valencian. This situation affects the position of foreign languages in CLIL programs: in monolingual communities, the foreign languages being boosted by CLIL are L2, whereas in bilingual communities they are L3 or even L4. In order to present the different implementations of CLIL in Spain we will firstly devote our attention to those bilingual communities that have implemented some kind of CLIL instruction and secondly we will shift our focus onto the monolingual communities. Regarding the bilingual communities, we mean to present a brief summary of the situation of CLIL in the Basque Autonomous Community (henceforth BAC), Catalonia, and Galician. Regarding the monolingual communities we will set our eyes on the cases of Andalusia, Madrid, and La Rioja, with a special emphasis on the last, as it has been mentioned above.

Firstly, in the BAC there are different linguistic instructional programmes as Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe (2010) note. Students may study subjects either through Basque or Spanish, they can learn Basque or Spanish as a subject itself or, depending on the school, they can even study some subjects through Basque and others through Spanish. This distribution of subjects is a response to the objectives pursued by the linguistic policies in the Basque region, which are as follows: it is intended that students reach different Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) levels at the end of the compulsory education i.e. B2+ for Basque and Spanish, B1+ for English, and A2 for French. Another case of CLIL implementation in a bilingual region is the Catalonian one pictured by Navs and Victori in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010-, if Basque coexists with Spanish in the BAC, it is Catalan the language coexisting with Spanish in this North-eastern Spanish region. CLIL began in Catalonia as early as the 1980s where 24 schools took place in the first pilot programmes and the number kept increasing until reaching 135 schools in 2009. According to Navs, in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010, the effectiveness of CLIL relies on the stability of the programmes together with other important factors like parental support. The situation of CLIL in Galicia is depicted by San Isidro, in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010, who posits that CLIL started in Galicia back in 1999 by means of pioneering programmes. Since then, it has kept on increasing its presence from 12 pioneer schools to 200 schools nowadays- as it happened in other regions a formal regulation took place in 2008. This formal regulation involved implementing CLIL in all educational levels in primary and secondary education whether through English or French. The main aim of CLIL in this community as reported by San Isidro is to motivate teachers and students to learn more additional languages. Having pictured the CLIL situation in three Spanish bilingual communities, we are now focusing on how CLIL is being implemented in some monolingual Spanish communities. Let us begin with Andalusia. This Spanish region has traditionally been a monolingual community but, according to Lorenzo, in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010, the issue of globalisation, the importance of tourism, and the growing of international educative exchange programmes Erasmus, for instance-, and the immigration- due to its neighbouring side related to its Mediterranean climate and its closeness to North-Africa-, made a turning point in Andalusian linguistic policies. 6

From Lorenzos point of view Andalusian PISA results in 2009 proved the existence of a worrying low level in linguistic competences in students mother tongue, whereas at the same time a great investment in bilingual education was giving good results and this situation led to a change in educational policies; it inspired the CIL document (Curriculum Integrado de Lenguas i.e. Integrated Curriculum of Languages) which was meant to change the bases of mother tongue teaching by making it more communicative. At the very same time, some subjects were to be also taught in foreign languages following the same communicative methodologies. The key aspects of this new orientation are i) Genre-based approach, ii) Taskbased methods, iii) Centrality of texts and iv) Continuous assessment. Accounting for the case of Madrid, Dafouz and Llinares, also in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010, summarise the situation of CLIL in this region and they point out that there exist two different CLIL programmes: on the one hand the MEC/British Council Project and, on the other hand, the CAM (Comunidad Autnoma de Madrid) Bilingual Project. Regarding the former, it began in 1996 and this project features the cooperation among Spanish native teachers, bilingual UK teachers, and English native assistants from the UK who provide extra exposure to students. The key points that characterize it are the usage of authentic English materials, and students and staff collaboration and exchanges with English schools. However, there are converging and diverging points between both projects; common to them it is the fact that there are native assistants involved and also the exchanges among teachers and students. Nevertheless there are differences too, for instance, the CAM Bilingual Project offers methodology and language courses for teachers throughout the academic year, and furthermore schools also enjoy an increase in funding, mainly for ICT and materials. However, as the authors point out, the CLIL offer is not limited to primary and secondary education; some universities in Madrid also offer a number of bilingual degrees where courses are taught completely in English. This picture of the CLIL situation in Madrid allows us to be aware that a great effort is being put into spreading CLIL, because it is being implemented on primary and secondary education, being above 300 the total number of schools involved in both projects. Should it be also taken into account the emphasis that is being put on tertiary education. This section on the implementation of CLIL in Spain will be completed by an account of CLIL in La Rioja. We deem this review necessary in order to place the context for our study, which is reported in section 4. As stated by Fernndez Fontecha, in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de

Zarobe 2010, La Rioja is a monolingual community where immigration and, above all, tourism have a huge importance due to the culture of wine, The Way of St. James, and San Milln de La Cogolla i.e. the cradle of the first Spanish words. The author points out the existence of some initiatives designed to improve the teaching of foreign languages teaching as for instance: the PILC Project (Proyectos de Innovacin Lingstica en Centros, i.e. School Language Innovation Projects) which consists of two different possibilities of using English or French in the classroom: Type A, where the foreign language is employed for greetings, routines, and instructions, and Type B, where part of the curriculum is taught in the foreign language (FL). There has been a great increase in the number of schools that have adhered to this instructional method, since back in 2005 only 10 schools were involved in this project; however in 2009 there are 46 schools. The Bilingual Sections are also summarised in Fernndez Fontecha in Lasagabaster and Ruiz de Zarobe 2010 and it is explained that it is a different way to implement CLIL in schools in La Rioja: In this case at least two subjects can be taught in a foreign language if the total number of hours taught in the foreign language does not surpass the 50% of the total hours of the curriculum. So far we have briefly portrayed the situation of CLIL in Spain and we can conclude that it is not consistent at all. As it happened with the different implementations in the European countries, differences also arise between different regions of the same country. As authors state, in spite of its diversity CLIL seems to be effective and produce good results. However, research that looks at the effectiveness of CLIL in an empirical way is still scarce and usually focuses on one aspect of CLIL. Therefore results cannot be generalised. Research is urgently needed, particularly research that looks at CLIL in a more comprehensive way: that is, research that looks at the main participants involved in the CLIL experience such as students and teachers. This is what we have attempted by means of the study reported in this dissertation. Therefore, having given an overview of CLIL, explained the main reasons for its rapid spread, as well as how it is being implemented in Europe and more specifically in La Rioja, it is time to move to the description of this empirical study whose general objectives are formulated in the next section.

3. Objectives
First of all, one of the main objectives of this dissertation is to describe how CLIL is being implemented in a school in La Rioja by means of asking teachers and students themselves their views on CLIL. Secondly, we set out to test the effectiveness of CLIL compared to English as a subject on two sides: (i) learners attitudes towards English language, and (ii) learners performance on a receptive vocabulary test in English. Thirdly, as CLIL is in an almost embryonic stage, we believe it is necessary to identify the problems and difficulties teachers encounter when implementing CLIL in their classroom settings as well as the effect of this educational approach on learners attitudes towards foreign languages. Needless to say of the importance for vocabulary and language education researchers of gathering information on the possible effect of CLIL on an important dimension of learners communicative competence: vocabulary knowledge.

4. Review of the literature

In this section we first begin by providing working definitions of key terms in this study such as beliefs, attitudes and motivation. We then move on to review the literature on the following areas of research: i) Studies on learners and teachers beliefs, and learners and teachers attitudes towards foreign languages, particularly towards English and English language teaching/learning both in CLIL and in non-CLIL classes. ii) Studies on the effectiveness of CLIL on general language proficiency as well as on specific aspects of communicative competence with particular attention to studies on the relation between CLIL and EFL learners lexical competence. 4.1. Working Definitions Each term that will be defined here has received considerable attention in different areas such as Educational linguistics, Second Language Acquisition, Bilingualism and Multilingualism, and Vocabulary studies. Due to the empirical nature of our study as well as to space limitations, we will not display all the definitions available for each term in the literature, nor

will we enter into theoretical discussions about the adequacy of each term in comparison to others. Instead, we will adopt a practical stance and we will define these terms out of a wellknown reference in the field of applied linguistics: Richards & Schmidts (2002) Dictionary of Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics. Belief systems
in language teaching, ideas and theories that teachers and learners hold about themselves, teaching, language learning and their students (Richards & Schmidt, 2002: 49).

Teacher belief systems

in language teaching, ideas and theories that teachers hold about themselves, teaching, language, learning and their students. Teachers beliefs are thought to be stable constructs derived from their experience, observations, training and other sources and serve as a source of reference when teachers encounter new ideas, sometimes impeding the acceptance of new ideas or practices. Beliefs also serve as the source of teachers classroom practices. Beliefs form a system or network that may be difficult to change. In teacher education a focus on belief systems is considered important since teacher development involves the development of skills and knowledge as well as the development or modification of belief systems (Richards & Schmidt, 2002: 541)

Learner Beliefs also learner belief systems

ideas learners have concerning different aspects of language, language learning and language teaching, that may influence their attitudes and motivations in learning and have an effect on their learning strategies and learning outcomes. Learners belief systems are relatively stable sets of ideas and attitudes about such things as how to learn language, effective teaching strategies, appropriate classroom behaviour, their own abilities, and their goals in language learning(Richards & Schmidt, 2002:297).

Language Attitudes
the attitudes which speakers of different languages or language varieties have towards each others languages or to their own language. Expressions of positive or negative feelings towards a language may reflect impressions of linguistic difficulty or simplicity, ease or difficulty of learning, degree of importance, elegance, social status, etc. Attitudes towards a language may also show what people feel about the speakers of that language. Language attitudes may have an effect on second language or foreign language learning. The measurement of language attitudes provides information which is useful in language teaching and language planning (Richards & Schmidt, 2002: 286).

Motivation
In general, the driving force in any situation that leads to action. In the field of language learning a distinction is sometimes made between an orientation, a class of reasons for learning a language, and motivation itself, which refers to a combination of the learners attitudes, desires, and willingness to expend effort in order to learn the second language.

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Orientations include an integrative orientation, characterized by a willingness to be like valued members of the language community, and an instrumental orientation towards more practical concerns such as getting a job or passing an examination. The construct of integrative motivation (most prominently associated with R. C. Gardner) therefore includes the integrative orientation, positive attitudes towards both the target language community and the language classroom and a commitment to learn the language. Another widely cited distinction is between intrinsic motivation, enjoyment of language learning itself, and extrinsic motivation, driven by external factors such as parental pressure, societal expectations, academic requirements, or other sources of rewards and punishments. Other theories of motivation emphasize the balance between the value attached to some activity

and ones expectation of success in doing it, goal setting, the learners attributions of success or failure, the role of self-determination and learners autonomy, and the characteristics of effective motivational thinking. Motivation is generally considered to be one of the primary causes of success and failure in second language learning (Richards & Schmidt, 2002: 343-4). Some reflections on the above definitions As we have just seen in the above definitions, motivation and attitudes towards language play an important role in learners linguistic achievement. Regarding the Spanish context, the strength of their role has been demonstrated by Prez 2006, and Delfn de Manzanilla 2007. These scholars observe how attitudes may have a positive or a negative influence over academic achievement. Therefore, it is essential for teachers and learners to be aware of this motivational and attitudinal influence; they should identify the different kinds of motivation in order to do their utmost possible effort. Ideally, there should be a reciprocal relationship among teachers and students in any given teaching-learning environment, and we can guess that the more and better motivated the teacher the more and the better motivated the learner is, and better results are achieved. When dealing with a group of adolescentsas it is the case in the present study- we should put a greater emphasis on the teachers role as a motivator and even greater in a CLIL school setting. And this is not only because of the shift of the teachers role in a CLIL classroom setting but also, due to the psychological features of adolescents, like their easily influenced personalities. However, after reviewing some articles about teachers perceptions on CLIL and on language teaching (Crawford 2001, Yazid 2003, Borrul et al. 2008, Pena Daz and Porto Requejo 2008) we come to the conclusion that theory and practice do not walk hand in hand: teachers acknowledge the importance and necessity of motivation although they do not or cannot pay as much attention to enhance learners motivation through teaching as it might be expected. Meanwhile, teachers involved in CLIL school settings accept its benefits and its

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effectiveness over other methodologies but are mostly reluctant to change their traditional teaching methods or they corner it by means of making a sparse use of the method. On the other hand, we find attitudes. As it has been stated in the above definitions, attitudes mostly entail emotions and beliefs, which are more of a personal issue rather than something objective. It is difficult to differentiate between motivation and attitudes. Gardner himself (in Liuoliene and Metiuniene, 2006) considered motivation as a construct made up of different elements among them, there are attitudes. Going further into attitudes classification, Ellis (1997) in Lennartsson 2008, divides them into positive and negative attitudes towards language. This differentiation implies that positive attitudes foster language learning whereas negative attitudes impede language learning. As it happens to motivation, attitudes can change since they are not fixed, thus negative attitudes can turn into positive attitudes and vice versa. So far we have seen how attitudes relate to language learning, but attitudes are not simply restricted to language learning. In other words, attitudes have to do with the feelings that any speaker may have towards any language; these feelings can be either positive or negative which, in turn, may have an influence over the speakers opinion towards language learning. Attitudes and motivation play a main role when it comes down to language and even more to language learning. This may explain the great amount of attention that has been paid to this issue in applied linguistics. 4.2. Evidence on the effect of CLIL The notions of beliefs, attitudes and motivation have been briefly presented, however no word has been said about the relationship between these variables and CLIL, nor on the relation between CLIL and learners lexical competence, aspects that are crucial in our study. The aim of this section is to provide an account of the studies that look at the interrelationship of these topics. As it has been explained in the introduction, there is a common agreement on the benefits of CLIL as for instance: the formation of positive beliefs and attitudes towards foreign languages and cultures, learners development of cognitive abilities, and above all, the natural acquisition of the foreign language by means of focusing on content. Given the diversity of experiences that can be found in the implementation of CLIL in foreign language class settings, it is absolutely necessary to systematise research on the effect of CLIL as to identify when, how and at what level of language competence this approach is most effective. The remaining of this section will be structured as follows: firstly we will look at studies

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which have focussed on teachers and learners beliefs and learners attitudes towards CLIL. Secondly, we will review studies on the effect of CLIL on several aspects of learners nonnative competence. 4.2.1. Beliefs, motivation and attitudes towards CLIL: empirical evidence Regarding attitudes and motivation, research has shown their strong influence on different aspects of language learning. A first search in the literature on motivation and attitudes towards languages and language learning yields an impressive collection of studies. Space restriction advises us to be selective rather than exhaustive on our review. Therefore, we will have a closer look on i) studies that explore the relationship between motivation and L2/L3 language achievement, ii) studies that look at learners attitudes towards an L2/L3, and iii) studies that investigate learners attitudes towards English as L2/L3; iv) research that combines the study of CLIL and attitude/motivation/perceptions. 4.2.2. Motivation and language achievement In the first place, we will focus on motivation and language achievement. We find evidence of the relation of these two variables in Prez (2006) and also in Sevim Inal and Saracaloglu (2007). These studies show that a high motivation in the foreign language involves positive attitudes towards the language, and it also conveys better academic language achievement. Furthermore, Sevim Inal and Saracaloglu (2007) as well as other scholars as Karahan 2007, Lennartsson 2008, and Verma 2008 observe that according to learners, teachers are one of the most decisive factors influencing positive attitudes. The importance of the role of the teacher as a motivator seems to be consistent in all learning periods and ages, from pre-teens in primary education (Karahan, 2007) to senior learners (older than fifty) enrolled in university studies (Lennartsson, 2008). These studies reinforce the theory summarised by Richards and Schmidt (2002) in the definitions provided above (section 4.1), proving the influence of motivation with respect to achievement. 4.2.3. Studies on attitudes towards language learning Regarding studies that have addressed the issue of attitudes towards language learning, we find Delfn de Manzanilla (2007) who show that university learners are both internally and externally motivated towards language, and they are willing to communicate in the foreign language. University students also hold positive attitudes towards foreign language speakers. 13

Likewise they have positive attitudes towards bilingualism (Mohideen Obeidat 2005). Research also points out that teachers are one of the main sources for motivation whether positive or negative. These results reported by Mohideen Obeidat (2005) can also be similarly found in Gonzlez Ardeo (2003) since he concluded that Spanish and Basque bilinguals and Spanish or Basque monolinguals university students show positive attitudes towards English although they are reluctant to be taught in English. There are other studies (see Liuolien and Metinien, 2006), which apart from reaffirming the importance of motivation in the learning process do reveal that students wishes and needs to work independently depend on their motivation. These studies also indicate that the greater the motivation, the more autonomous students want to be in their learning process. In our opinion, this latter assertion can be related to one of the main assumptions advocated by CLIL: the claim that it fosters cognition and learners independent learning, therefore, following this premise, a big amount of attention should be put on motivation. However, primary and secondary school students are not as motivated as elder learners regarding foreign language learning (Karahan 2007, Yassin et al. 2009). Research has shown that this lesser motivation has to do with the minimum contact learners experience with the language outside the classroom context; they are not motivated to learn a language because they do not think it is useful for their everyday life. Furthermore, in our view, this difference in motivation between university students and primary or secondary students may be also related to their ages: university students are closer to the job market if not already there- and they may consider learning a foreign language could help them to get a better job or a higher salary (extrinsic motivation). Being aware of learners attitudes towards foreign languages is of paramount importance for teachers and researchers, but even more important is to be aware of learners attitudes towards language teaching methodologies. As we have seen, studies have proved that teachers are one of the main driving forces in motivation; lets not forget that the main bond between teachers and learners is the classroom, i.e. the methodology the teacher uses. In this regard, it seems logical to think that teaching methodologies have a clear influence on making language learning more or less appealing to the eyes of the learner. Savignon and Wang (2003) and Verma (2008) conducted research in order to ascertain university students motivation and attitudes towards language learning. Regarding

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methodology, common findings are observed in these studies: students prefer and are more motivated with a communicative approach rather than with grammar-focused lessons. Furthermore, following the previous assertions about the role of the teacher, data resulting from these studies suggest that teachers are the main motivator for learners. These results are in agreement with the ones attained by Lennartsson (2008) since the learners in this study also consider that teachers influence positively or negatively their attitudes towards language. 4.2.4. Views and attitudes related to CLIL In order to complete our review we need to have a look at the different studies that have combined these attitudinal factors with learning in a CLIL context. First of all, we will focus on students, and then we will procedure accordingly with teachers. Students Studies on students perceptions on CLIL are scarce; in our review we will fall back on Dalton-Puffer et al. (2009)s study, which presents the views of Austrian university students involved in a CLIL programme. The results provided by these authors are of great value to us, as their findings do not seem to be fortuitous since 1660 former CLIL students answered a questionnaire and 20 students actually involved in CLIL completed a deep interview. The main results obtained in this study are summarised as follows: a) CLIL encourages learners to talk and to think by themselves, b) They feel more motivated because the teacher is the language expert and the subject expert at the same time, c) Students focus more on communication than on grammatical correctness, and d) CLIL lacks organization in the way it is implemented. Looking at these assertions closely we note that there is agreement between students views involved in a CLIL programme and the theoretical virtues attributed to CLIL. We will now turn our attention on students attitudes towards CLIL. To this respect we will refer to two studies that have dealt with this issue in secondary school settings: Lasagabaster and Sierra (2009) and Yassin et al. (2009). On the one hand, the main object in Yassin et al. (2009) is to document the experiences of learners and to ascertain their views towards the teaching of Science through English in Malaysia. The study was conducted with Year 4 students and the main findings were that NLEP (Non-Limited English Proficiency) learners have significantly more positive attitudes towards Science in English, greater parental support, and experience of using the English 15

language than LEP (Limited English Proficiency) learners. On the other hand, Lasagabaster and Sierra (2009) present the differences in language attitudes between CLIL students and non-CLIL students EFL learners in secondary education in the BAC. They also focus on how gender and social class have an influence on motivation towards foreign languages. This study reports that students who are involved in a CLIL programme show better attitudes towards English as well as towards other languages -Basque and Spanish in this case- and find learning English easier than EFL students do. Differences in favour of CLIL are significant. However, an accurate interpretation of the results is not possible since the study does not provide the number of hours of exposure to English, the characteristics of CLIL subjects and the length of the programme. Without this information the comparison with other studies is not possible. Teachers Having dealt with students views on CLIL, we can now cast an eye over studies reporting teachers views about language teaching and CLIL. Although research on these topics is not plentiful the few studies found provide an insight of how teachers perceive the CLIL experience. According to Crawford (2001), teachers are aware of the relationship between motivation and achievement. This author concluded that Taiwanese primary education teachers find hard to motivate their students because they do not perceive English as a useful subject. Furthermore, Taiwanese teachers preferred a communicative approach on language teaching, although students low competence makes its implementation difficult, besides Taiwanese teaching tradition emphasized reading and writing over speaking and listening. Students low competence is not exclusive to Taiwan as other studies seem to have arrive at a similar conclusion and highlight this point as one of the main weaknesses or problems that impedes implementing CLIL satisfactorily (see Yazid 2003, Infante et al. 2008, and Pena Daz and Porto Requejo 2008). According to teachers involved in CLIL programs, another common obstacle is the lack of specific CLIL materials. This conveys a large workload for teachers as they have to create or adapt others materials (Yazid 2003, Borrull et. al 2008, and Pena Daz and Porto Requejo 2008). Some teachers also show their willingness to follow a communicative approach in the class; however they find it difficult as a consequence of learners low linguistic competence.

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A close look at the results of the above studies reveals that teachers views are in agreement with CLIL assumptions since they share its effectiveness and its impact on cognition and motivation. Likewise, results on teachers views also reveal the important role played by attitudes towards CLIL: Borrull et al. (2008) posit that the main handicap for CLIL implementation is the negative attitude of learners. In our opinion, and following other observations noted in these researchers, negative attitudes are closely related to learners low competence in the target language: as they cannot follow the class, they become strongly discouraged, and, as a result, they may develop negative attitudes towards this approach. So far the literature review has provided us with the views of the main participants in a CLIL school; furthermore, this review has allowed us to note how attitudes have an out-of-doubt influence on learners achievement. Researchers claim that both learners and teachers regard CLIL as an effective approach. Theoretical premises and CLIL participants perceptions match up, nevertheless still some problems and difficulties remain. In the next section we shift our focus on studies that look at the effectiveness of CLIL on different aspects of learners communicative competence. At this point our aim is to ascertain whether the outcomes attained by empirical studies support CLIL theory as well as learners and teachers views on CLIL. 4.2.5. Studies on the effect of CLIL on learners language competence Research on the effect of CLIL on learners language competence is rather scarce when compared to the great number of studies on the implementation of CLIL or research on theories and principles of CLIL. Moreover, its systematisation is rather complex. The reason is that the studies aimed at ascertaining the effectiveness of CLIL differ a great deal at least on the following respects: the characteristics of the language learning contexts where CLIL was implemented, learners age and mother tongue as well as learners level in the target language, or the specific dimension of learners competence that is investigated. Comparisons among the studies, let alone generalizations of outcomes are risky due to the huge variation among the existing studies but also because of the lack of information regarding the number of hours of CLIL received by the learners participating in the studies. This information is needed in order to compare outcomes but unfortunately, the number of hours of CLIL is not usually reported in most studies.

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In spite of the above limitations, we believe that it is necessary to examine the results achieved by previous studies. Moved by this conviction, in the next paragraphs we will attempt to classify them according to the dimensions of communicative competence as put forward by Canale and Swain (1980): grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, strategic competence. To these dimensions we will add lexical competence. Canale and Swain include vocabulary under the category of grammatical competence; however, due to the multifaceted nature of vocabulary knowledge, lexical competence is nowadays studied on its own (see Nation 2001). The clarification of studies on the different dimensions of lexical competence was addressed by Jimnez Cataln (2002). Bringing together opinions from experienced vocabulary researchers on what means to know a word, she concluded that it is hard to provide a simple definition of lexical competence due to the multifaceted nature of words, and she summarised some defining features of lexical competence such as the fact that: i) knowledge of words is accumulative, ii) it is not fixed, it can change throughout life; iii) it may vary from person to person, depending on different factors such as gender, age, experience, and cognitive development. Therefore, we will bear some of these determining factors in mind while reviewing the existing literature in order to lay the foundations for a more exhaustive and better subsequent comparison with the results of our own study. Most studies on the effectiveness on CLIL reveal, as theory and teachers and learners views pointed out, that this approach entails better results for learners in most aspects of communicative competence and language skills as for instance: pronunciation, syntax, pragmatics, informal use of language, or reading comprehension, or writing (Admiraal et al. 2005, Agustn Llach and Jimnez Cataln 2007, Dalton-Puffer 2007, Huttner and RiederBunemann 2007, Llinares and Whittaker 2007, Jimnez Cataln and Ruiz de Zarobe (eds.) 2009, Sylvn 2010). In the following paragraphs we will give a brief account of some of the studies that have focused on the effect of CLIL on dimensions of EFL learners lexical competence. CLIL has been proved to have a positive influence on lexical competence as shown in Jimnez Cataln, Ruiz de Zarobe and Cenoz (2006) where they acknowledged that CLIL learners display higher lexical richness and sophistication in the vocabulary they use in compositions, as well as higher receptive vocabulary knowledge as measured by the 1000 and 2000 frequency bands of Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT). This study is not the only one to ascertain 18

differences in favour of CLIL. Agustn Llach and Jimnez Cataln (2007) studied how the type of instruction affected lexical reiteration and productive vocabulary in written texts; results confirm again that students involved in a CLIL environment perform better than nonCLIL learners. However, they also remark that both CLIL and non-CLIL EFL learners resort to repetition rather than to synonyms or antonyms suggesting similar mechanisms of lexical cohesion by CLIL and non CLIL EFL learners. Ruiz de Zarobe and Jimnez Cataln (2009) edited a book that encompasses different studies that compare CLIL learners to non-CLIL learners with respect to different aspects of lexical competence such as receptive vocabulary, word association, transfer between languages (Spanish-English) or use of inflected forms in English among others. In all cases but one CLIL students achieved better results than non-CLIL learners: Ojeda Alba (in Ruiz de Zarobe and Jimnez Cataln 2009) compared the vocabulary most frequently implemented by both groups showing that the non-CLIL had better results in certain vocabulary areas. The results of the latter study go in line with results attained by Jimnez Cataln & Ojeda Alba (2009), where they found that non-CLIL students produced a higher number of word types than CLIL students in a lexical availability task. Apart from these mentioned competences, there are other extra linguistic aspects that have been studied i.e. the effects of extramural exposure to English on learners vocabularies (Sylvn 2006). Sylvn argues that CLIL students have more contact with English outside the school than non-CLIL students and this greater amount of exposure affects positively their self-assessment in English. In a latter longitudinal study (Sylvn 2010) she also contrasted the differences in vocabulary size between a group of CLIL students and a group of EFL students. She reports that CLIL students performed better in all tests; however she highlights the importance of the exposure to English outside the class because some EFL students, those who affirmed having a wide contact with English outside the class reading, T.V., Internet-, were among the top scorers. The amount of exposure to English is a controversial issue to some extent in the field of language learning. Miralpeix (2007) studied the influence of exposure with regards to language learning. Her study reveals that one group with greater exposure 74 hours moreperformed similarly to two other groups that had received less exposure to English. This fact leads us to think about the importance of methodology; since these findings seem to contradict studies where learners with more hours of exposure through CLIL have better results (see 19

Jimnez Cataln and Ruiz de Zarobe (eds.) 2009). One of the main differences concerning learners involved in both studies seems to be the methodological approach: in Jimnez Cataln and Ruiz de Zarobe we mainly find comparisons on CLIL and non CLIL EFL learners while Miralpeix makes no reference to CLIL. In order to close this review on studies on the effectiveness of CLIL on EFL learners competences, we find mandatory to comment on that, as happened with the studies on students views, some researchers make clear that CLIL students are more motivated than non-CLIL students and it influences their achievement (Admiral el al. 2005; Sylvn 2006; Huttner and Rieder-Bunemann 2007). 4.3. Conclusion In this section we have attempted to review studies on teachers and learners beliefs, attitudes and motivation towards CLIL, along with studies on the effect of CLIL on the different aspects of learners language competence with particular attention to aspects of lexical competence. As we have seen, although scarce, there is research on almost every variable involved in CLIL: teachers, learners, subjects, CLIL activities, and language learning contexts. Likewise, there are studies on almost each dimension of communicative and lexical competence. However, as far as we know, there is no research that looks at the main participants in the CLIL experience within the same school, let alone through a whole educational stage. Most studies conducted so far give a partial view of CLIL as they focus on one single aspect. In our opinion, in order to advance in the understanding of CLIL it is necessary to adopt a more comprehensive view that may yield in a more detailed picture on the beliefs, attitudes, motivations and practices of the main participants in the CLIL experience. Therefore, in the study reported in this dissertation we set out to investigate teachers and learners views on CLIL, learners attitudes towards English and CLIL, teachers CLIL practices, and learners outcomes under the same scenario: the school where CLIL is being implemented. We do not set out to look at CLIL with preconceptions; rather we attempt to give a description of its reality by means of asking teachers and learners themselves, and by means of observing the possible effects of CLIL on learners performance on vocabulary tests. We believe that the adoption of a comprehensive approach in our study will provide us with invaluable data to identify strengths but also to detect possible weaknesses in the early stages of implementation of CLIL in the community of La Rioja.

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5. Research questions
In this dissertation we pose the following research questions concerning the main participants in a CLIL school: Regarding students, 1) Do students believe that CLIL helps them to improve their English? 2) According to the students, what skills do they improve most by means of CLIL? 3) What attitudes do students have towards English language? 4) Do CLIL students hold better attitudes than non-CLIL students? 5) Do CLIL students score higher than non-CLIL students on vocabulary tests? 6) Is there a positive relation between learners attitude towards English and learners scores on vocabulary tests? Regarding teachers, 1) What is the professional profile of the CLIL teacher? 2) What kind of motivation do teachers have towards English and CLIL? 3) How is CLIL implemented in this school? 4) According to teachers, is CLIL effective? 5) Have they encountered problems or difficulties in the implementation of CLIL?

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6. Method
6.1. Informants The sample of informants consists of 403 students, 3 CLIL teachers, and 2 EFL teachers from one private middle class school in Logroo1. Although these groups are interrelated in our study, for the sake of clarity, they will all be presented in separate sections. Students The study encompasses the school whole population as regards secondary education (SE) in the school year 2009-2010. The population comprises 403 students distributed among the four compulsory years of Spanish secondary education: first, second, third, and fourth ESO. Students ages range from 12 to 16. Table 1 shows the distribution of students by school grade and age range: Table 1 Distribution of students by school year and age range Grade N Age range 1st year 104 2nd year 99 3rd year 108 4th year 92 15-16 years old

12-13 years old 13-14 years old 14-15 years old

Regarding mother tongue, most students are monolingual speakers of Spanish as L1, whereas a small group of students have Spanish as L2. Their mother tongues are: Romanian, Arabic, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Russian, Senegalese, and Urdu.2 The distribution of students mother tongues is displayed in Table 2. Table 2 Distribution of students by mother tongue Sp 392 Rom 4 Arabic 1 Bulg 1 Cat 1 Chin 1 Rus 1 Sen 1 Urdu 1

The school provides education at all educational levels, from preschool to Professional Courses. Spanish native speakers born in South or Central America are not included in this group; they belong to the Spanish natives group according to our classification.
2

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At this point it is necessary to make a further description of the characteristics of CLIL throughout the fourth grades in the school we investigate. The main difference between CLIL and non-CLIL groups lies on the fact that the former received additional hours of exposure to English language by means of CLIL methodology. However, the number of hours is far from being equal, neither throughout the grades nor within each grade. Regarding CLIL, the situation of the school is rather complex and needs clarification. We tackle this issue in the following paragraphs. Figure 1: Distribution of students by type of instruction per year

CLIL Vs. Non-CLIL instruction 120 100 Students 80 60 40 20 0 1 2 S.E. year 3 4 CLIL Non-CLIL

1st year: only 3 out of 105 students have some previous CLIL experience throughout primary education. However the number of hours of exposure to English could not be calculated; the reason is that these three students were new to the school and it was not a goal of this study to trace learners previous CLIL experience in other schools but to focus on CLIL in one school. 2nd year: 28 out of 99 students had studied at least one subject by means of CLIL. However, the total number of hours could not be calculated either because the teacher in charge of the CLIL subject had left the school or because the students studied the CLIL subjects at a different school. 3rd year: the vast majority of students (96 out 108) had some CLIL experience. The total number of CLIL hours per student ranges from 10 to 30 depending on the subjects studied through English.

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Figure 2: Distribution of 3rd year students by the amount of CLIL hours received

CLIL hours S.E. 3rd year 60 50 Students 40 30 20 10 0 No CLIL Up to 15 15 to 30 Unknw on Total am ount of hours

4th year: a high percentage of students had some kind of CLIL experience: 75 out of 94. In this case, students had studied from one to three subjects in English. The total number of CLIL hours ranges between 10 to 90 depending on the different subjects studied by the informants all along secondary education. Figure 3: Distribution of 4th year students by the amount of CLIL hours received

CLIL hours S.E. 4th year 35 30 Students 25 20 15 10 5 0 No CLIL Up to 15 15 to 30 30 to 60 60 to 90 Total am ount of hours

Teachers In this case the sample is made up of two different specialist groups of teachers, on the one hand the CLIL teachers and on the other the EFL teachers. Regarding the former, the sample consists of 3 informants whose ages range between 30 to 45 years. Their teaching experience

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goes from 7 years of the youngest teacher to 18 years; however they all have the same CLIL teaching experience having used this methodology for 3 academic years. Finally, the sample of EFL teachers was made up of 2 teachers in a 50 to 55 years range and their EFL teaching experience was as long as 32 years in each case. 6.2. Data collection instruments Students were asked to complete a productive vocabulary test, a receptive vocabulary test and a questionnaire containing questions about their perceptions towards English and some further personal information. The tests and the questionnaire were completed in one single session (50-55 minutes). As far as the vocabulary tests are concerned, in the first place, and following the conventions, the Productive Vocabulary Levels Test (VLTP) was administered to students. These received oral and written instructions in Spanish on how to complete the test. The time given for test completion was 15 minutes. After the productive test was handed in, students were given the 2000 and 3000 bands of the receptive Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT) (Schmitt, 2001). They had 10 minutes to complete each band. The procedures were as follows: firstly, students accomplished the 2000 VLT, then, once completed, students had to accomplish the 3000 VLT under the very same conditions of time and instructions as in the 2000 VLT band. Finally, students were asked to fill in a questionnaire designed for the purpose of the task. Some questions were added asking information about the students CLIL experience and their perceptions and attitudes on it. In addition, teachers were interviewed on individual basis. The interviews were informal but guided (see appendix iv). The purpose was to collect information on the following issues: (a) Professional profiles, (b) Motivation towards English and CLIL, (c) Implementation of CLIL in the classroom. In other words, by means of informal but guided interviews we aimed at gathering information on teaching experience, level of proficiency in English, subjects taught in English, views on learning English and CLIL methodology, the way they were implementing CLIL in the school, the types of materials used, the activities done in the class, or the skills they were trying to boost in their pupils. On its part, EFL teachers were asked

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about their views on CLIL and its possible effect on learners improvement in English as compared to traditional classes (English as a subject). 6.3. Type of research The present thesis makes use of quantitative and qualitative methods. The former is used in the quantification of learners survey responses as well as in the quantification of their scores to the vocabulary tests. As to the qualitative method, we proceeded to interview both the CLIL teachers and the non-CLIL teachers. The purpose was to trace a profile of learners and teachers regarding perceptions and attitudes to CLIL as well as the effect of CLIL on learners performance on vocabulary tests. 6.4. Procedures Once the data gathering was completed, we proceeded to score the Vocabulary Level Tests giving one point to each correct answer and no point for incorrect answers, in that the maximum total score for each test was 30 points, being the minimum 0 points. After correcting the tests we typed the results into the computer together with the results of the questionnaire completed by students so it was possible to analyze them by means of different programs. Regarding the questionnaire, although participants had to fill in some questions about their personal experience with English language and other personal questions, for the purpose of this study we decided to focus only the questions concerning students perceptions on CLIL and their opinions on English language. Finally, after having typed the scores to the VLT as well as responses to the questionnaire we proceeded to the quantitative analysis of the data, which was completed using different statistic tests (including here Kolmogorov-Smirnov-Lilliefors, Shapiro-Wilk, and MannWhitney among others tests) where needed by means of SPSS3

We would like to wholeheartedly acknowledge Montserrat San Martn, lecturer at the Mathematics and Computing Department of the University of La Rioja, for her invaluable help in test selection and statistical data analysis.

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7. Results
In this section, we attempt to reply the research questions posed earlier (see section 5, page 20) by providing data elicited from students and teachers belonging to a CLIL school. In the first place we will provide the data obtained from students on their views on CLIL, their attitudes towards English, and their results in the VLT vocabulary test. Then, we will present teachers views on CLIL. 7.1. Students views on CLIL As to our first research question, Do students think that CLIL helps them to improve their English? The answer is negative since according to more than 80% of the students, CLIL is not considered as a useful experience. Figure 4 reveals that most of the students who had received CLIL instruction report that CLIL was either of very little help or little help. None of the students considered CLIL as very helpful. Figure 4: Distribution of responses given by students regarding their views on CLIL

Is CLIL helpful according to students? 100 80 Students 60 40 20 0 N/A Not helpful Very little Little Quite Very

Regarding our second research question, What skills have students improved most by means of CLIL? two tendencies clearly emerge in the data shown in Figure 5. In the first place, a great number of students reported listening and speaking as the most positively influenced skills. Secondly, we see that 3rd year followed by 4th year are the courses that concentrate the highest number of students who report CLIL to have been of help in the improvement of their language skills (mainly listening). Contrary to what might have been expected, a noticeable percentage of students felt that CLIL had not boosted any of their skills. Also, as we can observe in Figure 5, vocabulary is included together with the four skills. The reason for its

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inclusion here is that all the students who believed that CLIL had helped them in the improvement of the four language skills also referred to the positive effect of CLIL on the development of their lexicons. Figure 5: Distribution of skills improved per course

Skills improved by CLIL according to students

60 50 40 Students 30 20 10 0 Reading Listening Writing Speaking Vocabulary None Linguistic skills S.E. 1 S.E. 2 S.E. 3 S. E. 4

7.2. Students attitudes towards English We now turn our attention to students attitudes towards English (RQ3), including here the two groups of students: CLIL and non-CLIL. To this purpose, both groups were asked to rate English according to an attitudinal scale made up of positive and negative adjectives (item 15 in the questionnaire). The minimum score is 1 and the maximum 7. The means show that CLIL students and non CLIL students hold very similar attitudes towards English language, although the means are slightly higher for the CLIL group throughout the four years. A close look at Table 3 reveals that the highest scores, therefore the most motivated students, were obtained by CLIL students in the last year of Spanish Secondary Education: 4th ESO.

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Table 3: CLIL and non-CLIL students attitudes towards English

CLIL 1st year NO YES 2 year
nd

N 101 3 69 28 13 95 19 73

Mean 5,5000 5,6250 5,5236 5,5625 5,2692 5,6018 5,5977 5,7072

S.D. , 88829 , 78062 , 94136 , 69264 1,47624 1,03188 , 58097 , 66836

NO YES

3 year

rd

NO YES

4 year

th

NO YES

Although CLIL students score higher in their attitude towards English all through the four years, these differences were not statistically significant, as the results of Mann-Whitney U test applied to the means gave us the following values4 as regards 1st year (U = 137,000 z = ,778), 2nd year (U = 917,500 z = ,699), and 3rd year (U = 556,000 z= ,561). These high values of do not allow us to affirm that these differences found between CLIL students and non-CLIL students are significant. Regarding 4th year, the t-test5 performed showed non-significant differences either between CLIL and non-CLIL students. Results show a high value (t=0,516) and we cannot affirm that these are significant because the p-value should be less than 0,05 (p<0,05) 7.3. Students vocabulary outcomes In this section we mean to present the results obtained by our informants in the receptive VLT in its 2000 and 3000 words band version. Before getting any deeper in this respect it must be said that due to space limitations here we will present solely the results corresponding to 4th year of ESO. The reason for focusing on this course rather than the other three is that 4th ESO stands for the final stage of Spanish secondary education. Furthermore, we will also present
The Kolmogorov-Smirnov-Lilliefors Test run for normality testing showed the sample did not have a normal distribution (p<0.05). 5 the Kolmogorov Smirnov-Lilliefors Test showed that the sample had a normal distribution (p> 0,05), thus as the assumption of normality was met, a parametric test was used to compare the two groups.
4

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the results obtained from analyzing the relationship between attitudes towards English, presented above, and students achievement measured by means of VLT 2000 and VLT 3000. As it can be seen in Figure 6, CLIL and non-CLIL students performed similarly, although students having received some kind of CLIL instruction performed slightly higher in the two frequency bands than those who had not. The CLIL group obtained 19.85 correct answers in VLT 2k, whereas the EFL group obtained 18.5 in the same test. However, in VLT 3k results are much closer being 16.14 the average score obtained by CLILs and 16.00 the average score by the EFL group. As expected, both groups obtained higher scores in the VLT 2k rather than in the VLT 3k and differences between CLILs and non-CLILs are also greater in the former test. Figure 6: 4th year CLIL and non CLIL students scores in VLT 2k and 3k

VLT Results in S.E. 4th year 25 Correct items 20 15 10 5 0 VLT 2k VLT 3k CLIL Non-CLIL

Although we find differences in favour of CLIL students, these were found not to be significant after analysing them statistically. As the results of Mann-Whitney U test applied to the means gave us the following values6 as regards VLT200 (U = 603,500 z = ,384), and VLT300 (U = 690,000 z = ,973). The Kolmogorov-Smirnov for contrasting two samples was also applied to the data to search for significance, again non-significant differences were found between CLIL and non-CLIL students concerning their results on VLT2000 due to the high values (t = ,646) and VLT3000 (t = ,927).

The Kolmogorov-Smirnov-Lilliefors Test run for normality testing showed the sample did not have a normal distribution (p<0.05).

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7.4. Relation between students attitudes and vocabulary outcomes We are now presenting evidence for the relationship between students attitudes towards English language and vocabulary outcomes as measured by VLT2000 and VLT300. In this regard, there is a positive correlation (Spearman test) between attitudes and scoring in each VLT frequency band, and this correlation applies to all students, that is, those who had contact with CLIL and those who did not. . The results tell us that there is a significant increasing relationship between students attitudes towards English and their vocabulary performance. The values obtained were as follows: r=0.420, p<,000 for VLT2000, and r= 0.349, p<,001 for VLT3000. The significant correlation suggests that the better the attitudes towards English the better the performance on the two bands analysed from VLT test. It does not matter if the students have received any kind of CLIL instruction or not. The p-values (,000 in VLT 2000 and ,001 in VLT 3000) are less than 0,05, which indicates that the relation between attitudes and outcomes is significantly different. Furthermore the rvalues higher than 0,00 (,420 for VLT 2000 and ,349 for VLT 3000) indicate that this is an increasing relation: the higher the score in motivation, the better the results in VLT 2000 and VLT 3000. 7.5. Teachers Personal interviews with the teachers provided us with a first hand perspective on how CLIL is being implemented in a given school as well s on teachers views on CLIL. In this section we present a brief summary of the main topics covered during the guided interviews. For the sake of clarity we group the topics into five categories: (a) Professional profiles; (b) Motivation towards English and CLIL; (c) Implementation of CLIL in the classroom; (d) Perceptions on CLIL and its effectiveness; (e) Main problems and difficulties in CLIL implementation. (a) Teachers professional profiles As stated in the Method section our sample consists of five teachers: two EFL teachers and three CLIL teachers. The former are two female EFL teachers who hold a university degree in English Studies. They have more than 30 years of experience as English language teachers in

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a wide variety of educational levels: primary education, secondary education, baccalaureate, and Professional Courses. As to the CLIL teachers, their profiles are not as homogeneous as the EFL teachers; the CLIL group is set up by three male teachers whose teaching experiences range from 6 to 17 and 18 years respectively in all educational levels, from primary education to university. The subjects taught in English are Maths, Physical Education and Religion. The three teachers are in possession of a university degree in their own specialities. And as far as CLIL experience is concerned, the three teachers have been using this methodology for the last three years (from 2007-2008 to 2009-2010) in the subjects they teach. Regarding English, one of them (the Religion teacher) holds an English Studies degree, whereas, at the time of the interview, the remaining two had completed 3 courses from the local Escuela Oficial de Idiomas (Official Languages School), which certifies their intermediate English level, corresponding to a B1 for the Common European Framework of Reference. (b) Motivation towards English and CLIL CLIL Teachers coincided in their replies concerning their motivation towards English. The three teachers replied that they used English to teach their subjects due to the importance of this language as a lingua franca in nowadays society; another reason was that they wanted to transmit this idea to their pupils. As to their motivation towards CLIL, the three teachers said that they adopted this methodology out of personal interest; nevertheless one of them also said that he did for the schools reputation sake. Teachers remarked the skills they want their pupils to improve, the materials they use in the class, or how is the collaboration among content teachers and English language teachers. As to the skills they want their pupils to improve, the three CLIL teachers and the English as a subject teachers share the same view: oral skills listening and speaking- leaving aside writing and reading. What is more, the five of them try to enhance their students fluency and vocabulary. However, the latter was only highlighted by one teacher. (c) Implementation of CLIL Concerning how CLIL is put into practice, some tendencies emerged from the interviews and they are summarised as follows: English is used by CLIL teachers to teach Mathematics, 32

Physical Education, and Religion; however CLIL is differently approached in every subject since it is used in one third of the course in Mathematics, in two didactic units in Religion and randomly used in some lessons in Physical Education. Although every teacher has a different approach, they all share the idea about not increasing or decreasing the amount of hours in which they use English to teach their subjects. These CLIL teachers have been using this approach for three years and during this time they have implemented some changes in topics, activities, and the distribution of CLIL hours throughout the course. Activities, as teachers said, have been changing from the first time they became involved in CLIL. Regarding the type of activities accomplished in class, and according to teachers replies they range from discussions, correction of exercises, playing games, reading aloud, and some grammar-focused activities like rephrasing or translating. Teaching materials are a controversial issue in the implementation of CLIL as shown by the different opinions and perspectives teachers hold. Each teacher had its own approach to teaching materials; for example, one used no teaching materials at all, while the others used a textbook and a course guide self-elaborated, as well as summaries from books and personal notes. Teachers also informed us that although some materials are available, they have to prepare most of the material lectures, activities, examples - they use in class by themselves. In order to do so, they have to search for materials either on the Internet or in books. Also as a part of the CLIL implementation, we asked teachers about their collaboration with English language expert teachers and the results are, again, divergent. One of them maintained that the collaboration was positive whereas, the two remaining teachers considered that there was no collaboration, mainly because it was not necessary. Students participation in a CLIL programme was another point addressed in the interview; in this case, when teachers were asked about the selection of the students taking part in the CLIL class, the answer was the same: No selection is made. (d) Perceptions on CLIL and its effectiveness Teachers believe that students show positive attitudes towards CLIL and that CLIL helps them to improve their oral comprehension and speaking skills, as well as to increase their vocabulary. In addition, teachers think that CLIL also affects students attitudes and 33

motivation towards other languages in general and towards English in particular in a positive way. According to teachers, CLIL does not affect the amount of content of the subject; however for two teachers the amount of content would decrease in a definite manner in case they taught their subjects exclusively in English. We also asked them about their personal opinion about CLIL and about the changes that it may undergo in the future. Their opinions on CLIL are somewhat shared: they all consider that CLIL is a very good methodology and the passing of time will bring more CLIL hours and subjects, what will affect students positively. However, on their view, two main things are needed, namely more support for teachers by lightening their workload or by offering a wider range of courses both on language and on teaching methodology-, and better linguistic competences on the part of students. On the other hand, we decided to interview EFL teachers as to obtain a round picture on CLIL in this school: as experts on English language and teachers of English of students involved in CLIL they would be in an ideal position to assess students gains in English. As it was mentioned above, two female English experts are in charge of teaching English as a subject all through the four courses in secondary education. One teacher teaches English to all students in the 1st and 2nd year in Secondary Education and the other one teaches in the 3rd and the 4th year in Secondary Education. Both teachers have different opinions on CLIL and its effect on students. However, they agree upon the skills that are most positively affected by CLIL, i.e. speaking and listening, and they also share the view that CLIL (i) fosters students vocabulary; (ii) develops positive attitudes towards other languages; (iii) improves students oral expression and comprehension as well as their fluency and pronunciation. They confirmed that the influence of CLIL is shown positively or very positively in students marks. Nevertheless, when asked about the future of CLIL the two teachers remained sceptical and said that in this school- CLIL will remain as it is. In their opinion, it is hard to achieve better results due to the vast diversity of students and this situation could only be changed if students were divided into smaller groups and also if greater economic support could be received from the national Government as well as from regional/local administrations. Nevertheless, one teacher remarked that CLIL is an excellent initiative as long as it is optional

34

for students and she thought those CLIL hours will remain increasing, although achieving bilingualism seems to be a chimera. (e) Main problems and difficulties in CLIL implementation Up to now we have taken a look at CLIL teachers motivation and professional profiles and also at the implementation of CLIL in the school. However no word has been said about the difficulties, problems, or necessities that arise in a CLIL school. In this respect and according to the teachers of the school analysed, the main difficulties are firstly the scarcity of adequate teaching materials, secondly the lack of help from Government and other administrations which on their view such help is restricted to some language courses-, and finally although there is no agreement here, linguistic difficulties related to students poor competence. In order to solve these problems, on the one hand, they adapt the materials and, on the other, they make use of different strategies such as making use of audiovisual support, repeating explanations, rephrasing, and finally, translating if none of the former strategies was successful. Teachers feel rather pessimist as in their opinion, there is little they can do in order to change Governments support. 7.6. Discussion The results of our study provide us with different kinds of evidence on varied issues like students motivation towards English, the influence of CLIL in learners receptive vocabulary or the perceptions that teachers and students have on CLIL. We are trying to provide a valid interpretation to these results. Concerning students motivation, our results suggest that although EFL and CLIL students get similar scores, students receiving some kind of CLIL instruction show better attitudes towards English as compared to those students that are not involved in content teaching. Nevertheless, our findings are not limited to this fact because as it was explained in the previous chapter, there is a strong link between motivation and achievement since the more motivated students are also the ones that obtained the highest scores regardless of their instruction. Our results seem to match those attained by Prez (2006) and Sevim Inal and Saracaloglu (2007) where these scholars stress the importance of the positive relationship that binds motivation to achievement. However, there is one main difference if we are to compare these studies with ours: the age of informants. Whereas our informants are in the last year of the 35

secondary education, i.e. 15 to 16 years, their informants were already university students, so they were at least 18 years old by the time their studies were being carried out. We have therefore a difference in age but we have a similarity in the motivation-achievement relationship. This leads us to think that the influence that motivation has on achievement might remain at least stable throughout different educational stages, as we have seen. Let us now focus solely on motivation, leaving aside the influence it may have on achievement. By doing so we mean to fulfil one of the initial objectives of our study and to answer at the same time one of our research questions: Does CLIL affects students motivation? Other studies make clear that students from primary levels (Karahan 2007, Yassin et al. 2009), through to secondary levels (Lasagabaster and Sierra 2009) and university students (Gonzlez Ardeo 2003, Savignon and Wang 2003, Mohideen Obeidat 2005, Delfn de Manzanilla 2007, Lennartsson 2008, Verma 2008, Dalton-Puffer el al. 2009) have positive attitudes, due to different and varied internal and external factors, towards other languages which are not their mother tongues, and our results appear to be in line with them, since our informants from each of the 4 courses of our school presented high scores on average when they were asked to evaluate English. Very similar to our study is the one conducted by Lasagabaster and Sierra because their informants are the same age as ours and both of us measured students attitudes towards English by means of the same question (item 15 in questionnaire attached) therefore we can establish an interesting comparison with their study. We compared our informants attitudes with the mentioned study and we realized that, opposed to our study, in Lasagabaster and Sierras study CLIL groups, i.e. SE 3 and SE 4, had significantly better attitudes than EFL groups; this might be possibly due to a greater amount of exposure to English in favour of their informants. We do not think that the socioeconomic context of the informants in each of the studies can make a big difference because the cities where both questionnaires were administered on areas in the North of Spain and not far from each other. Nevertheless it is very important from out point of view noting that there is a great difference between the cultural contexts: English is L2 for our informants whereas English is L3 for Lasagabaster and Sierras informants. It implies that their informants live in a multilingual community and they might have developed more positive attitudes towards languages than our informants.

36

In addition, although the amount of hours of exposure to English is not made clear in Lasagabaster and Sierras study, we tend to think that their informants might have received a greater exposure. According to previous studies (Sylvn 2006 and 2010) a greater amount of exposure to the foreign language has a positive influence on the learners attitude towards it. Moving on to students performance and to the influence that CLIL might have on these, results throw some light on this issue and these results help us to answer the research question about the increase of vocabulary size in CLIL students. First of all, although we have seen that it was not significant, CLIL among other possible individual factors which we did not studyseems to have a positive influence on learners vocabulary since the CLIL group performed slightly better than the EFL group. This fact seems to be completely logical if we take into account that in its theoretical foundations CLIL is addressed to foster primarily, among others, students linguistic skills. However our CLIL informants did not perform significantly better than non-CLILs and the answer to this striking difference may rely on the actual implementation of CLIL in this school, which appears to be a poor implementation if we look at the amount of hours taught in English and we compare it to the CLIL hours in other studies (see Ruiz de Zarobe and Jimnez Cataln 2009) Furthermore our results do not seem to match other similar studies focused on the effectiveness of CLIL since other scholars have proved that CLIL can make a significant difference between students who are involved in CLIL and students who are not. For instance in Ruiz de Zarobe and Jimnez Cataln eds. 2009, we see that in most studies the CLIL group outperforms the control group; besides it is to be specially highlighted the study by Jimnez Cataln and Ruiz de Zarobe 2009 on receptive vocabulary in which CLIL students perform significantly better and they also have a greater vocabulary because there are several similarities between both studies, like the measuring tools, the context, or the age of the informants, and their results are much more significant than ours. Nevertheless, we have found similarities with at least one study (Miralpeix 2007) where the author devotes her study to test if a greater exposure to English entails better results. According to this study the CLIL group, which had received 74 extra hours of exposure to English, and the EFL group performed similarly, that is why she concludes that more emphasis should be put on the quality of the input.

37

These differences and similarities in findings lead us to one main possible interpretation. Both sides seem to be right to a certain extent. In our opinion, these studies have demonstrated that the amount of hours and the quality of the input given to students are both of capital importance. However in the context of our study and focusing our attention in the acquisition of vocabulary, we are inclined to give more importance to the amount of hours because we agree with Jimnez Cataln and Ruiz de Zarobe (2009) when they say that CLIL appears to be an effective teaching methodology although the differences in students performance might rely on the greater exposure to English that CLIL students have. Nevertheless, it is important no to forget that CLIL is still in a preliminary stage in La Rioja, let alone the school of our study, therefore we think that, for the moment, a greater emphasis should be put on the amount of hours while CLIL undergoes a global process of standardization. After carrying out our study and exploring other studies we have noticed that the implementation of this methodology is somewhat irregular in the school under study. To find how is CLIL being implemented we asked the content teachers how do they apply this methodology, and the obtained results provided us with a picture that allows us to interpret the actual CLIL implementation. Firstly, we found that CLIL is being implemented without following any given pattern, that is, teachers work very independently and they have different approaches when it comes to teaching in English, and secondly the CLIL hours vary considerably among teachers, being from our point of view scarce in all cases in order to achieve relevant results in students linguistic skills. However, as we saw in the results section, all three teachers aim at enhancing their students oral skills, i.e. speaking and listening, and students perceptions support this view since the majority of our informants pointed at listening as the skill that has improved the most, closely followed by speaking. Leaving aside the fact that CLIL implementation may not be systematic, the coincidence in teachers and students perceptions regarding the linguistic skills that have been improved lead us to think about an interpretation for the results obtained in the two VLT: Teachers and students feel that CLIL boosts their listening and speaking skills, thus the differences in

38

achievement between CLILs and non-CLILs should be notable in these skills but not necessarily in vocabulary. Finally, in order to close this section we observed the main problems, and difficulties that teachers must face when they get involved in teaching through English. According to teachers the main problem they face is the lack of appropriate teaching materials but they also complain about the lack of courses that Government offers. This may be due to the early stage of CLIL in La Rioja; it is seen, according to the English teachers of our sample, as a good initiative that needs some time to develop and to give notable results. The opinions of these professionals in the education field did not seem to be completely convinced about the effectiveness of CLIL and it allows us to think that there can be a sceptical vision on behalf of the Government, together with other possible causes, such as economical reasons. These teachers perceptions go hand in hand with the main difficulties listed by the European study (Eurydice, 2006) mentioned in the introduction to this study, that is the lack of appropriate teaching material, the lack of trained professionals, and the lack of investment. The possible reasons to give an explanation to these difficulties are of different nature. To begin with, the lack of materials can be attributed to the early stages that CLIL is in; we must bear in mind that the North American immersion programmes in the eighties are predecessors of nowadays CLIL; we mean that a greater period of time is needed for the creation of more materials and more specific. Secondly, the lack of trained professionals according to Eurydice 2006 seems to be connected to the lack of courses focused on CLIL that teachers in our study demand: we understand that there can be no specialist teachers without specialist courses.

8. Conclusion
By means of a series of tests, questionnaires, and interviews we have tried to provide a birdseye view on a whole single CLIL secondary Spanish school, something that had not been done previously as far as we are concerned. We have done that by presenting students and teachers perceptions on CLIL, students results on different vocabulary level tests, and also by summarising how teachers are implementing CLIL in their classes. We have tried to fulfil three main objectives and in order to do that we proposed some research questions, which we think, have been answered. Results have proved on one hand 39

that CLIL seems to have a positive effect on students, as it was expected. However these interpretations should be taken with extreme care because statistical tests affirmed that the positive differences in favour of CLIL students were not significant. On the other hand results showed that although different teachers have different approaches to CLIL, teachers and students perceptions match up when it comes to the linguistic skills that students are supposed to have improved after having been involved in a CLIL context. In addition to teachers opinions we find the fact of the actual implementation of CLIL in the classroom. To this respect, we have shown that this implementation at this very specific school is rather irregular because there is not any guide or pattern to be followed by teachers and there is no agreement between them on how to apply this methodology in their classes. These interpretations should be cautiously taken into account due to the, to some extent, pioneer character of the work and, also due to this character of the study, there is room for further studies which aim at investigating and helping to improve CLIL. Results show the need for further studies devoted to research in depth how extramural exposure affects learners compared to CLIL exposure. Together with the influence of exposure to the language outside the class, the influence of the amount of exposure hours needs also to be studied. The results that we obtained also lead us to think that further research is required comparing the amount of hours of exposure to the quality of exposure to the language in order to find out which of these is more relevant for students better linguistic achievement. In order to close this dissertation we must make reference to the implications that this study might have for teachers. In the first place, from our point of view, it is obvious that Spanish students need a higher competence in English if CLIL is meant to be successful and this task relies on many different bodies, ranging from Government to each of the language teachers, who should do their utmost in order to help students to achieve a higher competence. Regarding CLIL teachers, they should try and follow at least a similar pattern of CLIL teaching which would help them in a definite manner, as well as students. Besides we have learnt that attitudes towards languages have a significantly positive influence on students achievement; therefore, teachers should really put a great emphasis on trying to enhance their pupils motivation and attitudes, in this case towards English.

40

Finally, regarding the difficulties and problems that teachers face when implementing CLIL in their classes, we think that a greater effort on the part of local, national, and international educational and governing bodies is necessary because more specialists are needed in order to make CLIL a more effective methodology.

Acknowledgements
We are very grateful to every member of the school that allowed us to elicit data for the present dissertation. Particularly, we would like to thank both teachers and students for their collaboration.

References
Admiraal, W. et al. (2006) Evaluation of Bilingual Secondary Education in The Netherlands: Students language proficiency in English. Educational Research and Evaluation Vol. 12, No. 1: 75 93 Agustn Llach, M. P., (2006) "Lexical Errors in Young EFL learners: How do they Relate to Proficiency Measures?" Interlingstica, 17, pages: 63-73. Agustn Llach, M. P., (2007) "Lexical Errors as Writing Quality Predictors" Studia Linguistica 61, 1, pages: 1-19. Agustn Llach, M. P., and Jimnez Cataln, R. M., (2007) Lexical Reiteration in EFL Young Learners Essays: Does it Relate to the Type of Instruction?. International Journal of English Studies vol. 7: 85-103. Borrull, N. et al. (2008) La enseanza del ingls como lengua extranjera basada en contenidos. Percepciones del profesorado de educacin secundaria en las Islas Baleares. Revista Electrnica dInvestigaci i Innovaci Educativa i Socioeducativa Vol. 1: 104-128 Coyle, D. et al., (2010) CLIL : Content and Language Integrated Learning. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press. Crawford, Jane C. (2001) Teacher perceptions of the primary English language program in Taiwan: From the outside looking in. Applied Linguistic Association of Australia Annual Conference, Canberra University 41

Dalton-Puffer, C. et al. (2009) Technology-Geeks Speak Out: What Students Think About Vocational CLIL. International CLIL Research Journal, Vol.1. 18-25 Delfn de Manzanilla, B. (2007) Attitudes Towards English in Higher Education Students. REDHECS Vol.2: 1-35 Eurydice, (2006) Aprendizaje Integrado de Contenidos y Lenguas (AICLE) en el contexto escolar europeo. Espaa: Omagraf S.L. Fernndez Fontecha, A., (2009) "Spanish CLIL: Research and Official Actions" In Y. Ruiz de Zarobe & R.M. Jimnez Cataln (Eds.) Content and Language Integrated Learning. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters., pages: 3-22. Gonzlez Ardeo, J. M., (2003) Attitude Towards English and ESP acquisition as an L2 or L3 at University. Ibrica, 6: 109-133 Huttner, J. and Rieder-Bunemann, A. (2007) The Effect of CLIL Instruction on Children's Narrative Competence. VIEWZ Vol. 16: 20-27 Inal, S. et al. (2005) The Relation Between Students Attitude Toward Foreign Language and Foreign Language Achievement. dergiler.ankara.edu.tr/dergiler/27/754/9618.pdf (Retrieved July 16, 2010) Infante, D. et al. (2009) The Effects of CLIL from the Perspective of Experienced Teachers, in Marsh, D. et al (eds.) CLIL Practice: Perspectives from the Field, University of Jyvskyl. Jimnez Cataln, R., and Ojeda Alba, J., (2009) Disponibilidad lxica en ingls como lengua extranjera en dos tipos de instruccin. Lenguaje y Textos N 30: 167-176. Jimnez Cataln, R.M., Ruiz de Zarobe, Y., Cenoz, J. (2006). Vocabulary profiles of English Foreign Language learners in English as a subject and as a vehicular language. Vienna English Working Papers. Vol. 15: 23-27 Karahan, F. (2007) Language attitudes of Turkish students towards the English language and its use in Turkish context. Journal of Arts and Sciences, N 7: 73-87. Finland, CCN:

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Lasagabaster, D. and Ruiz de Zarobe, Y., eds. (2010) CLIL in Spain: Implementation, Results and Teacher Training. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Lasagabaster, D. and Sierra, J.M., (2009) Language Attitudes in CLIL and Traditional EFL Classes. International CLIL Research Journal, Vol.1: 4-17 Lennartsson, F. (2008) Students motivation and attitudes towards learning a second language: British and Swedish students points of view. http://lnu.diva-

portal.org/smash/record.jsf?pid=diva2:206523 (Retrieved July 12, 2010) Liuolien, A. and Metinien, R., (2006) Second language learning motivation. Santalka. Filologija. Edukologija. Nr.2: 9398. Llinares Garca, A. & Whittaker, R. 2007. Talking and writing in the social sciences in a foreign language: a linguistic analysis of secondary school learners of geography and history. In F. Lorenzo, S. Casal, V. Alba & P. Moore (eds), Models and Practice in CLIL, RESLA. Monogrfico. 83-94. Marsh, D. and Wolff, D., eds., (2007) Diverse Contexts, Converging Goals: CLIL in Europe. Frankfurt: Peter Lang Mehisto, P. et al., (2008) Uncovering CLIL. Oxford: Macmillan Education. Miralpeix, I. (2007) Lexical Knowledge in Instructed Language Learning: The Effects of Age and Exposure. IJES Vol. 7: 61-83 Mohan, B. (1986) Language and Content. Addison-Wesley Publishing Company. Mohideen Obeidat, M. (2005) Attitudes and Motivation in Second Language Learning. Journal of Faculty of Education UAEU, Year 18 Issue 22: 1-17 Pena Daz, C. and Porto Requejo, M. D., (2008) Teacher Beliefs in a CLIL Education Project. Porta Linguarum 10: 151-161 Prez, C. J., (2006) Motivacin Interna y Rendimiento de los Estudiantes de Ingls de la ULA Tchira. Accin Pedaggica, N 15: 64-73

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Richards, J. C., and Schmidt, R. (2002). Longman dictionary of language teaching and applied linguistics. London: Longman Ruiz de Zarobe, Y. and Jimnez Cataln, R.M., eds., (2009) Content and Language Integrated Learning: Evidence from Research in Europe. Short Run Press Ltd. Savignon, S and Wang, C. (2003) Communicative Language Teaching in EFL Contexts: Learners Attitudes and Perceptions. IRAL Vol. 41: 223-249. Sylvn, L. K. (2006) How is extramural exposure to English among Swedish school students used in the CLIL classroom?. VIEWZ Vol. 15 No.3: 47-53 Sylvn, L. K. (2010) Teaching in English or English Teaching? On the effects of content and language integrated learning on Swedish learners incidental vocabulary acquisition. Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis, Gothenburg. Verma, M. H. (2008) Learners Attitude and Its Impact on Language Learning. http://www.hku.hk/clear/conference08/doc/handouts/VERMA%20Meenakshi%20H_handout. pdf (Retrieved July 16, 2010) Yassin, S. M. et al. (2009) Learners Perceptions Towards The Teaching Of Science Through English In Malaysia: A Quantitative Analysis. International CLIL Research Journal, Vol. 1: 54-69 Yazid, Z. (2003) Support for Science and Mathematics Teachers in The Implementation of PPSMI: Challenges Ahead and Strategies to Sustain The Momentum. ELTC ETeMS CONFERENCE 2003: MANAGING CURRICULAR CHANGE 2 4 DECEMBER 2003.

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Appendix i: VLT 2000 CENTRO____________________________________________________________ CURSO_____________________________________________FECHA__________ APELLIDOS, NOMBRE ______________________________________________________ Este es un test de vocabulario. En la parte izquierda te presentamos grupos de seis palabras inglesas y a su derecha, los significados de slo tres de ellas. Escribe junto a stos, el nmero de la palabra inglesa correspondiente a dichos significados. Observa el siguiente ejemplo:

EJEMPLO

RESPUESTA CORRECTA

1 business 2 clock 3 horse 4 pencil 5 shoe

____ part of a house ____ animal with 4 legs ____ something used for writing

1 business 2 clock 3 horse 4 pencil 5 shoe

__6__ part of a house __3__ animal with 4 legs __4__ something used for writing

1 coffee 2 disease 3 justice 4 skirt 5 stage 6 wage 1 choice 2 crop 3 flesh 4 salary 5 secret 6 temperature 1 cap 2 education 3 journey 4 parent 5 scale 6 trick 1 attack 2 charm 3 lack 4 pen 5 shadow 6 treasure 1 cream 2 factory 3 nail 4 pupil 5 sacrifice 6 wealth

_____ money for work _____ a piece of clothing _____ using the law in the right way

1 adopt 2 climb 3 examine 4 pour 5 satisfy 6 surround 1 bake 2 connect 3 inquire 4 limit 5 recognize 6 wander 1 burst 2 concern 3 deliver 4 fold 5 improve 6 urge 1 original 2 private 3 royal 4 slow 5 sorry 6 total 1 ancient 2 curious 3 difficult 4 entire 5 holy 6 social

_____ go up _____ look at closely _____ be on every side

_____ heat _____ meat _____ money paid regularly for doing a job

_____ join together _____ walk without purpose _____ keep within a certain size

_____ teaching and learning _____ numbers to measure with _____ going to a far place

_____ break open _____ make better _____ take something to someone

_____ gold and silver _____ pleasing quality _____ not having something

_____ first _____ not public _____ all added together

_____ part of milk _____ a lot of money _____ person who is studying

_____ not easy _____ very old _____ related to God

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Appendix ii: VLT 3000

CENTRO _________________________________________________________________ CURSO_____________________________________________FECHA________________ APELLIDOS, NOMBRE ______________________________________________________ Este es un test de vocabulario. En la parte izquierda te presentamos grupos de seis palabras inglesas y a su derecha, los significados de slo tres de ellas. Escribe junto a stos, el nmero de la palabra inglesa correspondiente a dichos significados. Observa el siguiente ejemplo:
EJEMPLO RESPUESTA CORRECTA

1 business 2 clock 3 horse 4 pencil 5 shoe

____ part of a house ____ animal with 4 legs ____ something used for writing

1 business 2 clock 3 horse 4 pencil 5 shoe

__6__ part of a house __3__ animal with 4 legs __4__ something used for writing

1 bull 2 champion 3 dignity 4 hell 5 museum 6 solution

_____ formal and serious manner _____ winner of a sporting event _____ building where valuable objects are shown

1 muscle 2 counsel _____ advice 3 factor _____ a place covered with grass 4 hen _____ female chicken 5 lawn 6 atmosphere 1 abandon 2 dwell _____ live in a place 3 oblige _____ follow in order to catch 4 pursue _____ leave something 5 quote 6 resolve 1 assemble 2 attach _____ look closely 3 peer _____ stop doing something 4 quit _____ cry out loudly in fear 5 scream 6 toss 1 drift 2 endure _____ suffer patiently 3 grasp_____ join wool threads together 4 knit _____ hold firmly with your hands 5 register 6 tumble 1 aware 2 blank _____ usual 3 desperate _____ best or most important 4 normal ___ knowing what is happening 5 striking 6 supreme

1 blanket 2 contest _____ holiday 3 generation _____ good quality 4 merit _____ wool covering used on beds permanently 5 plot 6 vacation 1 comment 2 gown 3 import 4 nerve 5 pasture 6 tradition

_____ long formal dress _____ goods from a foreign country _____ part of the body which carries feeling

1 pond 2 angel _____ group of animals 3 frost _____ spirit who served God 4 herd _____ managing business and affairs 5 fort 6 administration 1 brilliant 2 distinct 3 magic 4 naked 5 slender 6 stable

_____ thin _____ steady _____ without clothes

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Appendix iii: Questionnaire completed by students CENTRO______________________________________________________________ CURSO______________________________FECHA__________________________ APELLIDOS________________________________NOMBRE__________________ Maca con una X la respuesta que corresponda: 1. Sexo Hombre Mujer Espaola Otras. Especifica cual: ___________________________ Espaola Otras. Especifica cual: ___________________________

2. Nacionalidad

3. Lengua materna

4. Conoces otras lenguas adems de ingls y espaol? No S - Cul o cules? Especifica: _______________________________________________ - Cmo calificaras tu conocimiento global en esas lenguas? Lengua: _____________________ - Hablar y escribir en esa lengua: Excelente Muy bueno Bueno Regular Malo

- Leer y escuchar esa lengua: Excelente Muy bueno Bueno Regular Malo

Lengua:______________________ - Hablar y escribir en esa lengua: Excelente Muy bueno Bueno Regular Malo

- Leer y escuchar esa lengua: Excelente Muy bueno Bueno Regular Malo

5. Recibes clases particulares de ingls fuera del colegio? S No He ido, pero ya no voy

47

6. En caso de que hayas recibido clases de ingls fuera del colegio, especifica: Durante cuntos aos: Menos de un ao Cuatro aos Un ao Cinco aos Dos aos Tres aos Ms de cinco aos

Durante cuntas horas a la semana: 1 hora 2 horas 3 horas 4 horas 5 horas Ms de 5 horas

Cul ha sido el motivo: Haba suspendido y quera aprobar. Sacaba buenas notas en el colegio pero quera mejorar. Me gustan mucho los idiomas y me divierte aprenderlos. Complacer a mi familia. 7. Has estado en algn pas de habla inglesa o en campamentos o colonias de ingls? No S - Cundo? _______________________________________________________ - Durante cunto tiempo? ___________________________________________ - Has ido a clases de ingls all?______________________________________

8. Cul fue tu nota de ingls el ao pasado? ______________________________________________________________________ 9. Has recibido clases en ingls de alguna otra asignatura que no sea ingls? No S Qu asignaturas?__________________________________________________ Cuntas horas a la semana?_________________________________________ Durante cuntos aos?_____________________________________________ 10. Crees que estudiar otras asignaturas en ingls te ha ayudado a mejorar en ingls? Nada Muy poco Poco Bastante Mucho

11. En qu te ha ayudado estudiar otras asignaturas en ingls? Entender ingls escrito Hablar en ingls Entender ingls hablado Escribir en ingls Otras:_______________________________________

12. Marca con una X la frecuencia con la que realices las siguientes actividades en las asignaturas que estudies en ingls (sin contar las clases de ingls).

48

- Completo esquemas en ingls: Nunca Muy poco - Leo textos en ingls: Nunca Muy poco - Hago resmenes en ingls: Nunca Muy poco - Veo pelculas en ingls Nunca Muy poco - Participo en discusiones en ingls: Nunca Muy poco - Escucho explicaciones en ingls: Nunca Muy poco

Poco

Bastante

Mucho

Poco

Bastante

Mucho

Poco

Bastante

Mucho

Poco

Bastante

Mucho

Poco

Bastante

Mucho

Poco

Bastante

Mucho

13. Cmo describiras tu nivel de ingls? Muy bueno Bueno Regular Malo

14. Cunto tiempo le dedicas cada da al ingls en casa (sin contar las clases que recibas)? Menos de media hora Entre media hora y una hora Entre una y dos horas Ms de dos horas. Especifica:_______________ 15. Pon una X en la casilla que corresponda de entre las siete que te presentamos, incluida la sombreada (La casilla sombreada te gua para que identifiques el trmino medio las opciones presentadas). Aprender ingls es: Necesario Feo Difcil Atractivo Agradable Poco importante Intil Interesante Innecesario Bonito Fcil No atractivo Desagradable Importante til Aburrido

49

Appendix iv: Guide for interviewing teachers

Sexo: Masculino / Femenino Edad: Aos de experiencia docente: En qu niveles?: Primaria, ESO, Bachiller, FP Por qu trabajas el aprendizaje integrado: Inters personal, peticin del centro, sustitucin, otras: En qu asignaturas utilizas el ingls? Matemticas, msica, historia, educacin fsica, religin, CCNN, tecnologa, Cuntas horas a la semana? 1, 2, 3, 4, Trabajas el aprendizaje integrado durante Todo el curso, un trimestre, un mes, dos semanas por curso, una semana por curso, algunas lecciones, das sueltos, otras:. Te gustara ampliar o reducir el nmero de horas lectivas en ingls? Ampliar, reducir, suprimir, sin cambios. Cunto tiempo has estado trabajando con CLIL en el centro o en otro centro? Un curso, dos cursos, tres cursos, otro: Qu ha cambiado desde el primer ao? Asignatura, temas, actividades, dedicacin de tiempo: ms o menos horas dedicadas a la asignatura, materiales: cules

Qu tipo de actividades realizis en ingls? Lecturas de textos en ingls Explicaciones gramaticales Discusiones en parejas Debates en grupos Listenings sobre temas de la asignatura Role plays Juegos Presentaciones mediante PPT u otros medios audiovisuales Utilizamos grficos Utilizamos pginas web Elaboramos webquests Qu destrezas lingsticas pretendes que mejoren los alumnos? (Writing, listening, speaking, Reading, text comprehension,)

Qu aspectos del ingls pretendes que mejoren los alumnos? Gramtica, vocabulario, pronunciacin, fluidez expresiva, conocimiento de la cultura de la lengua inglesa, otros:..

Qu materiales utilizas para el aprendizaje integrado? Audiovisuales: grabaciones, videos de internet sobre aspectos gramaticales, pelculas, sketches, wallcharts, pictures, photographs, otros:.... Libro de texto en espaol que traduces al ingls. Libro de texto publicado en ingls. Utilizis libros de texto en ingls o tenis otro tipo de materiales ms independientes (lecturas sueltas, vdeos, ejercicios,)?

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Fotocopias de otros libros de texto Enciclopedias en ingls Readers (libritos de lectura seriados) Material impreso autntico: cul? Diccionarios bilinges (impresos o online?) Diccionarios monolinges Lo preparas t o hay materiales ya preparados? Si preparas t el material: Qu tipo de material? Ejemplo de material que preparas, Temas?

Es difcil encontrar este tipo de materiales? encuentra y te hara falta?

Por qu? Qu material no se

Qu fuentes utilizas para encontrar material en ingls? Internet, biblioteca del centro, centro de Profesores, Otras bibliotecas: cules

Encuentras dificultades al dar la clase en ingls? En caso de que haya: Lengua, falta de materiales, problemas lingsticos por parte de los alumnos, problemas de motivacin por parte de los alumnos -

Cul es la respuesta de los alumnos al aprendizaje integrado? Muy positiva, positiva, indiferente, negativa, . Crees que los alumnos encuentran ms motivacin para aprender ingls? Bastante, poco, mucho, nada, . En qu medida crees que el CLIL-AICLE ayuda a los alumnos? Aprenden ms vocabulario Aprenden ms gramtica Mejoran su comprensin oral Mejoraran su expresin oral Mejoran su expresin escrita Mejoran su compresin escrita Mejoran su actitud hacia el ingls Mejoran su motivacin hacia las lenguas Otras:. Se aprecia alguna evolucin en las calificaciones de los alumnos? En ingls y la materia que impartes, slo en una de ellas o en ninguna? Positiva: obtienen mejores calificaciones en ingls Negativa: obtienen peores calificaciones en ingls No hay variacin entre alumnos que reciben CLIL y los que no. Otra evolucin:..

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Crees que el CLIL favorece el aprendizaje de un idioma a cambio de ralentizar el aprendizaje de otra materia o el aprendizaje es el mismo en ambas asignaturas? Por qu?

Cul es tu preparacin lingstica en ingls? (Cambridge, Trinity, E.O.I., otros certificados) Nivel: B1, 2, C1, C2, Intermediate, Advanced, First Certificate, Proficiency, Ttulo EOI, licenciatura en Ingls, magisterio en Ingls, otros ttulos:..

Qu criterios se siguen para decidir con qu grupos trabajar en ingls? Los alumnos son seleccionados en base a sus notas en ingls Es un programa voluntario: hay alumnos que no optan por CLIL No hay ningn criterio establecido: todos los alumnos reciben CLIL Otros: Cmo solucionas posibles problemas lingsticos por parte de los alumnos? Explicaciones en espaol intercaladas con ingls, apoyo visual y de otros recursos para que comprendan mejor, abandonar el CLIL,

Qu es lo que te motiva para trabajar en ingls?

Cmo ves el aprendizaje integrado en el centro dentro de unos aos?

Cmo es la relacin y colaboracin con otros profesores que trabajen tambin el aprendizaje integrado? Muy positiva Positiva Regular Indiferente Negativa Por qu?:

Recibs ayuda o apoyo de algn tipo por parte de algn organismo (gobierno, MEC) con el CLIL-AICLE?

Qu tipo de apoyo? Cursos en pas de habla inglesa, en La Rioja, mritos para concurso de traslado o de otro tipo, reconocimiento de algn modo: promocin?

Qu se podra cambiar para mejorar esta situacin? Materiales, TIC, apoyo por parte de otras instituciones, cursos para profesores,

Opinin personal sobre CLIL

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