CLIL Soft Models: The Challenge of Teaching Very Young Language Learners

Abstract

The typical context in which Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) has been implemented all over Europe corresponds to primary or secondary education classrooms where academic subjects, such as Geography or Science are taught through an additional language different to the one used in mainstream education with dual-focussed aims, the learning of content and the simultaneous learning of the target language (Marsh, 2005, p. 2 as cited in Vinuesa, 2017, p.16). Although CLIL may often be understood as an approach more suitable for older children, its implementation in pre-primary education would be possible thanks to the wide range of possibilities and models it offers, from “language showers” (Mehisto, Marsh, & Frigols, Uncovering CLIL: Content and language integrated learning in bilingual and multilingual education. Macmillan Books for Teachers, 2008) to total immersion, from language-led (soft CLIL) to subject-led (hard CLIL) (Ball, Does CLIL work? In Hill & Pulverness (Eds.), The best of both worlds? International perspectives on CLIL (pp. 32–43). Norwich Institute for Language Education, 2009; Bentley, The TKT (Teaching Knowledge Test) course CLIL module. Cambridge University Press, 2010). In this chapter, given the globalized characteristics of the pre-primary Education curriculum, and considering that for early language learning the “main focus is on the doing – be it playing, singing, drawing, building models, or other activities” (Edelenbos, Johnstone, & Kubanek, The main pedagogical principles underlying the teaching of foreign languages to very young learners: Published research, good practice and main principles, European Commission Final Report 89/04, 2006, p.17) we will explore the CLIL types known as “language showers and soft CLIL”. In these two language-led models, children are exposed to the target language for short periods of time during the week through games, songs, stories, realia, visuals, and movement, with the aim of making learning enjoyable, full of practice, meaningful, purposeful, social, and supported. The aim would not be learning a second language but learning curricular topics “in” and “through” the target language.