Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) is a dual-focused educational approach whereby an additional language is used for the learning and teaching of both content and language. In the Netherlands, this takes place in bilingual secondary education (tweetalig onderwijs). Policy guidelines, teaching handbooks, research and teacher education primarily focused on how subject teachers implement CLIL. Little was known about the nature and range of the pedagogical and collaborative practices of language teachers in this context. Exploring formal and practical theories of teaching, this dissertation reports on four studies; a literature review, focus group study, survey, and multiple-case study. These generated building blocks for a knowledge base for Teachers of English in Bilingual streams (TEBs) including a theoretical framework for language teaching in CLIL contexts, a set of practices which emerged as a professional development tool for TEBs, eight case descriptions of prototypical practices, and a model of the dynamic interaction of TEBs’ beliefs and practices. Reviewing the findings in the light of developments in conceptualizing what CLIL means for teachers in practice, the discussion highlights four points. Firstly, language teaching in CLIL contexts is not the same as foreign language teaching. Secondly, CLIL achieves integration through subject-specific language. Thirdly, CLIL contexts can lead to transformative change in language teachers’ beliefs and practices. Fourthly, collaboration between language and subject teachers can be beneficial. It concludes that teacher education and policy guidelines can and should do more to support, encourage and enable language teachers to be both creators and agents of change.
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Explicit language objectives are included in the Swedish national curriculum for mathematics. The curriculum states that students should be given opportunities to develop the ability to formulate problems, use and analyse mathematical concepts and relationships between concepts, show and follow mathematical reasoning, and use mathematical expressions in discussions. Teachers’ competence forms a crucial link to bring an intended curriculum to a curriculum in action. This article investigates a professional development program, ‘Language in Mathematics’, within a national program for mathematics teachers in Sweden that aims at implementing the national curriculum into practice. Two specific aspects are examined: the selection of theoretical notions on language and mathematics and the choice of activities to relate selected theory to practice. From this examination, research on teacher learning in connection to professional development is proposed, which can contribute to a better understanding of teachers’ interpretation of integrated approaches to language and mathematics across national contexts.
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This study reports on a Professional Development Program (PDP) designed to raise teachers' subject specific language awareness (TSLA) as a relevant and specific element of their practical knowledge and improve their language integrated teaching behaviour. The design of the PDP was based on the interconnected model of teacher professional growth (Clarke & Hollingsworth, 2002). Data were collected using semi-structured interviews, classroom observations, and video-stimulated interviews. The PDP resulted in change in both teachers' subject-specific language awareness and related teaching behaviour. Teachers' sense of responsibility to address students' language learning appeared to be relevant for teachers' change of behaviour.
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