Analysing students’ content-learning in science in CLIL vs. non-CLIL programmes: empirical evidence from Spain

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates students’ performance in content-subjects in the framework of CLIL programmes in Spain. So far, CLIL research has focused primarily on language attainment in the L2 and the L1, but students’ achievements as regards content-subjects have been largely ignored. Competence in Science in the L1 is analysed by comparing pupils enrolled in mainstream schools with students in the so-called ‘bilingual streams’ offering CLIL-based approaches. The main objective is to assess if students learning Science through the L2 (English) outperform their counterparts studying in the L1 (Spanish) as regards content acquisition. The paper analyses a sample of 709 6th grade Primary Education students enrolled in public schools in the Principality of Asturias (Spain). A test to assess students’ knowledge in Science and a context questionnaire (measuring participants’ socio-economic status) were designed. The main finding is that students learning contents in their L1 perform slightly better than those studying Science through the L2. Furthermore, participants with lower socio-economic status obtain lower scores than those coming from more privileged backgrounds.

KEYWORDS:

• Content and language integrated learning (CLIL)
• science
• subject-matter learning
• primary education
• socio-economic status (SES)

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Javier Fernández-Sanjurjo is a researcher at the Department of Educational Sciences of the University of Oviedo, Spain.

Alberto Fernández-Costales is a Lecturer in Applied Linguistics at the University of Oviedo, Spain.

José Miguel Arias Blanco is Associate Professor in Research Methods and Diagnosis in Education at the University of Oviedo, Spain.

Notes

1 Although participating schools offer bilingual streams and are not ‘completely CLIL establishments’, for the sake of simplicity, the terms CLIL and non-CLIL schools will be used.

2 The PISA report is developed by the OECD: https://www.oecd.org/pisa/. TIMMS and PIRLS are published by the IEA: http://timss.bc.edu.

3 Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports of the Principality of Asturias. Asturian curriculum: https://sede.asturias.es/bopa/2014/08/30/2014-14753.pdf.

4 Institute of Economic Development of Asturias. http://www.idepa.es/sites/web/idepaweb/productos/cifras/demografia/index.jsp?section=3.

5 All students were delivered the questionnaire in order not to discriminate any pupil. However, students with special needs were omitted from the sample. In all the cases, students were excluded after consulting the teaching board of the schools and only in order to avoid possible distortions in the analysis. Students and schools were informed about the nature of this project and all ethical considerations were taken into account when writing the paper.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad of the Government of Spain [grant number EDU2014-54093-R] and Government of Catalonia – Agència de Gestió d’ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca (AGAUR) [grant number 2014 SGR 208].