Enhancing CLIL Teacher-training In Preschool Education Through R2L Implementation
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Date
2024
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Abstract
This action research aims to enhance the quality of teacher-training for preschool teachers in a Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) program. The study was conducted in a teacher-training course for preschool teachers from three public schools in Santiago, all participating in a bilingual project. The course aims to provide teaching strategies for preschool non-EFL teachers to integrate content and language knowledge in their classrooms. This study addresses the challenges identified in CLIL training by proposing a more effective integration of content and language, specifically through a pedagogic approach known as Reading to Learn (R2L).The general objective of this study is to implement the R2L approach as a method for providing effective CLIL teacher training in preschool education, by fostering meaningful pedagogic interactions and activities. The objective is achieved through action research methodology. The intervention provided workshops that teaches R2L as an explicit teaching approach that guides the development of CLIL activities in preschool classrooms. The R2L pedagogy was taught using the scaffolding principles informed by the genre-based pedagogy, including modelling and deconstruction of the R2L pedagogy, joint planning, before participants’ individual practice in the preschool classrooms. The impact of the intervention is assessed through two different types of data – that are the recording of participant’s teaching performances, and one- on-one interviews with the participants.The analysis of participants’ performances revealed that R2L helped preschool teachers develop teaching activities that integrated content and language effectively. Additionally, it supported teachers in creating effective pedagogic interactions in the classroom. Analysis of teacher interviews revealed that R2L provided an explicit approach to work with CLIL in very young learners, they highlighted the usefulness of having a script to guide their interactions, together with the support of multimodal resources. However, they acknowledge that further training was needed to improve proficiency and interaction in L2 in the future.This study contributes to the teacher-training program by developing understanding of the R2L approach for preschool teachers in CLIL contexts. The results demonstrate that enhancing teachers’ knowledge about language can lead to a systematic understanding of the linguistic characteristics present in texts, providing an explicit framework for developing pedagogic approaches that address both content and language knowledge with EFL learners.
Description
Tesis (Magíster en Lingüística Aplicada al Inglés como Lengua Extranjera)--Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, 2024.
Keywords
Teacher education, Content and Language Integrated Learning, Genre-based pedagogy, Reading to Learn