CLIL and Listening Skills: Research Review and Evidence

Introduction

Does the application of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) truly encourage and develop better listening skills? What proof is there that CLIL can indeed help students listen more closely for content and substance? Where are the empirical research efforts that can prove CLIL strategies improve student listening skills? This paper sheds light on the purpose and success of the CLIL model and provides a guide for further research.

Students in the majority of pedagogical situations need to enhance their learning experiences and their listening skills. Whether through integrated learning tactics or other formats, listening skills not only help students become better learners and stronger students, but well-developed listening skills can carry through a lifetime of learning and growth. Moreover, students today — particularly in the West — have so many distractions in their lives that learning often takes a back seat to texting, talking on a smartphone, and spending time on Facebook and other social media outlets. These digital technologies are not going away any time soon, and the interest students have in staying connected to friends and media for a large part of the day can undermine their engagement with learning.

Just a few years ago there were no progressive learning opportunities that could match the potential of the CLIL strategy. High school students could take an elective class in a foreign language for one semester, and that was all that was required in many cases. Fast forward to 2012, and in Europe the goal is to have students learn two languages in addition to their native tongue. In Andalusia, the largest region in Spain, the regional educational ministry put forward a plan to promote "plurilingualism" — knowledge of several languages — as additional evidence that languages are playing an increasingly important role in the lives of adolescents. As a vehicle for teaching students those languages, the Spanish ministry recommended CLIL as the driver of these language initiatives.

Author Dalton-Puffer responds to the Andalusia proposal: "CLIL is regarded on the political level as a core instrument for achieving policy aims directed at creating a multilingual population in Europe" (Casal, 2008).

Research Question

Is there verifiable evidence that the use of the CLIL model enhances listening skills?

Review of Literature

The National Centre for Languages (NCL) explains that it sometimes takes a period of time before students become acclimated to the challenges presented by CLIL, but once they become familiarized with the strategies involved, they will experience a "demonstrably increased motivation and focus" on the subject they are studying. Clearly, part of the process of learning through CLIL entails students listening very carefully, given that they are being taught in their second language. It obviously takes more concentration to discern meaning in one's second language than in one's native tongue.

Theresa Naves writes in Content and Language Integrated Learning: Evidence from Research in Europe that the salient point of CLIL — gleaned from international research — is to enhance the teaching of academic subject matter. Naves (2009, 25) references Littlewood (2007), who insists that besides content-language instruction, CLIL achieves another important goal: it helps develop "learners' communicative competence," which encompasses listening and speaking skills. Littlewood (2004) asserts that CLIL and TBLT (task-based learning and teaching) work together to develop skills "within the communicative approach," and the pivotal feature of that approach is that communication serves not only as a major component of CLIL but as the subject around which CLIL courses can be organized. In this way, both Littlewood and Naves allude to communication — listening and speaking — as central skills within the CLIL framework.

Naves also references Nunan (2004), who believes the "overarching concept" of CLIL lies in the development of "communicative language teaching," which embraces a "broad, philosophical approach to the language curriculum." That implies going considerably deeper into teaching and learning than subject matter alone — and again points toward listening skills. Naves' research indicates that students learn more when the focus of language instruction shifts away from explicit language learning and toward a dynamic where students acquire language "through lively exchanges with other students" — that is, through listening and talking. Naves further explains that learners do well when engaged in "spontaneous speech in an interactive context," which involves listening, responding based on what they heard, and then listening to the response to their response (Naves, 26).

Christine Dalton-Puffer takes issue with administrators in Austria who view content as the sole goal of CLIL. "Why should we be doing CLIL at all if there are no language goals present?" she asks (Dalton-Puffer, 2007, 295). She argues "very strongly" that language curricula should be developed with "goals in speaking, writing, reading, and listening concretized" alongside content curricula. When presented correctly, Dalton-Puffer asserts, these programs "are likely to be good training grounds for listening to and reading in the foreign language" (295).

Lydia Sajda argues that CLIL is an "umbrella" approach to learning because it involves both content and language/communication skills. The Commission of the European Communities states that CLIL entails having students "acquiring the skills to communicate with one another effectively and to understand one another better" (Sajda, 2008, 31). Sajda notes that at the lower secondary level in the Austrian curriculum, foreign language teaching should include communication competencies encompassing "reading, hearing, speaking, and writing skills in the foreign language" (Sajda, 37). Using their second language effectively allows students to further develop "their hearing, speaking, reading, and writing skills" in a range of public and professional situations (Sajda, 37).

Within a CLIL environment, students practice the four skills — listening, speaking, reading, and writing — in an integrative way, which also strengthens their ability to digest and understand the content being presented (Sajda). A strong example of how listening skills help bridge the gap between languages is offered by Sajda, who references Cameron (2007):

"Children listening to a story told in the foreign language from a book with pictures will understand and construct the gist, or outline meaning, of the story in their minds. Although the story may be told in the foreign language, the mental processing does not need to use the foreign language, and may be carried out in the first language or in some language-independent way" (Sajda, 58).

Sonia Casal presents a counterpoint: while students learning through CLIL are gaining reading and listening skills, they may be missing out on "productive" skills such as writing and speaking (Casal, 2008). On the issue of speaking, Casal argues that students in CLIL formats do not have enough opportunity to speak, even though they receive ample opportunities to listen. She supports this concern with a simple calculation: in a 50-minute class with 25 students, each individual would have only about 2 minutes of speaking time once the instructor's own speaking time is accounted for.

Conclusion

Teresa Naves reports on research conducted in Catalonia, in which students from a number of different grade levels participated in CLIL learning activities. Notably, "the most fluent writers were CLIL learners from grades 9 and 10," both of whom performed as well as non-CLIL learners from grade 12. Even more remarkable, some CLIL learners from 7th grade managed to write as fluently in English as non-CLIL 12th graders. This does not prove that these same students developed superior listening skills, but it does suggest that significant language gains are achievable through CLIL. There is data available — held by teachers who have conducted CLIL classes — that could and should be retrieved in the ongoing search for evidence of improved listening skills through CLIL instruction.