Defining content and language integrated learning for languages education in Australia.

Cross, Russell

ABSTRACT

While there is much that Australia has done well with respect to languages education, many problems still persist in terms of mainstream provision of quality languages programs, attaining real outcomes and gains in language learning, and in relation to retention of students studying languages through to the senior years of school. The success of new approaches focused on integrating language with the mainstream curriculum across schools in Europe suggests new possibilities for dealing with the challenges of languages in the Australian schooling context. This paper considers key aspects of the Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) approach as developed in Europe over the past two decades to help clarify and establish a shared professional conversation for advancing the approach amongst teachers of languages in Australia interested in its possibilities. The paper includes core ideas underpinning the CLIL framework, an awareness of its benefits as well as challenges, and guidance about 'first steps' on implementing CLIL based on trials in the Victorian context, together with how effectiveness of such a program might be determined.

KEY WORDS

CLIL, content and language integrated learning, languages pedagogy, languages curriculum, languages policy, bilingual language learning

INTRODUCTION

Content and Language Integrated Learning, or CLIL, has been established as a mainstream option for languages teaching and learning throughout Europe since the term was first used some 20 years ago (Marsh, 1994). Traction has been especially strong in the last 10 years since the European Commission's 2004 Action Plan, Promoting language learning and linguistic diversity, recognised that CLIL had 'a major contribution to make to the Union's language learning goals' (European Commission, 2003, p. 8).These goals include Europe's 'one plus two' strategy, which encourages proficiency in at least three languages: each citizen's national language, as well as two others from the wider EU community (often including English as the common lingua franca). In Italy, for example, the Ministry of Education has now mandated CLIL as the teaching approach for all non-language subjects in the final year of secondary school, regardless of whether students are undertaking an academic or vocational pathway (L'Associazione Professionale dei Docenti Italiani, 2014).

In the last three to five years, interest in CLIL has begun to expand rapidly beyond Europe, Including to settings as diverse as Japan (Sasajima, Ikeda, Hemmi, & Reilly, 2011), Singapore (Hanington, Devi Pillai, & Kwah, 2013), and the Middle East (Riddlebarger, 2013). Likewise, Australia has also begun to explore the possibilities of CLIL within local settings, and how the approach might offer new solutions to longstanding problems that have troubled languages education in mainstream Australian schools (e.g. Victorian DEECD, 2014; see also Fielding & Harbon, this issue). These challenges for languages in Australia include quality program development and teaching, sufficient time for worthwhile gains in language use, and student retention through to advanced levels of study in the senior secondary years (Turner, 2013).

With the growing expansion of CLIL into contexts beyond and for which it was originally developed comes uncertainties about how the approach might be most successfully 'exported' into new education settings and jurisdictions. As the global transfer of education policy and curriculum has taught us, what works well in one context does not always guarantee the same results elsewhere (Carnoy & Rhoten, 2002; Lingard, 2010). The eventual outcomes can be disastrous; with the effect being very different from what was originally intended, including lower gains in achievement as well as in target language development (Valdes, 1997; Walter, 2008).

For CLIL to have a genuine chance of take-up in the Australian context, the imperative for its immediate future is first to better clarify and establish a shared professional understanding of what CLIL is, and what it is not. Given the longstanding problems that have affected languages education in Australia (see Lo Bianco, 2009; and Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), 2009, for example), there is an understandable desire to find an approach, model, or idea that offers a solution to improved languages education take-up and outcomes, and the success of CLIL in Europe in the last 20 years does offer some hope. CLIL in Europe has been extremely successful, replicating the outcomes of Canadian Immersion schooling, which is an approach that develops genuine communicative competence In two languages, as well as heightened levels of student engagement (Alberta Education, 2010; Coyle, Hood, & Marsh, 2010; Mehisto, Marsh, & Frigols, 2008). In the last 20 years, Immersion enrolments In Canada have Increased by 28% to 324,000 students, while those learning French through the regular public school curriculum declined by 24% over the same period (Statistics Canada, 2013). In comparison, the 2006-2012 language enrolment data for P-12 government schools In Victoria, the Australian state with the largest proportion of students learning a language (Llddicoat, Scarlno, Curnow, Kohler, Scrlmgeour, & Morgan, 2007), show that numbers for French have fallen by 14%, Italian by 33%, and German by 41 %, for example (Victorian DEECD, 2012). A key difference between CLIL and immersion is that the former has been able to be expanded across the diverse range of education systems and language learning contexts within the EU--something that has remained a challenge with Immersion approaches, which have evolved within very specific social, cultural, historical conditions In the Canadian context.

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CLILs flexibility--the idea that 'there is neither one CLIL approach nor one theory of CLIL (Coyle, 2008, p. 101)--Is perhaps one of the most attractive qualities of the approach, and provides potential for CLIL to offer a robust framework suitable for the diverse Australian contexts for language learning across different states, jurisdictions, and schools. But such possibility necessitates all the more the need for clarity around CLILs core Ideas to advance the professional space constructively, as well as to support CLIL scholarship and research In relation to the particular needs of the Australian learning contexts and education systems. This is not dissimilar from past discussions within Babel on other key pedagogic developments within our field, Including those around the place of communicative languages teaching (e.g. Beale, 2002; Mangubhai, Dashwood, & Howard, 2000; Venning, 2002), and a recognition of the need to rely less on prescriptive methods for Instruction, than 'approach-based' frameworks that Instead provide broader guidance based on the contextual demands of varied sites for teaching and learning. This article sets out the main ideas underpinning CLIL for teachers who might consider using the approach within their own local classroom contexts. The Australian languages teaching community can learn from the European CLIL experience, reviewing Its twenty years of trialing of what works most effectively for Integrating language and learning content to bring about successful outcomes for learners.

CLIL AS AN APPROACH FOR IMPROVING LANGUAGES EDUCATION

Put simply, 'content and language Integrated learning' refers to a pedagogy with a dual focus on developing outcomes In both language (e.g. French) and content (e.g., science) learning, simultaneously (Coyle, Hood, & Marsh, 2010). Although a 'descendent' of the Canadian Immersion approach (Perez-Canado, 2011, p. 316), a critical difference between Immersion and CLIL--as developed In the European Union In the mid-1990s--is the flexibility CLIL provides as a pedagogy applicable to a range of varied educational settings and conditions (e.g. Individual or team-teaching approaches; timetabled as a single-class or as part of a whole-school curriculum; etc.).The emphasis lies less on the need to create systemic or structural conditions necessary to Immerse students In the target language than on using pedagogical approaches that capitalise on existing opportunities to enhance language learning retention and outcomes. As Mehisto, Marsh, and Frigols (2008, p.27) explain: 'Although CLIL ... does Involve a new approach and a certain degree of change, It can easily fit Into the parameters established by the national or regional curriculum. [it is an] approach that seeks to enrich the [existing] learning environment'.

In this way, Coyle (2013) argues that CLIL Is Increasingly being recognised as a 'change agent' (p. 244) for language education programs, with a capacity to reshape traditionally monolingual-centric approaches Into genuine bilingual experiences for learners. Such an approach Is significant for languages education since 'strong' models of bilingual education (Baker, 2011; see Fielding & Harbon, this Issue, for a more detailed account of 'strong' and 'weak' programs)--such as CLIL, as well as Immersion--provide the optimum conditions for second language development. That Is, strong programs provide opportunities to encounter comprehensible and meaningful language with the expectation that students engage with, respond to, and use that language for themselves within purposeful, well-scaffolded communicative experiences (Lantolf & Thorne, 2007; Lightbown & Spada, 2013). De Graaff, Koopman, Anikina, & Westhoff (2007) expand this Idea further by linking major developments in the last 30 years of language education research that support the move towards CLIL-based approaches:

1. Communicative language teaching: language is acquired most successfully when it is learned for communication purposes in meaningful and significant social situations (Brumfit & Johnson, 1979).

2. Content-based language teaching: the integration of content and second language instruction provides a substantive and functional basis and exposure for language teaching (Cummins & Swain, 1986; Echevarria et al., 2000; Genesee, 1987).

3. Task-based language teaching: exposure, use and motivation in functional and relevant activities are prerequisites for successful language learning (Bygate et at., 2001; Ellis, 2003; Willis, 1996) (de Graaff et al, 2007, pp. 606-607),

Such a move effectively mirrors what Mehisto et al. (2008, p. 101) have asserted is CLILs 'winning game plan': the achievement of content-based learning outcomes integrated with language goals that facilitate understanding of that content, while also developing overall general learning skills for learners as Independent problem-solvers. When Implemented properly, CLIL programs should be able to achieve:

* Year level-appropriate levels of academic achievement in subjects taught through the CLIL language

* Year level-appropriate functional proficiency in listening, speaking, reading and writing in the CLIL language

* Age-appropriate levels of first-language competence in listening, speaking, reading and writing

* An understanding and appreciation of the cultures associated with the CLIL language and the student's first language

* The cognitive and social skills and habits required for success in an ever-changing world (Mehisto et al., 2008, pp. 11-12).

The emphasis on Year level-appropriateness is crucial, since the success of the approach depends on purposeful interaction and engagement--provided by the content--as much as it does on simply understanding language for its own sake (Coyle et al., 2010). It is the attempts to make meaning, and to be meaningful, when teachers and learners work together to construct and reconstruct content-based knowledge and understanding through the language, that provides the catalyst for language and content growth (Cross, 2012).

SOME TERMINOLOGICAL CLARIFICATION

Across Australian education systems there is considerable variability in the terms used to describe approaches and programs that have a curriculum-based focus. It is helpful to be explicit about where and how CLIL might sit alongside these.

First, CLIL is best understood as an 'umbrella' (Marsh, 2002, p. 56) term for a flexible pedagogical approach to dual focused (content/language) Instruction; that is, CLIL as a descriptor for the type of teaching approach used. CLIL-based programs can take a variety of forms (e.g. units of work within standard languages programs, standalone subject options within larger school programs), or CLIL can be the pedagogical basis for regular bilingual programs (i.e. where the whole school curriculum is organised for Instruction In the medium of another language, using CLIL pedagogy). As explained above, a key point of distinction between CLIL and similar content-related pedagogies is the explicit dual focus in CLIL on developing both new content and language, rather than a focus on content while teaching through the medium of another language, or using content to simply frame language around particular themes or topics that might only be an incidental to the teaching of language.

Bilingual is useful as a broader program level descriptor--i.e. how instruction is organised, rather than how instruction is actually delivered (pedagogy)--for a school-level approach that aims to provide extensive opportunities for students to become familiar with a second language and the culture(s) of its native speakers. In New South Wales, for example, there is an expectation that 'bilingual schools' offer at least 7.5 hours (about 33%) of the curriculum through the medium of the target language (Fielding & Harbon, this Issue; NSW DEC, 2014). Bilingual programs can be delivered by different types of pedagogies, including (but not necessarily) CLIL.

Within the international literature, immersion refers to a well-defined form of bilingual program in which a significant portion (or even all) of the mainstream curriculum is taught through the target language on a continuum from partial (at least 50%) to full immersion (100% of class time) (Baker, 2011). As a school-level approach, immersion programs typically focus on the teaching of curriculum content via the medium target language, with separate curriculum elements devoted to specifically language/focus on form development (e.g. 'Italian Language Arts'). However, alternative approaches to delivery adopt an integrated focus on both language and curriculum throughout the curriculum as a whole (I.e. immersion programs using CLIL pedagogy).

WHAT DOES CLIL LOOK LIKE IN PRACTICE?

As discussed above, the real potential of CLIL lies in the flexibility it offers as an approach to produce the optimum conditions for languages learning across a wide range of teaching contexts. Hood & Tobutt (2009), for example, have identified at least four models of CLIL within the UK context. These include:

* Surface cross-curricular linking [using the regular language class to teach content-related language relevant to what is being taught in other curriculum areas]

* Integrating language while building on semi-familiar content

* Integrating language and new content

* Immersion [as understood in the CLIL UK context] (Hood & Tobutt, 2009, p. 105)

Because of this flexibility, it is essential that practice is informed by a robust theoretical basis; that is, a clear system of key principles and building blocks for guiding Instructional decisions as they relate to the demands of different contexts. It is not so much 'what' teachers do that matters--as if to suggest that a prescriptive set of techniques could achieve the outcomes of CLIL--than understanding 'how' and 'why' language and content integration can be approached in a range of different ways, given a variety of different settings for integrated practice, to produce desired outcomes.

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The core theory underpinning CLIL comprises four key 'building blocks' (Coyle, 2006b, p. 9), known as the 4Cs Framework:

Content: The subject matter, theme, and topic forming the basis for the program, defined by domain or discipline according to knowledge, concepts, and skills (e.g. science, ICT, arts).

Communication: The language to create and communicate meaning about the knowledge, concepts, and skills being learned (e.g. stating facts about the sun, giving instructions on using software, describing emotions in response to music).

Cognition: The ways that we think and make sense of knowledge, experience, and the world around us (e.g. remembering, understanding, evaluating, critiquing, reflecting, creating).

Culture: The ways that we interact and engage with knowledge, experience, and the world around us: socially (e.g. social conventions for expressing oneself in the target language), pedagogically (e.g. classroom conventions for learning and classroom interaction), and/or according to discipline (e.g. scientific conventions for preparing reports to disseminate knowledge).

Further, in contrast to conventional 'methodologies' of language teaching that rely heavily on specific conditions for successful implementation (e.g. see Baker, 2011, for a list of 'core' and 'variable' features of immersion), CLIL is informed by a set of relational (and therefore more contextually sensitive and flexible) principles for pedagogy designed to work across different educational contexts. With the aim of incorporating all aspects of the 4Cs framework, the principles support the understanding that learning Is based on the construction of new knowledge/skills rather than mere acquisition: that there is a need for explicit attention to the role and development of cognitive skills to facilitate quality student-centered, participatory learning experiences; that interaction and context are central for reconstructing meaning and understanding; and that the relationship between language and culture Is complex, inseparable and central to the development of Intercultural understanding (Coyle, 2008).

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The excerpt below describes one teacher's CLIL approach in a Year 2 Spanish/science class. As already explained, this Is only one way of approaching CLIL, but It does highlight the interrelated focus on content, culture, cognition, and communication, along with the pedagogical principles that guided this teacher's Integrated approach to practice. It also highlights the strategic role of English. While never used by the teacher herself to deliver Instruction, It is allowed between students (and accepted In student-to-teacher responses, depending on the task) as a translanguaglng strategy commonly used within CLIL classrooms (Creese & Blackledge, 2010; Cross, 2012; Lasagabaster, 2013):

In the initial lesson for the topic, the teacher read an illustrated story which she had translated from English into Spanish. All of the Year 2 classes were using this story as the means of activating students' knowledge about causes and their relationship to effects. However, as the teacher pointed out during the follow-up interview, this had not worked well in Spanish for two reasons. First, the students had limited exposure to the language, and she needed to focus on a small number of key vocabulary items rather than overall comprehension of the story. Second, the cause and effect sequences in the story were more social than physical, whereas the following lessons focussed on scientific concepts of cause and effect such as friction, weight with force of gravity, and air pressure. The social nature of the story did, however, enable the teacher to draw the students' attention to some intercultural aspects of the behaviour of Spanish speakers in the situations compared to their expectations based on Australian cultural assumptions.

The three lessons involving student experiments followed a similar pattern, with the teacher preparing a lesson plan based on a model adapted from Coyle et at. (2010) and Dale and Tanner (2012). Each lesson began with a warm-up activity to activate students' Spanish vocabulary with the teacher using games to revise previously learned words and new ones needed for the particular experiment. To guide students' understanding of the particular cause and effect concept, the teacher demonstrated the experiment, and then asked a student to demonstrate it with her, each time explaining in Spanish what they had to do and asking questions of the class to ensure they had understood the process and were able to explain it in Spanish. To consolidate the cause and effect comparative structures, the teacher wrote examples on the whiteboard with gaps for students to complete using their own data and conclusions. The teacher also used prepared flash cards with words in Spanish to [scaffold and elicit] examples from the students' own findings about the results of each experiment, and placed these on the magnetic whiteboard so they could complete their individual charts. Students worked in pairs or small groups to support each other during each of the experiments, but wrote their own results in Spanish on pre-prepared charts. At the end of each lesson, the teacher summarised what had been done, focussing on the language of predicting and hypothesising related to each cause and effect experiment and the materials used.

The language focus for this topic centred on lexis for the materials used in each experiment, and syntax for comparatives. The 'hands on' nature of the teacher's approach meant that the macro skills focus was on listening and responding orally and in writing, by completing set sentences where the basic elements were provided and students wrote one or two words per gap to complete their own sentences.

As a final product, students worked in pairs to produce a poster illustrating each of the experiments and writing a short paragraph of three to four sentences to record what they had discovered during this topic.

Through the content of this inquiry unit, the teacher was able to develop the students' thinking skills by asking them to predict what might happen with each experiment and to provide a possible explanation of this. During the experiments, she circulated around groups of students, talking to them in Spanish and helping them to formulate their conclusions in a mixture of English and Spanish. Scaffolding was provided both orally and in writing, with students encouraged to use the outline of the sentences on the whiteboard to describe the result of each experiment where they used different materials or processes. (Cross, 2013, pp. 66-67).

FIRST STEPS: WHAT DO SCHOOLS NEED TO DO?

Although the focus is integration, CLIL is content driven (Coyle et al., 2010). The first step in planning any program, then, lies with identifying which curriculum areas offer the greatest likelihood of establishing a program given the dynamics of the particular school. For example, if the languages specialist is already experienced in another area (e.g. mathematics), there is a natural connection for advancing a CLIL strategy further. In other cases, it might make more sense for the languages teacher to collaborate with others (e.g. primary generalist teachers) to identify which units of work, or extensions to existing units of work, they might take responsibility for to establish a CLIL program. For language teacher specialists without much experience of teaching into other curriculum areas, scheduling opportunities to plan, shadow, or team-teach with those already teaching those units of work can be a useful way to build knowledge, skills, and confidence across new content areas. Indeed, the flexibility that CLIL offers means it is often taught by teachers who have method specialisms in both languages and another content teacher, but also allows for co-teacher configurations in which languages specialists work in collaboration with other colleagues, such as primary generalist teachers (Cross, 2013).

A CLIL approach can be implemented across the full range of conventional subject areas, including art, economics and business studies, geography, history, ICT, mathematics, music, drama, science, and physical education (Dale & Tanner, 2012). Furthermore, Genesee (1994) contends 'the content of integrated second language instruction need not be academic: it can include any topic, theme, or non-language issue of interest or importance to the learners' (p. 3). What matters most is choosing subject matter that offers the greatest flexibility for teachers to work with to develop a program specifically for their students (e.g. a good working partnership with a particular member of staff within the chosen content area; experience or confidence in teaching a particular domain; an existing well-established unit of work that would generate strong interest in the program (Cross, 2013)).The Irish Modern Languages in Primary Schools Initiative (2014) offers several suggestions to consider in making choices of subject areas for CLIL, especially with beginners. These include subject areas requiring:

* A lot of seeing, watching, observing (documents, photographs, objects, film, teacher and others)

* A lot of experiencing, handling, doing (i.e. performing real tasks with objects, realia)

* A lot of listening (teacher and others, tape, film)

* A rich visual environment, Including written language (including both new and known language)

* Aural language which is both rich and accessible to beginners in context (including both new and known language)

* The possibility of producing language in the modern language [both orally and through writing] (www.mlpsi.le/index.php/teaching-languages15/classroomresources/clil)

In terms of learners, many European CLIL programs do not commence until students have already developed literacy in their first language (Dalton-Puffer & Smit, 2013). However, the immersion experience confirms that the early introduction of additional languages as an alternate medium of instruction has no long-term detrimental effects on students' first language development. Although students sometimes lag behind monolingual learners initially (Fortune & Tedick, 2003), research confirms students in early immersion programs from the start of schooling soon catch up with, and often outperform, monolinguals in assessment of metalinguistic awareness and first language competence (Bialystok, Peets, & Moreno, 2014; Turnbull, Hart & Lapkin, 2003; Fortune, 2012).

However, an advantage that older CLIL learners have over those in the primary years is that their cognitive skills are often better developed, and students can transfer their metacognitive skills to the CLIL classroom to facilitate more effective learning (i.e. study skills, inferencing, memory, etc.) (Lightbown & Spada, 2013). Not surprisingly, the introduction of complex curriculum content can have a negative impact on learners but, as noted below, this is sometimes less to do with the approach itself, and more to do with instances where the pedagogy might not be being applied effectively, or where the content has not been scaffolded appropriately (Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976), which would make learning in any language difficult. If done well, teachers can identify appropriate ways to select, introduce, and scaffold students' understanding of the content to avoid these problems, while facilitating greater language and content skill development in the process.

Regardless of whether CLIL programs start at the primary or secondary level, evidence from early CLIL trials in the Victorian context suggest the need to begin programs with 'opt-in' groups first (Cross, 2013), where students elect to participate. This approach has been common with many (although not all) models of CLIL in Europe (Maljers, Marsh, & Wolff, 2007). Working with students who also show some initial commitment to the approach enables a quality program to evolve gradually while the teaching team makes changes and adjustments during the early phases. This does mean, however, that there is a need to provide information to the school community and stakeholders (including parents and feeder schools) about the CLIL program through newsletters, information nights, taster classes, etc. to generate interest and awareness, and to bring the community on board.

Significantly, the early Victorian CLIL trials have also identified a difference between 'support' and 'commitment' for establishing a successful CLIL program (Cross, 2013). CLIL does not necessarily depend on having to secure whole school 'buy in'--that Is, a commitment in terms of restructuring timetables, impacting staff hiring decisions, etc.--but teachers do need executive level support, including trust and confidence from their senior leadership team to allow teachers to work with the approach. Other forms of external support available include professional teachers' networks (e.g. AFMLTA and its state affiliates, as well as single language subject associations), universities, other languages teachers (both within and across schools), and departmental initiatives (e.g. www.education.vic.gov.au/school/principals/curriculum/Pages/languageclil.aspx).

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BENEFITS OF ADOPTING THE APPROACH

As with research on other models of additive bilingual education, the impact of CLIL includes beneficial linguistic, academic, and social outcomes (Baker, 2011).

The authenticity of the content that drives the CLIL learning experience has been shown to increase levels of student engagement (Coyle et al., 2010; Mehisto et at, 2008). Moreover, and consistent with studies on the interrelationship between first and second language development (Cummins, 1979), students learning languages through additive bilingual programs also often do as well, or better, in assessment of their first language skills than those learning their first language through monolingual (first language only) programs (Alberta Ministry of Education, 2010; Baker, 2011). With respect to academic outcomes, CLIL students focus on age-correspondent/Year level-equivalent content in the same way as those in a parallel monolingual curriculum, with a focus on the same knowledge, skills, and concepts rather than 'dumbed-down' units of work (Coyle et at, 2010). Despite studying curriculum content through a second language, CLIL students still typically do at least as well on tests of that content as those learning the same material in their first language (Dalton-Puffer, 2008). Finally, CLIL also promotes higher levels of intercultural sensitivity and competence, including a more positive attitude towards the cultures of others (Lasagabaster & Sierra, 2009; Rodriguez & Puyal, 2012; Sudhoff, 2010).

Although it seems counter-intuitive that learning through a language other than one's first language could have such positive outcomes, Munoz (2002, p.36) offers the following explanation:

* Learners benefit from higher quality teaching and from input that is meaningful and understandable.

* CLIL may strengthen learners' ability to process input, which prepares them for higher-level thinking skills, and enhances cognitive development.

* In CLIL, literacy development takes place In the first language, which is cognitively beneficial for the child. Later, literacy skills will transfer to the additional languages.

* In CLIL the learners' affective filter may be lower than in other situations, for learning takes place in a relatively anxiety-free environment.

* Learners' motivation to learn content through the CLIL language may foster and sustain motivation towards learning the language itself.

ISSUES AND CHALLENGES IN ADOPTING A CLIL APPROACH

CLIL can have the exact opposite effect of the recognised benefits discussed earlier, including disengaging learners due to the heavy focus on curriculum content, the lack of oral interaction due to the difficulty in understanding and using the target language, and a negative impact on learners' self-concept/esteem (SelkkulaLeino, 2007; Bruton, 2011). Moreover, despite the large body of research that supports the outcomes of CLIL in terms of Its positive linguistic, cognitive, and social/cultural benefits, there are concerns that most of this evidence has been based on student cohorts that have opted into CLIL programs, which already show a positive predisposition towards this way of learning languages (Dalton-Puffer & Smit, 2013, p. 549). Bruton's (2011, p.524) critique of the approach Is that 'the truth Is many of the potential pitfalls which CLIL might encounter are actually avoided by selecting for these programs students who will be academically motivated to succeed in the [foreign language], as In other subjects'.

What this suggests, however, is not that CLIL Is necessarily problematic In itself-there is a great deal of solid evidence that the conditions promoted by content and language integration are highly conducive to learning both successfully--but that the stakes are very high in ensuring teachers properly understand and can effectively use the pedagogy, and In ways that engage with each student cohort's (and indeed each student's) specific needs.

More important, then, are Issues related to Implementing CLIL. Cross (2013) documents a number of challenges within local Australian settings as they relate to the Victorian context, but given commonalities across the profession in other Australian states they carry caveats that are worth considering across other jurisdictions. One critical point included the need for languages teachers to become CLIL advocates within the school community through an educative role working with colleagues, parents, and school leadership to an extent that might have been much broader than their traditional role as 'language teacher'. This also included collaborating with other schools and networks to promote CLIL programs to feeder primary schools, or to establish new CLIL pathways as options within their feeder secondary schools. Further issues significant to teachers more widely included the emotional demands of teaching through CLIL given It can be overwhelming for both teachers and students; school-based decisions about whether CLIL should be offered as an elective stream or simply adopted as the standard approach for all students in a particular cohort; and ensuring the focus was not only on having students understand the content being taught, but were actively engaging in target language production activities throughout the unit of work (Cross, 2013).

Many of these challenges are in some ways similar to wider issues documented In the CLIL literature elsewhere (e.g. Georgiou, 2012). However, In most cases, each problem is also very specific to the context and demands of each particular setting. For Implementation to be successful, it Is less a matter of the CLIL framework Itself not being suitable than Identifying where specific problems lie, and developing strategies to then address how they might be best managed given that context.

To date, the majority of commercial resources for CLIL have been published in Europe, primarily for English language instruction, where English is the additional language (see www.onestopclil.com, for example). While this is not ideal for Australian teachers of other languages, the materials are often of high quality and well designed (see, for example www.onestopenglish.com/clil/secondary/science). As such, commercially available materials provide useful templates and guidelines for teachers to develop other language adaptations to suit local needs and contexts. Likewise, although curricular frameworks also differ, many core Ideas, topic areas, and learning outcomes intersect at various points allowing for Internationally-produced materials to be re-purposed to fit local curriculum demands.

As Interest in CLIL grows In Australia, repositories for storing and sharing material have become the focus of several recent projects, including the Modern Language Teachers Association of Victoria's (MLTAV) cllllanguageteachers.weebly.com, a Victorian DEECD portal for teacher-produced CLIL material (fuse.education.vic.gov.au/pages/Results.aspx?s=CLIL); and a national CLIL Languages Learning space in development between Education Services Australia and the Melbourne Graduate School of Education (see lls.edu.au).

HOW CAN EFFECTIVENESS BE DETERMINED?

Finally, an Important consideration is how CLIL outcomes can be assessed and evidenced if it is adopted. CLIL has many parallels with other language learning approaches and orientations, but with further explicit attention on the development of content knowledge and skills, as well as the cognitive processes and cultural competence that relate to these (Coyle et al., 2010). Since content has as much significance as language, the question is not whether to focus on content or language in relation to assessment, but whether and how they should be considered simultaneously.

The decision should depend on the needs of the context and targeted goals at that point in the students' learning. There may be times when it is more appropriate to assess students' content knowledge In their first language to enable them to demonstrate their full level of understanding, which may precede their level of additional language production/expression. On other occasions, the focus might be on the language itself, and students' competence in particular situations, rather than within the curriculum domain. Ideally, however, the majority of assessment will consider both language and content together, reflecting a consistent integrated approach throughout the full teaching, learning, and assessment cycle (Llinares, Morton, & Whittaker, 2012).

CLIL, like other contemporary pedagogies, also has a strong focus on formative assessment to ensure ongoing opportunities to check students' understanding of both language and content as they move from not only one lesson to the next, but also within each stage of the lesson. One especially useful formative assessment strategy is 'performance assessment' (Cambridge English, 2010), in which students demonstrate their understanding of the language and content (e.g. explaining the different types of sources from which they collected the Information; drawing a flow chart of the process involved in solving a problem):

Teachers observe and assess learners' performance using specific criteria. Performance assessment can involve individuals, pairs or groups of learners. As CLIL promotes task-based learning, it is appropriate that learners have opportunities to be assessed by showing what they know and what they can do. Performance assessment can also be used to evaluate development of communicative and cognitive skills as well as attitude towards learning. For example, teachers can look for evidence of justifying opinions (communication), reasoning (cognitive skills) and co-operative turn-taking (attitude). (Cambridge English, 2010, p. 7)

Another commonly used strategy within CLIL is portfolio-based assessment (Mehisto et al., 2008). Portfolios are collections of students' work that provide evidence of their developing understanding and competence over a period of time (e.g. a term or annual portfolio). Mehisto et al. (2008) advocate for the use of portfolios not only because they provide a summative collection of evidence at the end of a medium to long-term learning period, but that they also support ongoing learning over the course of the term/year by building students' awareness of their own strengths and weaknesses, facilitating conversations with other peers and their teacher about the quality their outcomes and work that is being produced, and by assisting to establish future learning targets as students progress towards the end of the unit.

CONCLUSION

For more than 50 years, the Canadian immersion experience has demonstrated that when students are provided with genuine opportunities for meaningful engagement with language In, through, and across the curriculum, it leads to worthwhile outcomes in both first and second language development, increased levels of interpersonal and intercultural understanding, and students' overall sense of achievement and engagement in learning. These are the contributions we would hope any quality language education program might be making towards our students' total educational experience throughout school.

Yet challenges replicating the conditions necessary to expand the immersion model within local Australian school systems have meant that its mainstream viability has always remained elusive. While there are some very high quality programs and small-scale Initiatives, for the majority of students this will never be an opportunity that they can access for learning a new language at school.

CLIL offers the potential for change, and new tools to approach old challenges differently. As a pedagogic innovation that builds on the immersion model but with a new level of contextual responsiveness and flexibility, the building blocks that underpin CLIL have allowed teachers across Europe to approach language/content integration in ways that have suited a broad and very diverse range of education systems and settings.

The evidence from Europe suggests the same possibilities might also be true for the expansion of CLIL in the Australian context. Such potential, however, depends on proceeding with an informed, shared, and collective professional understanding of the approach to consider how CLIL might be applied most effectively in local classroom settings. Similarly, and no less importantly, is the willingness to also consider how CLIL Itself might further continue to evolve to meet new demands and challenges that comes with this global expansion and up-take.

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Caption: Figure 1. Coyle's (2006b, p. 14) 4Cs CLIL Framework.

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Russell Cross is senior lecturer in language and literacy education at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education of The University of Melbourne. His research focuses on the social, cultural, and political knowledge base of teachers' work, and he currently leads Melbourne Graduate School of Education's research/teaching programs in Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL).