N ENGLISH LANGUAGE (ELT) IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS CLIL BASED ...
Transcript of N ENGLISH LANGUAGE (ELT) IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS CLIL BASED ...
Astrid Ebenberger
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NEW TRACKS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE
TEACHING (ELT) IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS
IN AUSTRIA – CLIL BASED COMPETITIONS
AS A FORM OF ENRICHMENT PROGRAMME
ASTRID EBENBERGER
Abstract. English language teaching (ELT) in Austrian secondary
schools has well developed within the last two decades whereas
English teaching in primary schools has been suffering from a lack
of time reserved for ELT in the national core curriculum as well as
in the individual timetables of the schools and from a lack of well
trained teachers. A qualitative research at the University College of
Teacher Education in Krems (KPH Wien/Krems) has pointed out
the educators’ needs and wishes concerning teaching English as a
first foreign language. To support these ideas and to underline the
value of foreign language learning and teaching, the model of
supra-regional CLIL (content and language integrated learning)-
based competitions at New Secondary School – “English
Olympics” – was transformed into primary school competitions.
This pilot project took place in June 2015. It was a great success.
There is a plan to implement these competitions in the schedule of
primary schools. With measures like a new curriculum in teacher
education, system support concerning different school initiatives in
ELT and implementing of CLIL as an important methodological
approach a new quality in English language teaching (ELT) in
primary schools will be provided.
1. Introduction
In most European countries obligatory language learning in primary
schools started in the second half of the 20th
century. After some years of
experiments Austria started in 1983 (Römer 2014: 860). Today in New
Secondary Schools (NMS, 10-14ys) and primary schools (VS, 6-10ys)
New Tracks in ELT in Austria 2
English is the most frequently taught first foreign language. Pupils attend
around three to four lessons every week during their four years at lower
secondary schools (BGBl. 2012). In primary schools English is a
mandatory subject from the very beginning. During the compulsory school
time there are around 660 hours of teaching in the first foreign language.
That means that compared with 25 European countries Austria ranges in
the middle and reaches an A2 standard, whereas the maximum of hours is
taught in Luxemburg (1178 hours) with the minimum attainment of B2
(European Commission/EC 2014: 30). Language competences are crucial
in our modern, global world. Languages build bridges and provide
communication. They create tolerance and understanding. The European
Commission (EC) declared the knowledge of two foreign languages as a
goal for each European citizen (European Commission 1995: 19). The first
landmark to achieve this will be a school system that ensures appropriate
competences in the first foreign language.
2. English in primary schools – current situation
For primary schools the national core curriculum defines integrated ELT –
according to the children´s capacity and receptivity – in years one and two
and ELT as one single lesson per week in years three and four (BGBl.
303/2012: 246). It depends on the autonomous decision of schools whether
it is only taught in a separate lesson as a separate subject, or if there is also
bilingual teaching by integrating the use of English in other subjects, like
sports or science or music or arts. Schools also have the opportunity to
arrange optional language courses with either English native speakers or
motivated language teachers. These offers depend on the access to human
and financial resources as well as on the interests of the school
community. As a result the EC report points out that Austria has the
lowest level (2%) of language lessons in primary education compared to
other European countries (European Commission/EC 2014: 22).
Teaching English starts in nursery school and continues throughout
primary school, with a very strong focus on a child-appropriate playful
approach, the aim being to provide a good basis and firm competences by
the beginning of secondary school. However, experience has shown that
language skills differ so strongly that secondary English starts at a very
low level in order to reach all pupils. As a current development a set of
competences has been designed for primary schools, but the use is optional
(ÖZE 2013). In fact it depends on the teachers´ language competences
how they work in the language classes. These circumstances increase the
problem of transition between primary and secondary education. The
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secondary school teachers have their expectations on the English
competences of their new pupils, whereas the primary school teachers
complain about the lack of time reserved for ELT and consequently feel
stressed by the pressure to reach the goals of the curriculum.
2.1. Evidence
The outcomes of a qualitative empirical research of students at the
University College of Teacher Education in Krems (KPH Wien/Krems)
which was conducted between January and June 2015 in fifteen of their
primary schools for professional training, underline the current situation of
ELT. The interviews with primary school teachers focused on three main
questions:
1) Which experience do teachers at primary schools have in
early language teaching (ELT)?
2) How is English promoted at primary schools?
3) Are language competitions suitable to promote ELT?
Results:
1) Experience
All teachers underlined their motivation in ELT. They pointed out that
next to methodological competence the personal language competence is
crucial. That means that teacher training colleges and in-service training
have to offer not only a fundamental but an extensive programme to
improve language competence. The teachers complain about the low
number of lessons at primary schools. Many of them would prefer a
curriculum that provides more ELT lessons. They are satisfied with the
non-assessing practice in ELT although some of them suggest grading in
the last year of primary school. They point out that it makes transition to
secondary school easier if the children are adjusted to marks. Non-
assessing in years one-three goes better with the playful way of ELT.
The core aspects are listening and oral communication. Teachers use
different methods and different materials to introduce new words and
stories with word- and picture-cards. Most of them work with songs,
chants and rhymes and clarify the meaning with gestures and miming.
They prefer building smaller groups to make children talk.
Only some teachers are familiar with the term CLIL (content and
language integrated learning) whereas more of them use this
methodological approach when they combine other subjects like physical
education or music or biological (animals, plants …) and science topics
(weather, seasons…) with English.
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Children also start reading to get adjusted to the differences in spelling
and pronunciation, which constitutes a major difficulty as the German
language does not have this feature.
That is the base for writing. Although this skill is not part of the
curriculum of primary schools most teachers let the children write words
and sometimes short texts. Reasons are the curiosity of the children – they
like to try out writing – and transition to secondary schools, where
children start writing from the very first day. So the teachers feel that the
pupils will be better prepared for the next school.
2) Promoting English at school
All teachers emphasize the necessity of early language learning. Their
schools run different programmes to promote English. Some of them offer
optional ELT-courses, which are very often taught by English native
speakers. For these courses some schools also cooperate with language
institutes. It was also mentioned that there are language programmes
during the school year not only in English but also in Turkish and German,
because there are many migrants in some schools. Other schools arrange
project weeks which emphasise foreign language speaking and
intercultural learning. All teachers wish to have more resources and
opportunities to put more weight on ELT.
3) The value of language competitions
The teachers recognize language competitions as an appropriate means
to stress and to value ELT at primary schools. To answer this question
another questionnaire was filled in by the teachers who accompanied the
pilot project of “Mini-Olympics” which will be described further on. They
all mentioned that the children that were chosen to take part were very
proud of it. Their parents were proud, too. They all agreed that
competitions are motivating and the participation underlines the focus that
a school puts on ELT.
2.2. Educational attempts
As ELT is considered crucial to deal with a global world, current school
development faces four tracks to brush up ELT (see figure 1):
1) Teacher education
2) National curriculum
3) New methodological approach for ELT in schools
4) System support, initiatives
Astrid Ebenberger
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Figure 1: Educational attempts towards more quality in ELT.
Teacher education
In 2013 the Austrian parliament decided to implement a new teacher
education (BMBF 2015). According to the Bologna Process of 1999
(European Higher Education Area 2014) it has been divided into two
parts:
Teacher education for primary schools, conducted by University
Colleges of Teacher Education, duration: eight semesters, 240 EC,
graduation as “Bachelor of Education” (BGBl 2013: 3). The curricula have
already been designed. The first courses are going to start in October 2015.
Teacher education for secondary schools, in cooperation between
University Colleges and Universities, duration: eight semesters, 240 EC,
graduation as “Bachelor of Education”. The designing of the curricula will
start after successful negotiations concerning the cooperation between the
University Colleges and the Universities. The first courses will start in
October 2016.
Master-programmes are created as in-service studies. There are at least
60 credits (depending on the different programmes of the different
universities) to be reached.
The studies for primary schools teachers cover basic competences as
well as specializing in subjects (like ELT, German, Mathematics etc.) or
educational paradigms (like inclusion, school development etc). That
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means that a specialised English teacher for primary schools has to reach
an additional 30 EC in ELT.
National curriculum
The current national curriculum for primary schools (BGBl. 303/2012:
243) has focused on the development of listening and speaking skills. A
group of experts created a book of competences for the four years of
primary school (ÖSZ 2013) and added competences in reading and writing
which should lead to an A1 language competence after primary school. As
a consequence they have to be implemented in a new curriculum within
the next years. Standard testings were already carried out in German and
Mathematics in the last year (year four) in primary schools, therefore
standard testing for English has also been discussed.
Methodological approach:
Next to the emphasising of reading and writing the experts suggest cross-
curricular teaching. Legutke et.al. (2015: 106) pointed out the two
different approaches of cross-curricular teaching which are associated with
the term CLIL (content and language integrated learning):
A subject-based approach: The foreign language is exported into
another subject (e.g. in sports)
A theme-topic-based approach: The subject (e.g. Biology) is
imported into English.
There is a lot of supporting material available to teach CLIL. It covers:
Biological topics: my body, skeleton, my senses, health, nutrition,
animals, life cycles, habitats, plants and fruits, etc. (Fuchs, Grabner 2012).
Orientation and science: Reading a map, vehicles, weather, electricity,
the solar system, water cycle, etc.
Issues to enhance global and environmental awareness: How does
weather affect us? (Grieveson, Superfine 2012). The global footprint,
natural or non-natural materials, recycling, separating waste, etc.
Games like domino (see e.g. figure 2), memory, bingo etc. as well the
provision of a rich learning environment motivate the children. Cross-
curricular-teaching or content and language integrated learning (CLIL)
should lead to general competences like:
cognitive strategies by comparing, counting, classifying, ranking,
predicting, problem-solving, measuring, hypothesizing,
meta-cognitive strategies by reflecting on the learning process
social strategies by helping each other with language or content
problems, being patient and tolerant, giving feedback, offering
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advice (Legutke, Müller-Hartmann, Schocker v. Ditfurth 2015:
108).
Figure 2: Domino – animals in the woods (ÖSZ 2013: 71).
System support, initiatives
The federal republic of Austria consists of nine states, which have to serve
the same laws but may vary in their execution. So the system support
concerning school development and quality is different in the nine states.
They mostly focus on the same key aspects but the expenses for the
resources can be different. There are different school- based experiments
in ELT. The following lines mention projects in the biggest Austrian
states, Vienna and Lower Austria.
In Vienna schools can work with the European Language Portfolio. It
focuses on the learning of a first and second foreign language as well as on
the mother tongues of the many immigrants. It supports intercultural
learning and understanding (Felberbauer et al. 2010). The „LOLLIPOP“-
project teaches ELT from the very beginning in an enjoyable way, like
consuming a lollipop. There are also many Vienna Bilingual Schools
starting with primary classes. The project NESSIE (Native English
Speaker Support in Education) offers each child in the fourth year of
primary school a one-week intensive course with an English native
speaker (Höltzer 2014: 796). The project GEPS (Global Education
Primary Schools) emphasises English as a working language in other
subjects (Stadtschulrat für Wien 2015).
In the state school inspectorate of Lower Austria a special department
for school development has to approve, to monitor and to supervise school
development experiments. Schools can offer one to three hours of
additional intensive English courses starting in the first year. Courses are
run by English native speakers or primary school teachers who are
qualified in English. The programme was first evaluated in 2007. The
results showed the high potentials of children that can be supported by
offering intensive courses with highly trained teachers. Children were very
much motivated, they only used English in communication with the
English native teacher (Buchholz, Mewald, Schneidhofer 2007: 85).
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3. CLIL-based competitions as a kind of enrichment
programme
School has to promote and encourage each individual child in its learning
and development of competences. There have been different concepts how
to treat children individually. The progressive education at the beginning
of the 20th
century focused on cooperative learning, on a well prepared and
motivating learning environment, on self-conducted work and a teacher in
the role of an organizer, a supporter and coach (Ebenberger 2015a: 19). In
heterogeneous classes differentiation is crucial. There are many forms in
use: organisational differentiation groups pupils with similar interests and
similar levels of giftedness in special courses. Differentiation within
classes provides appropriate material, open, self-conducted work
according to individual interests and speed. Competitions are
acknowledged as one form of supporting and enriching pupils in their
individual development (Schmid 2014: 167). Competitions that are based
on cooperative work, with a CLIL-approach, for pupils with special
English speaking competences and a wide range of different interests
correspond perfectly with enrichment programmes of schools. They are
based on enjoyment, engagement and enthusiasm (Ebenberger 2015b:
149).
3.1 English Olympics in secondary schools
“English Olympics” were established as such a kind of enrichment
programme for English language teaching in secondary schools of Lower
Austria. Today there are about 200 schools participating in about 20
districts of Lower Austria. They are fighting for the state championship in
one final competition (Matzka, Ebenberger 2013: 22). The CLIL-based
competitions develop different competences: cross curricular thinking,
cognitive skills, creativity, general knowledge, teamwork and language
skills. The very successful programme is based on the cooperation
between the two University Colleges of Teacher Education (KPH
Wien/Krems and PH NÖ, Baden) – students create the tasks for the
various “stations” and supervise them – the department of education in the
federal state of Lower Austria (Landesschulrat für Niederösterreich,
LSRfNÖ) and the specific organisations via different hosting schools (see
figure 3). Indicators for the success are the increasing number of
participating schools and the increasing interest of sponsors supporting the
competitions.
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Figure 3: Organisation/Station plan of English Olympics.
3.2. Mini-Olympics in primary schools – a pilot project
After the great success of “English Olympics” at secondary schools and
the wish of the school inspectorate of Lower Austria to value the efforts of
ELT in primary schools the idea to design a similar pilot project for
primary schools arose. The goal was to give primary schools – which have
a focus on ELT or emphasize ELT and teaching CLIL – the chance to
present their outcomes. So the notion of increasing quality in ELT will be
spread all over the country. The first events took place in June 2015 in the
districts of Krems and Baden in Lower Austria. In both districts a primary
school specialised in English teaching had to organize the morning for the
participating six or seven different school-teams. The team-members were
chosen on the basis of their language competence, their motivation to work
in groups and their giftedness. They attended the last (fourth) year at their
schools.
Students for primary school education created the tasks (see e.g. figure
4). The CLIL-based topics covered music, science, mathematics, logics,
orientation, biology and knowledge about daily routine, like shopping. The
tasks were organised in a station plan and conducted, supervised and
graded by the students. Each task had to be solved in the team, it lasted
fifteen minutes and pupils could achieve a maximum of 20 points. The
materials addressed different frames of mind according to the theory of
Howard Gardner (Oswald 2012: 220).
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Figure 4: “Station” (task) at Mini-Olympics: logical.
The station plan was implemented in a morning full of English. It
started with an introduction to the process. It was interrupted by a break,
which was organised by the primary school. It finished with group songs
and games which were taught by the students before the award ceremony
took place (see figure 5).
Shortly afterwards the pilot-project was evaluated by a questionnaire
which was addressed to the teachers that accompanied the groups. The
results underlined the success of this pilot project. The teachers
appreciated the organisation, the structure of a station plan, the cooperative
work and especially the CLIL-approach. Most of them added that they
were also working in their classes following this method. Only one
complained about a lack of communicative appeals. For the teachers it was
appropriate to invite children of the fourth year of primary schools to the
competitions. And although there had been doubts how schools could
organize the participation, teachers did not point out any problem.
For a follow-up the project has to be developed. It has to be considered
which schools will be addressed. It will not be possible to invite all 660
primary schools in Lower Austria as the competition is carried out at the
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same time as the English Olympics at secondary schools. The project
could be expanded for all the schools which are running school
experiments in ELT. To follow the idea of promoting English in all
primary schools there has to be a different approach. A group of experts
will have to consider and decide in the end.
Figure 5: Successful team of participants at Mini-Olympics.
4. Conclusion
In the current school system in Austria there are negotiations going on to
develop the system. Although ELT in primary schools does not seem to be
the main focus there are different tracks to follow which promote ELT.
They focus on teacher education as well as the national curriculum, the
support of ELT at single schools and new methodological approaches. One
of them is CLIL, which is also implemented in competitions that are run
successfully for secondary schools in Lower Austria. A similar project
transferred into primary schools was started. Its positive results can be
used as an incentive to brush up ELT. If it is possible to convince
responsible institutions to offer enough resources concerning students,
teachers, organisation, settings, etc. CLIL-based Mini-Olympics at
primary schools will play an important part in increasing the quality of
ELT in primary schools.
New Tracks in ELT in Austria 12
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Biographical note:
Astrid EBENBERGER, Dr., Med. – teacher at the University College of
Teacher Education Wien/Krems, at campus Krems since 2011. 25 years of
experience in teaching English in secondary schools, headteacher at a
secondary school until 2011. Teaching focus at the University College
upon English for students for primary schools, research, educational
studies.