CLIL and different types of questions

These in days in class we have been learning CLIL methodology and some of you may be wondering: what does CLIL mean? Well, do not worry about that because in this post you are going to know a lot of notions concerning this topic. First, I would like to talk about the meaning of this concept and then, I will explain how we can put into practice this methodology through a story, depending on the reading comprehension questions we decide to ask to children.

To begin with, CLIL stands for Content and Language Integrated Learning and refers to teaching content of different subjects to students through a foreign language. But, how does it work? The basis of CLIL is that topics are taught and learnt in a language which is not the mother tongue of the learners.Therefore, learning is improved through increased motivation and the study of natural language seen in context. As everybody know, when learners are interested in a topic they are motivated to acquire language to communicate. Speaking for myself, I reckon working from this methodology can be very enriching for children because they will learn a lot of new vocabulary but without being forced to learn meaningless. The main reason it is because it is easier to learn lexis in a context, as one can relate ideas and knowledge became meaningful.

Then, I would like to explain how we can use CLIL to work on a story with our pupils. First of all, teachers have to choose the tale depending on the age of the students and the number of them they have in class. For instance, if they have small groups it is better if they sit with them at the same level to read the story due to the fact that all kids will be able to see all the images. Personally speaking, I believe it is important to teach them to be respectful and to raise their hand every time they want to participate because if not there will be kids who will not pay attention to the activity. In addition, my advice is that teachers can help students with miming in order to students can understand the new vocabulary. In the same way, it is also important that we use our voice to grab children’s attention.

Finally, one of the useful strategies we can follow is to show them the cover of the story and ask what they think is going to happen or bring into the class some objects related tot he topic of the story. I am pretty sure that doing this our pupils will be motivated and interested in the task!! Perhaps some of you, at that point, are wondering if any book is effective to teach through CLIL or we need specific materials. In my own conceit, teachers can choose any narrative text they believe children may like it and which they can learn. However, we saw in a video, a book from the Oxford Reading Tree collection, titled: “The treasure chest” and we enjoyed it a lot. For this reason, I decided to investigate about this assortment and I discovered that Oxford editorial has a variety of books for all ages. Each novel has a color that indicates the level of difficulty and the size of the letter also changes, depending on the age of children. I attach some pictures, so you can see what I am talking about.

But what happens when both, teacher and  children, have finished reading the book? Well, now comes one of the most important parts we need to take into account and why I think it is so important? Well, after giving this matter some serious thought, I believe that through questions we can ensure student’s comprehension. Kids can associate the words they listen or say with the correct pronunciation, and also we can encourage them to feel comfortable when they speak English. At that point, we as a teachers or future educators need to differentiate 4 types of questions depending on our purpose of teaching and learning. You can see them below.

1- Questions based on the plot of the story: our objective is to make children repeat sentences or be able to retell some parts of the story.

2-  Questions related to children personal experiences: we want to go further. How would you feel if … or have you ever …?
3- Questions beyond the story to develop cognitive skills children: we can get this asking why, so Pupils can predict, imagine and reasoning.

4- CLIL: Questions to link the story with content of different subjects.

To practice this in class, my group and I tried to formulate a question of each type from an adaptation of the Tale of Peter Rabbit, a book from Beatrix Potter. From my point of view, I have been really interested in this activity because I love reading and I believe when we do this activity with kids and we ask them questions it is essential these have sense, so comprehension of the text can be meaningful. Before I finish this post, I would like to share with you the questions we thought related with “Peter Rabbit” so they can serve as an example.

1- Questions based on the plot of the story: Which vegetables and fruits did Cotton-tail eat?

2-  Questions related to children personal experiences: Do you eat vegetables at home? Which is your favourite?
3- Questions beyond the story to develop cognitive skills children: How do you imagine Mr. Green(a character from the story)? Is he tall? How old is he? What is his job?

4- CLIL: What part of carrots,potatoes and tomatoes do we eat? (Science).

I hope this post has been helpful! See you next time!!