Making the match between content and foreign language: A case study on university students’ opinions towards CLIL

Abstract

CLIL methodology is gaining path in Spanish universities as a promising means to train students to manage in a globalized world by increasing their competence in foreign languages, particularly English. The advent of CLIL in tertiary settings raises a variety of questions related to the possibility and the manner of applying this approach to English-Mediated learning contexts, especially regarding the syllabi planning and methodological development to scaffold the learning of the target language and the subject content. Although a number of experiences are currently starting to be reported in Spanish university settings, this phenomenon is still recent and needs to be extensively investigated. Thus, on the one hand, the present article intends to show the positive opinion of post-graduate university students after the curricular integration experience and the application of CLIL scaffolding techniques. On the other, it proposes to identify areas of methodological improvements and recommendations in the application of CLIL in the referred programme, as well as in other higher education contexts.