Introduction

Welcome to the Engaging with CLIL – curriculum, unit and lesson planning module.

In this unit you'll look at the relationship between CLIL and the curriculum. You'll explore the different
dimensions of content in the syllabus and some of the methods which can be used for organising
such content.
By the end of the unit, you'll be able to:

 give definitions of curriculum

 order the stages of curriculum organisation
 identify three dimensions in CLIL objectives.

This unit takes about one hour.

Defining curriculum 1
In CLIL, the curriculum is important because the bilingual experience should be an enriching,
challenging and effective way to learn. You don't want learners to miss out because the use of
another language inhibits their ability or confidence.
There are many variations of the definition of curriculum. The basic key messages are that a
curriculum should be:

 focused on the learners

 focused on the school or wider state objectives
 focused on values
 structured to support learning (the level of the learners).

How do you define the concept of a curriculum? Make some notes of your definition to compare to
other teachers' definitions in the next slide.
Defining curriculum 2
Complete the six different definitions of 'curriculum' by choosing the best word for each gap.

The curriculum is the entire 

 Correctprogramme

 provided by a classroom, school, district, state or country. A classroom is assigned sections of

the curriculum as defined by the school.

Defining curriculum 3
Now match some of those definitions of curriculum to the key themes they represent.
The curriculum is the aggregate of courses of study given in a learning environment. The

courses are arranged in a sequence to make learning a subject easier.

Defining curriculum 4
Curriculum, then, can mean several different things. It might refer to learning strategies at state level,
the programme of study across subjects or your stage of work in the classroom.
As teachers, with some power to manage the content and strategies you use with your learners,
perhaps the most relevant definition to you is:
The curriculum is the total learning experience provided by a school. It includes the content of
courses (i.e. the syllabus), the methods employed (i.e. strategies) and other aspects, like norms and
values, which relate to the way the school is organised.
Conceptual and procedural curriculum content
The subject content, or syllabus, can be referred to as the conceptual content, while the methods
and strategies you use can be referred to as the procedural content. The procedural content refers
to how you deliver the conceptual content as well as how you manage your learners to interact with
the content.

Defining curriculum 5
Are these examples of conceptual or procedural content?

Learners will be able to record their observations in sketchbooks, journals and other media as a

basis for exploring their ideas.

Conceptual

CorrectProcedural

Learners will be able to analyse and evaluate styles of art from the 19th century.

Conceptual

CorrectProcedural

Learners will be able to explain the correlation between population and economic growth.
CorrectConceptual

Procedural

Learners will understand what algorithms are and how they are implemented as programs on

digital devices.

CorrectConceptual

Procedural

Organising steps in a curriculum 1

So, what do you need to do before you can write a curriculum? Writing a curriculum should start with
a needs analysis – this will primarily focus on the needs of your learners but will also include state
and school objectives, values, etc. Start with what your learners need to learn, then focus
on how they will learn them. You'll also need to consider how learning will be measured or assessed.

What other elements do you need? What steps should you take and in what order? Think about this
for a moment before moving on to the next slide.

Content and learning outcomes 1

The previous section shows that it's important to formulate a clear idea of what content you want to
include, and how you organise, teach and evaluate it.
But what exactly is 'content'? Is content only the 'what', or does it also include the 'how' in some
way? Is language also content?

Content and learning outcomes 2

Content always involves language, and language always involves content. So perhaps there
shouldn't be a lot of fuss about CLIL! Content and language have always worked side by side, and in
CLIL it's the job of the teacher to make this relationship more significant.
One problem, however, is that the acronym CLIL separates the word content from language, as if
language was something other than content. Furthermore, if you think about language skills, then it's
still content – it's just content of a different kind. In short, it's impossible to understand CLIL and its
potential to change your practice unless you're prepared to change your ideas about the
word content.
What do you understand by content? How can you set learning objectives that tell learners what
content they will be focusing on in the lesson?