Content Based Foreign Language Teaching - Book

CONTENT-BASED FOREIGN
LANGUAGE TEACHING
Pushing the field forward in critically important ways, this book offers clear cur-
ricular directions and pedagogical guidelines to transform foreign language class-
rooms into environments where stimulating intellectual curiosity and tapping
critical thinking abilities are as important as developing students’ linguistic rep-
ertoires. The case is made for content-based instruction—an approach to making
FL classrooms sites where intellectually stimulating explorations are the norm
rather than the exception. The book explicitly describes in detail how teach-
ers could and should use content-based instruction, explains how integration
of content and language aims can be accomplished within a program, identifies
essential strategies to support this curricular and pedagogical approach, discusses
issues of assessment within this context, and more.
Content-Based Foreign Language Teaching

• provides theoretical perspectives and empirical evidence for reforming
curricula and instruction;
• describes models and curriculum planning strategies that support implemen-
tation of well-balanced FL programs;
• explores the transformative potential of critical pedagogy in the FL class-
room; and
• offers illustrations of secondary and post-secondary language programs that
have experimented with alternative approaches.
Advancing alternatives to conventional curriculum design, this volume posits

meaning-oriented approaches as necessary to create language programs that
make a great difference in the overall educational lives of learners.
Laurent Cammarata is Associate Professor in Education at the Faculté Saint-

Jean, University of Alberta, Canada.
CONTENT-BASED
FOREIGN LANGUAGE
TEACHING
Curriculum and Pedagogy for
Developing Advanced Thinking
and Literacy Skills
Edited by Laurent Cammarata

First published 2016
by Routledge
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cammarata, Laurent, editor.
Title: Content-based foreign language teaching : curriculum and
pedagogy for developing advanced thinking and literacy skills /
edited by Laurent Cammarata.
Description: New York : Routledge, [2016] | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015038013 | ISBN 9780415880152 (hardback) |
ISBN 9780415880169 (pbk.) | ISBN 9780203850497 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Language and languages—Study and teaching—Foreign
speakers. | Language teachers—Training of. | Teacher participation in
curriculum planning. | Language arts—Correlation with content
subjects. | Critical thinking—Study and teaching. | Interdisciplinary
approach in education.
Classification: LCC P53.85 .C67 2016 | DDC 418.0071—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015038013
ISBN: 978-0-415-88015-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-415-88016-9 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-203-85049-7 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
I wish to extend my heartfelt thanks to my wife, Kazue, and my
children, Maël and Léa; to my parents, Marie and Paul; and to my
mentor and dear friend, Dee. This book would not have come to life
without their love and support.
CONTENTS
Preface xi
1 Content-Based Instruction and Curricular Reforms:

Issues and Goals 1
Laurent Cammarata, Diane J. Tedick, and Terry A. Osborn
PART 1
Theoretical Perspectives and Empirical Evidence 23
2 Sociocultural Theory and Content-Based Foreign

Language Instruction: Theoretical Insights on the
Challenge of Integration 25
Richard Donato
3 Scaffolding Advanced Literacy in the Foreign Language

Classroom: Implementing a Genre-Driven Content-Based
Approach 51
Marianna V. Ryshina-Pankova
4 Integrating CBI into High School Foreign Language

Classrooms 77
Joy Cumming and Roy Lyster
viii Contents
PART 2
Curriculum Development for the Thinking-Oriented
Foreign Language Classroom 99
5 Tapping the National Standards for Thought-Provoking

CBI in K–16 Foreign Language Programs 101
Jason Martel
6 Foreign Language Education and the Development of

Inquiry-Driven Language Programs: Key Challenges
and Curricular Planning Strategies 123
Laurent Cammarata
7 Assessing What Matters within Content-Based Foreign

Language Teaching through Integrated Performance
Assessment 147
Francis J. Troyan
PART 3
Critical Pedagogy and the Foreign Language
Classroom 171
8 Language Teachers in Foreign Territory: A Call for a Critical

Pedagogy-Infused Curriculum 173
Timothy Reagan
9 Critical Content-Based Instruction in the Foreign Language

Classroom: Critical Issues for Implementation 192
Ryuko Kubota
PART 4
Exemplars of Cognitively Engaging Curriculum
Planning for the Foreign Language Classroom 213
10 Le Maine Francophone : An Expeditionary Unit Targeting

the Development of Higher-Order Thinking Skills 215
Francis J. Troyan
11 Exploring Environmental and Sustainability Issues in the

Intermediate-Level Foreign Language Curriculum 234
Elizabeth A. Kautz
Contents ix
12 A Look at CBI in Action: An Exploratory Journey into

the Arts and History in the Foreign Language Classroom 250
Nancy Hagstrom
About the Contributors 265

Index 269
PREFACE
Laurent Cammarata
Today, the need for change in foreign language (FL)1 education is dire because
precious few language learners exit grade 12 or universities with a level of lan-
guage proficiency that appropriately reflects the time they’ve invested in attempt-
ing to learn the target language. While there are many reasons that contribute to
the lack of success of today’s conventional K–12 and post-secondary FL programs
(see, for example, Reagan & Osborn, 2002; Cammarata, Tedick, & Osborn, Chap-
ter 1, this volume; Martel, Chapter 5, this volume), this volume makes the case
that the nature of such programs is much the cause. By and large, their curricular
structures remain grammar driven, failing to (1) engage learners in cognitively
stimulating tasks and (2) connect with learners’ lived experiences and, thus, entice
them to learn languages or use them beyond the classroom walls.
In the past two decades, several renowned scholars in the field have challenged
the status quo, arguing that it is essential for us to find more effective ways to
engage learners in the pursuit of language learning. They have also argued that
FL education could play a more significant role in learners’ lives as issues of lan-
guage education are fundamental to any stated or implicit goals of a just society,
that is, a society oriented toward the defense of human, linguistic, and environ-
mental rights (e.g., Guilherme, 2002; Osborn, 2000, 2002, 2006, Reagan, 2007;
Reagan & Osborn, 2002; Shohamy, 2001; Skutnabb-Kangas, 2000; Tollefson,
2002). Charging language scholars and teachers with a responsibility to under-
stand the broader implications of their endeavors (e.g., Kubota, Austin, & Saito-
Abbott, 2003), this discussion has to date (1) helped identify and clarify the
field’s potential to support learners’ overall intellectual and academic develop-
ment beyond the expected acquisition of an additional language, and (2) clarified
the need to reconsider the content we utilize to teach languages.
xii Preface
Osborn (2006), for instance, made a convincing argument for the integra-
tion of social justice-related content into the FL curriculum and for the use of
such content as an overarching thematic focus to guide FL instruction. Kubota’s
(2012) illustration of the use of a critical content-based instruction approach
to planning instruction whose primary aim is to help learners reflect on “the
contested issues in history and the conflicts among public memories” (p. 54) is
another great example of the importance of reconsidering the strategic integra-
tion of meaningful content in the FL curriculum.
Kubota’s argument, which echoes Stoller’s (2002) previous call to think about
content as sources of positive tension—content that can stimulate “thoughtful
consideration of multiple perspectives, different but complementary views, and
opposing viewpoints” (n.p.)—as well as Kramsch’s (1993, 2003) call for approaches
that can help create positive cultural tensions (e.g., the kaleidoscope model) and build
on cognitive dissonance in the FL classroom, underscore the capacity of the field
to broaden language learners’ worldview when appropriate content is utilized to
contextualize language instruction.
Nevertheless, scholars’ arguments to reform the field have not, to date, led to
significant concrete proposals when it comes to long-term curricular change.
Although scholars’ discussions represent an implicit invitation to integrate var-
ied subject-matter–specific content into the FL classroom and develop curricu-
lar programs that could effectively balance content and language instructional
aims, no work has yet explicitly described in detail how teachers could and
should go about it, posited content-based instruction as the curricular approach
of choice when it comes to achieving this complex instructional goal, described
how the integration of content and language aims can be accomplished within
a program, identified essential strategies to support such a curricular and ped-
agogical move, discussed issues of assessment within this context, or related
issues. As a result, key stakeholders desiring to embark on the adventure of
transforming the FL classroom into sites capable of promoting the development
of the knowledge and intellectual skills necessary for individuals to become
capable autonomous thinkers and critically minded reflective citizens are left
without clear directions as to how to operationalize and promote these laudable
new instructional goals.
This book provides the beginning of a response to the lack of clear curricular
directions and pedagogical guidelines when it comes to transforming FL class-
rooms into cognitively stimulating environments where the practice of advanced
thinking and academic skills is considered as important as the development of
learners’ linguistic repertoire. It is aimed at a broad audience that includes teacher
educators, seasoned K–16 language teachers, and scholars in the field interested
in this line of work and will also be of interest to curriculum coordinators at the
school district, state, or province level, and post-secondary directors of language
instruction as these educators are also responsible for preparing future genera-
tions of language teachers.
Preface xiii
The book comprises twelve chapters organized within four distinct sections.
The overarching theme that serves as a thread connecting all chapters together is
the need for the field to revisit and broaden its primary goals so that the language
programs of tomorrow may be able to stimulate learners’ intellectual curiosity
and tap their critical thinking ability. The premises are that learners only need
appropriate triggers to engage in in-depth reflections about their surrounding
world and identity within the context of learning an additional language, and
that FL education is a perfectly adapted ground for the concurrent develop-
ment of language abilities, essential academic skills, and key intellectual traits if
(1) such goals are all considered primary and (2) appropriate curricular models
are utilized.
The volume begins with a discussion of the need to engage in important cur-
ricular reforms in the field so that programs can be re-envisioned and makes a
case for the adoption of content-based instruction, a curricular and instructional
approach well adapted to transform the FL classroom into sites where intellectu-
ally stimulating explorations can become the norm rather than the exception.
The following chapters and accompanying discussions (1) provide theoretical
and empirical evidence that such a reform movement is both desirable and sound
within the context of FL education, (2) describe models as well as curriculum
planning strategies that can support the implementation of well-balanced FL
programs—that consider content, language, and literacy as key instructional
components needed for the changes advocated in this volume to ever become
a reality, (3) explore the transformative potential of critical pedagogy in the FL
classroom, and (4) offer illustrations of secondary and post-secondary language
programs that have experimented with such alternative approaches.
Finally, this volume is simply an invitation to embark onto curricular and
instructional paths less traveled by within the field of FL education and to explore
and experiment with a different yet very compatible way to teach language. The
ideas proposed in the following chapters are meant to offer alternatives to con-
ventional curriculum design and formally posit meaning-oriented approaches as
an inevitable choice if we are to ever create language programs that can make a
great difference in the overall educational lives of learners. These ideas have been
fueled by past experiences and encounters with many talented FL teachers as well
as scholars in the field whose work continues to inspire all of us. They are not
written in stone; they evolve constantly and are yours to shape.
Note
1. The language education field has debated the use of the phrase “foreign language”
for many years now, with many arguing that the term “foreign,” among others, is
problematic on many levels. No term works perfectly—“foreign,” for example, may
invoke pejorative connotations; terms such as “world language” commonly used as
an alternative in North America are problematic as well (Larsen-Freeman & Free-
man, 2008) because “world” is not used regularly outside the U.S. context and often
xiv Preface
assumes broad use of language, which is not the case for some (e.g., Italian). In the
end, I sided with Reagan’s argument regarding the use of the “foreign language” label
(see Reagan, this volume) and asked all contributors to this volume to use the term for
consistency. I am, thus, the only one to blame for what might appear to some as an
academic momentary lapse of reason.
References
Guilherme, M. (2002). Critical citizens for an intercultural world: Foreign language education as
cultural politics. Tonawanda, NY: Multilingual Matters Ltd.
Kramsch, C. (1993). Context and culture in language teaching. Oxford, UK: Oxford Uni-
versity Press.
Kramsch, C. (2003). Teaching language along the cultural faultline. In D. Lange &
M. Paige (Eds.), Culture as the core: Perspectives on culture in second language learning
(pp. 19–35). Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.
Kubota, R. (2012). Memories of war: Exploring victim-victimizer perspectives in criti-
cal CBI in Japanese. L2 Journal, 4, 37–57. Retrieved from http://escholarship.org/uc/
item/2c88h039
Kubota, R., Austin, T., & Saito-Abbott, Y. (2003). Diversity and inclusion of sociopo-
litical issues in foreign language classrooms: An exploratory survey. Foreign Language
Annals, 36 (1), 12–24.
Larsen-Freeman, D., & Freeman, D. (2008). Language moves: The place of “foreign” lan-
guage in classroom teaching and learning. Review of Research in Education, 32, 147–186.
Osborn, T. A. (2000). Critical reflection and the foreign language classroom. Westport,
CT: Bergin & Garvey.
Osborn, T. A. (Ed.). (2002). The future of foreign language education in the United States.
Westport, CT: Bergin & Garvey.
Osborn, T. A. (2006). Teaching world languages for social justice: A sourcebook of principles and
practices. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.
Reagan, T. (2007). The future of foreign language educators: Are we on our way to
becoming dodos? Paper Presented at the Closing plenary at the Fifth International Confer-
ence on Language Teacher Education (ICLTE), Minneapolis, MN.
Reagan, T. G., & Osborn, T. A. (2002). The foreign language educator in society: Toward a
critical pedagogy. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Shohamy, E. (2001). The power of tests: A critical perspective on the uses of language tests.
Harlow, UK: Longman.
Skutnabb-Kangas, T. (2000). Linguistic genocide in education—or worldwide diversity and
human rights? Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Stoller, F. (2002). Content-based instruction: A shell for language teaching or a framework for
strategic language and content learning? Paper presented at the TESOL conference: Ple-
nary Address, Salt Lake City, UT.
Tollefson, J. W. (2002). Language policies in education: Critical issues. Mahwah, NJ: Law-
rence Erlbaum Associates.
1
CONTENT-BASED INSTRUCTION
AND CURRICULAR REFORMS
Issues and Goals
Laurent Cammarata, Diane J. Tedick,

and Terry A. Osborn
Introduction
For millennia human beings have been compelled to learn languages for politi-
cal, economic, social, and personal reasons (Genesee, 2008; Jackson & Malone,
2009). In the twenty-first century, however, the need has become critical. A few
reasons for the increase in demand for bi- and multilingualism include the rise in
globalization of business and commerce, health and security matters that require
international cooperation, the proliferation of international migration, and the
huge impact that scientific advances and telecommunications have had on mod-
ern societies (Genesee, 2008; Stewart, 2007; Tucker, 1998).
In the United States, the need for skilled speakers of languages other than English
has been articulated for well over 50 years in governmental reports and documents,
testimonies before Congress, published studies, and media reports at both national
and local levels (Jackson & Malone, 2009). Yet little change has occurred. Less than
half of all high school students in the United States study a foreign language (FL),
and few advance beyond the introductory level (Draper & Hicks, 2002; Reagan &
Osborn, 2002; Stewart, 2007). Why does this pattern persist when most other
countries around the world develop bilingual if not multilingual communities? In
this chapter we explore some of these issues in further depth and propose our ideas
and rationale for transforming FL education within and outside the United States.
We offer these ideas for transformation in hopes of (1) increasing the number of
students who study FLs, (2) ensuring that students acquire higher levels of profi-
ciency through persistence in FL study, and (3) reaching the potential of FL study
to contribute to students’ development as critical thinkers and responsible citizens.
In this chapter, we also make a case for the use of the content-based instruction
(CBI) approach to language teaching. We argue that reforms such as the ones we
propose in this volume are unlikely to materialize without the implementation of
2 Laurent Cammarata et al.
curricular and instructional frameworks like CBI, which is specifically designed to

concurrently integrate content and language instruction.
The Crisis of FL Education and the Need

for a Philosophical Reflection
This volume begins with the warning that a crisis is about to happen within the
field of FL education and that drastic measures will need to be taken to avoid it.
In truth, such apocalyptic warnings are common in the literature (for a descrip-
tion of the use of this rhetorical tool, see Gee, 1990). This can be easily explained
by the fact that, as Klein (2007) has so meticulously documented in her work,
there is no better recipe to promote new agendas—be they political, educational,
or other—and provoke rapid change than the use of the fear factor. But our
warning is not a scheme to convince readers to rally to our side, although, in all
fairness, we hope they will in the end. As the following sections will illustrate,
solid evidence demonstrates that most conventional, school-based FL programs
currently in place fail to deliver when it comes to achieving what we consider
their primary mission: to motivate students to persist in learning a language dur-
ing and after their formal schooling years.
Failure of a System
How many of us have heard people we encounter (close friends or family, com-
plete strangers) say something along these lines when describing their language
learning experience in school? “I took French, but I never really liked it, and I
was never good at it. I can say a few words like Bonjour, comment allez-vous? but
that’s about it.” When it comes to the U.S. K–12 FL educational context, for
instance, general apathy toward language learning and little success in second
language (L2) acquisition among the majority of Americans persist despite what
the field has learned about the benefits of L2 acquisition and despite the clear
need the United States has to develop a bi-, indeed multilingual, citizenry. This
situation is not unique to the United States, however, as skill-driven FL programs
are still the norm in many countries around the world.
Anyone involved in FL education should feel concerned by the fact that pre-
cious few language learners in the United States or other countries around the
world exit secondary school or universities with a level of language proficiency
that appropriately reflects the time they’ve invested in attempting to learn that
language. In the particular case of the United States, a recent, large-scale study
by Oregon’s Center for Applied Second Language Studies (CASLS), one of the
national Foreign Language Resource Centers in the United States,1 provides a
sobering account regarding the state of affairs in FL education:
The majority of students studying a foreign language in a traditional high

school program reach benchmark level 3 or 4 by the end of the fourth year
CBI and Curricular Reforms 3
of study, regardless of the language studied. These levels are similar to the
ACTFL [American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages] levels
Novice-High and Intermediate-Low.2
(CASLS, 2010, p. 1)
In other words, after four years of study, students can only communicate with
predictable, memorized phrases, and are just beginning to develop the ability
to use the language forms they know in a novel fashion (ACTFL Proficiency
Guidelines, 2012; Martel, 2013).
These appalling outcomes have little, if anything, to do with people’s capac-
ity to learn languages. Certainly there are individuals who have special aptitudes
when it comes to language learning (e.g., more efficient information processing
capabilities, keen ability to discriminate sounds). Nevertheless, we know that if
an individual has been able to acquire one language, he or she has the ability to
develop a sufficient level of control in at least one additional language. Why, then,
do apathy and lack of success with language learning persist in the United States?
While there are many reasons that contribute to these patterns (see, for example,
Reagan & Osborn, 2002), we believe that a major culprit resides in the nature
of today’s K–12 and post-secondary FL programs. By and large, their curricular
structures are grammar driven and skills based, and fail to connect with learn-
ers’ lived experiences. Such structures fail to entice students to learn languages or
use them beyond the classroom walls, and prevent the development of advanced
literacy skills that foster higher levels of thinking. Indeed, this curricular dilemma
is not unique to the United States; in other countries around the world grammar-
driven language teaching remains pervasive. It is important to point out, how-
ever, that contexts vary greatly, and in the case of Europe, the proximity of and
exposure to speakers of some of the most popular languages taught in school
(e.g., English, Spanish, French, German) may at times compensate for the lack of
effectiveness of conventional school-based foreign language programs. Regardless
of the geographical context and possibilities of exposure to the target language,
school-based FL programs around the world can play an important role in ensur-
ing that learners continue to pursue language learning beyond their formal school
years. Thus, it is essential for us to (re)examine our vision and figure out more
effective ways to engage learners in the pursuit of language learning.
Re-envisioning FL Education as a Discipline:

Where Should We Begin?
Motivation represents an engine crucial to the learning of second and foreign
languages (e.g., Crookes & Schmidt, 1991; Dörnyei, 2001; Gardner, 1985, 2001;
Masgoret & Gardner, 2003; Nakata, 2006; Spolsky, 2000; Tremblay & Gard-
ner, 1995), which means that the process of re-envisioning FL education as a
discipline should begin with figuring out better ways to entice language learn-
ers to participate fully and wholeheartedly in the language learning experience
within and beyond the classroom setting. Ideally, we would like to see students
who feel compelled to study the materials provided in class, participate in the
tasks, and use language for their personal pleasure outside of class (goals articu-
lated as important by both the ACTFL as well as the Council of Europe3). Such
goals imply, among other things, that we need to reconsider what it is we ulti-
mately want students to learn beyond the basic skills, that is, the ability to read,
write, speak, and understand. In other words, we must rethink our approaches
to instruction as well as the content we utilize to teach languages in order to
better connect with students’ lives and interests here and now. But prior to defin-
ing what it is we want to do—that is, what goals we should pursue beyond the
mastery of discrete language skills, what curricular approaches would be most
effective to implement such goals, and what content other than language would
be most appropriate to contextualize language instruction in this context—we
must first clarify what it is we believe the field can do best. In other words, we
must appraise its potential beyond the obvious communicative benefits we are
all aware of.
Appraising the “True” Potential of FL Education
Beyond Language as a Tool for Communication

No one can argue with the fact that a language is a tool for communication and
that its use involves the development of specific skills. Nevertheless, acquisi-
tion of an additional language affords many more benefits than the mere ability
to communicate with others. The implications of the impact of language on
thinking are too many to explore in such a short space, but the work of many
renown scholars throughout the twentieth century, such as Sapir (see Sapir &
Mandelbaum, 1985), Whorf (1956), Halliday (1993), and Vygotsky (1986), only
to name a few, has made clear the important relationships existing between and
among language, culture, and thinking processes. Today, language can no longer
be viewed simply as a means to an end, a tool with which to communicate, but
as an historically and socioculturally bound complex semiotic system that has
a tremendous impact in shaping one’s overall consciousness and social identity.
Furthermore, learning to master a language is a process that cannot be defined
by the simple acquisition of its form and structures, a minimalist view that fails
to reflect the complex nature of language. Rather, as Habermas (1992) explains,
“learning to master a language or learning how expressions in a language should
be understood requires socialization into a form of life” (p. 63). Habermas’s
thoughts regarding the nature of the language learning experience underscore
the fact that learning another language encompasses more than the simple mas-
tery of linguistic patterns. Rather, it implies the acquisition of sufficient knowl-
edge to become sensitive to the way reality is perceived through the particular
cultural lens associated with the language being studied. In the sections that
follow, we unpack this notion and briefly summarize some of the benefits rarely
taken into consideration when K–16 FL programs are designed. We argue that
these benefits should drive future reforms in the field.
The Potential of FL Education to Support Learners’

Intellectual Empowerment
No better field than FL education can provide the opportunity to empower learn-
ers, that is, help them become “active questioners of the social reality around them”
(Gee, 1990, p. 41), because the study of an additional language cannot be dissoci-
ated from the exploration of how identity is formed (Pennycook, 2004). The study
of additional languages also allows for immersion into alternative ways of perceiv-
ing and conceptualizing reality (Reagan & Osborn, 2002), a type of exploration
associated with a high degree of cognitive dissonance essential to increasing aware-
ness of the self and other members of the communities to which one belongs. It is
this intrinsic quality that pertains to the field of FL education that, when combined
with appropriate pedagogies, makes this discipline an essential component of any
educational program that is dedicated to ensuring the well-being of increasingly
more culturally and linguistically diverse democratic societies. Furthermore, FL
education has the potential to play a key role in stimulating interdisciplinary and
transdisciplinary explorations, which represent an important step toward helping
learners develop advanced cognitive academic thinking skills essential to autono-
mous thinking. Reagan and Osborn (2002) remind us that the FL field,
[u]nlike any other, is by its very nature concerned with bridging disci-
plines. [For instance the] category culture, in common use, has included
strong components of studies of history, political science, food science,
literature, economics, media studies, and so forth.
(p. 80)
The Potential of Foreign Language Learning for

the Development of Self-Consciousness
The field of FL education has, over the last three decades, focused most of its
instructional energy on developing learners’ communicative abilities. This trend,
we contend, is based on a minimalist and limited understanding of the nature of
language and the role it plays in the shaping of human consciousness.
The findings of Vygotsky’s research and theoretical perspectives focused on the
intricate relationship existing between and among language, culture, and thought
provide support to the argument that there is more to the study of an additional
language than the acquisition and mastery of linguistic knowledge and the devel-
opment of communicative skills. According to Vygotsky (1986), it is language,
and more particularly meaning, that is in fact at the center of the way human
consciousness is dynamically organized (Roebuck, 2000). Vygotsky’s legacy

underscores the central role language plays when it comes to thinking, creating,
solving problems, and moving beyond the ephemeral nature of our biological life
through the perpetuation of useful knowledge over time; it provides compelling
evidence that supports the claim positing language as a determinant factor in the
shaping of our conceptualization of the world and what we consider reality.
Thus, learning a new language means much more than acquiring the means
to communicate with others; as importantly, if not more, learning a new lan-
guage affords the ability to acquire new possibilities of perception. The careful
unwrapping and deciphering of the prejudices embedded in language and dis-
course makes possible the questioning of the taken-for-granted that is at the heart
of developing a deeper state of awareness. Focusing on language and unveiling
the worlds it contains is the first step toward developing an awareness of how real-
ity shapes and is shaped by the languages we speak. As Byram (1991) explains:
Language is not simply a reflector of an objective cultural reality. It is

an integral part of that reality through which other parts are shaped and
interpreted. It is both a symbol of the whole and a part of the whole which
shapes and is in turn shaped by sociocultural actions, beliefs and values. In
engaging in language, speakers are enacting sociocultural phenomena; in
acquiring language, children acquire culture.
(p. 18)
Over the last three decades, research and work in the field of sociolinguistics
and critical linguistics—such as Fairclough’s (1989) analysis of the relationship
between language and power, Van Lier’s (1996, 2004) and Gee’s (1990) scrutiny of
the historical and sociocultural nature of language, and Reagan’s (2004) discus-
sion of issues related to the objectification of language and the role of critical lan-
guage awareness as a means to individual empowerment—have provided vibrant
descriptions of how the exploration of one’s own language can help individuals
become more conscious of themselves and the world they live in. Additionally,
research investigating the intricate link existing between language and thought
underscores the consciousness-raising potential associated with FL learning and
clarifies its impact on cognitive development in general. For instance, according
to the Piagetian notion of decentering—that is, the ability to look at experiences
from different perspectives—learning a new language can free individuals from
the reality imposed by their own language, allowing them, as a consequence, to
acquire new perspectives and understandings about the world. Vygotsky (1986),
elaborating on the impact the learning of FLs can have on learners’ overall aware-
ness of their internal world, explains that
he who knows no foreign language does not truly know his own.
Experimental studies fully endorse this. It has been shown that a child’s
understanding of his native language is enhanced by learning a foreign

one. The child becomes more conscious and deliberate in using words as
tools of his thoughts and expressive means for his ideas. . . . As algebra
liberates the child from the domination of concrete figures and elevates
him to the level of generalization, the acquisition of foreign language—in
its own peculiar ways—liberates him from the dependence on concrete
linguistics forms and expressions.
(p. 160)
This notion that FL education can help individuals develop self-consciousness as

well as “provide varied and alternative conceptualizations which enable flexible
and critical thinking” (Baker, 2006, p. 163) is also well supported by theorizing
and research in second language acquisition (SLA). For instance, research explor-
ing implications of speaking additional languages on thinking (e.g., Pavlenko,
2005a, 2005b), supports the claim that the learning of additional languages has
the potential to help individuals move away from innate egocentric/ethnocentric
tendencies and, ultimately, allows them to cross cultural borders, “which entails
the active and intentional (re)construction of a history” (Pavlenko & Lantolf,
2000, p. 174). Furthermore, the claim that learning additional languages can
help increase individuals’ overall social awareness and sensitivity to the Other,
Baker (2006) explains, is well supported by research and experiments exploring
the influence of bilingualism on communicative sensitivity (e.g., Ben-zeev, 1977;
Genesee, Tucker, & Lambert, 1975; Mohanty, 1994).
Language Learning and the Development of Critical

and Cultural Awareness
The awareness-raising potential associated with the mastery of additional lan-
guages is best portrayed by Reagan and Osborn (2002) in their claim that learn-
ing foreign languages means being exposed to and transformed by alternative
realities:
In studying languages other than our own, we are seeking to understand

(and, indeed, in at least a weak sense, to become) the Other—we are, in
short, attempting to enter into realities that have, to some degree, been
constructed by others and which many of the fundamental assumptions
about the nature of knowledge and society may be different from our own.
We are, in fact, creating new selves in an important sense.
(p. 13)
It is the benefit of providing learners with a transcending learning experience

that reveals the true potential of FL education for developing critical and cul-
tural awareness, a potential that places the field of FL education in a very unique
position when it comes to preparing individuals to function in plurilingual and

pluricultural democratic societies. This potential has been acknowledged within
North America and Europe, two continents that have over the last two decades
explored the capacity of FL education to help strengthen social cohesion (Coun-
cil of Europe, 2006; Modern Language Association, 2007). In the particular case
of Europe, this acknowledgment has had an important impact on policy as well
as led to massive investment aimed at increasing both the spread and effective-
ness of well-integrated content and language programs across the continent (for
a detailed description, see Council of Europe, 2006, pp. 5–12). But, even if many
scholars in the field have in recent years underscored the power of FL education
to help support the healthy development of culturally and linguistically diverse
democratic societies like ours (e.g., Guilherme, 2002; Osborn, 2006; Reagan &
Osborn, 2002), such a feat is only possible if the field is willing to consider drastic
curricular and instructional reforms. Such reforms should be based on a long-
awaited philosophical reflection regarding what the field is about and where
it should be heading, which could then lead to a reevaluation of its primary
instructional goals.
New Goals, New Curricular and Instructional Directions
Overcoming the Obsession with Linguistic Concerns

and Resistance to Change
For important reforms to take place, we must first overcome the natural ten-
dency for any discipline to resist change. In the particular case of FL education,
this translates into overcoming what could be termed linguistic hegemony. Consid-
ering the current situation, the changes and reforms needed for FL education to
play a central role in the overall educational development of learners are still far
from becoming a reality. The field of FL education can still be characterized as
extremely conservative—an exclusive focus on form (i.e., grammar, syntax, and
phonology) as opposed to an integrated and balanced focus on meaning and form
remains the main organizing principle of most current mainstream language
programs across the United States and many parts of the world.
The dominant influence of the field of linguistics on teaching FLs, which
leads to the objectification of language and imposes the view of language as
“object” (something to be analyzed and broken down into its smallest compo-
nents) (Reagan, 2004; Tedick, 2002; Tedick & Walker, 1994; Tedick, Walker,
Lange, Paige, & Jorstad, 1993), can partly explain the still current obsession with
linguistic concerns and the unique focus of language instruction on learning
about language rather than on learning with or through language (see also Martel,
2013). Today, the linguist’s view of language still prevails and guides the selection
of sterilized curricula in most mainstream language programs across the United
States, which renders any meaningful and cognitively stimulating exploration
impossible. A quick review of FL textbooks (which drive the curriculum in

most instructional settings), be they at the high school or post-secondary level,
would reveal that the focus of most FL curricula is on learning about language
rather than learning to use language for meaningful communication about rel-
evant content. Even when textbooks are standards based and/or thematically
oriented, their underlying organizing principle remains grammar driven. Such
an approach to language instruction limits the possibilities of tapping into the
full awareness-raising potential that the language learning experience can offer
(Cammarata, 2009; Guilherme, 2002; Osborn, 2006; Reagan & Osborn, 2002).
Indeed, most traditional methods of language instruction with their overt focus
on form often confuse learners about the true nature of the language learning
experience, making its potential for intellectual development go unnoticed.
Redefinition of the Primary Goals and Re-envisioning

of the Field’s Potential: A Long-Term Vision
This edited volume is based on the premise that FL education can and ought
to be doing more than it currently does, that it may (1) better stimulate stu-
dents’ motivation to engage willingly and wholeheartedly in the study of a language
within and beyond the school setting and (2) be supportive of the development
of learners’ capacity to engage in deeper forms of thinking that will lead to intel-
lectual autonomy. If FL education is to play a more important role in the overall
intellectual development of twenty-first century learners, which all authors in
this volume would argue it can and should, language programs across the entire
K–16 spectrum must revisit their goals. What follows is an illustration of the fruit
of such a reflection we engaged in a few years ago as we attempted to define
what the goals of FL education might look like when merged with those of dem-
ocratic education aimed at fostering an enlightened citizenry, an overarching
mission that is usually considered a primary responsibility of public education.
Goal #1—Placing the development of critical thinking and advanced literacy
skills at the forefront:
Preparing students for active citizenship and engagement through the practice
of questioning and the development of critical thinking skills should be consid-
ered, we believe, as one of the overarching educational goals within FL educa-
tion. The abilities to reflect critically and to question are inextricably linked
to the development of advanced literacy. They are essential to the survival of
any democratic community because democracy “responds to hands-on participa-
tion” (Gates, 2000, p. xii) and thus requires individuals who are actively engaged
in the shaping of the multiple communities to which they belong. An educa-
tional system designed to support democratic life, thus, should have as its most
basic goal helping individuals make appropriate choices that will result in the
improvement of their conditions and those of other community members. This
implies the development of particular skills, which include the ability to think
critically and to read between the lines, the ability to ask questions about mean-
ings rather than to simply acknowledge given “truths,” and the capability to
question one’s interpretation of reality. As Wiggins and McTighe’s (2005) work
has convincingly argued in the past, learners’ intellectual curiosity and critical
orientation can be nurtured when school programs are designed with inquiry as
a guiding principle of curriculum design around themes that really matter, such
as those that are existential in nature or that are linked to essential questions that
are meaning oriented and do not always have a clear answer (e.g., What is a real
friend? What does it mean to speak in culturally appropriate ways? Do we need
to be wealthy to be healthy? etc.). As many chapters in this edited volume will
illustrate, there is no reason why FL programs could not be designed around
such principles. Doing so would entail having FL education place learners in
contexts where they have to think deeply about complex topics while develop-
ing proficiency in the target language. FL programs can and should favor a focus
on themes that are deeply connected to authentic life concerns and can impact
students’ lives and those of others, such as themes linked to social justice, eco-
justice, ethics, rights, and power. Adopting inquiry as a core driving principle
for developing FL curricula is a sure way to motivate learners as we know that
themes and accompanying topics that tap into existential themes are those that
have a fighting chance to connect with an adolescent audience.
Goal #2—Stimulating students intellectually and cognitively through the
development of higher-order thinking skills:
Designing programs that target higher-order thinking skills or that encourage
learners to utilize deeper, more complex forms of thinking is highly desirable
because we know that the development of such skills is essential for twenty-first
century learner-citizens to thrive in their democratic environment (e.g., Guil-
herme, 2002; Osborn, 2005). We also know that such skills are good predictors
of success within higher education and the increasingly competitive job market,
where interdisciplinary knowledge and the ability to navigate within culturally
and linguistically complex communities is not only welcomed but expected. As
we and many authors in this volume contend, the field of FL education can play
its part in helping learners develop such essential thinking skills and intellectual
traits given the use of appropriate curricular models and compatible pedagogical
frameworks.
Goal #3—Fostering students’ intellectual sensitivity:
Important intellectual traits to have in order to thrive in today’s multiethnic
and multicultural communities include (1) acceptance of the unknown and the
other, (2) the ability to empathize, (3) intellectual humility, and (4) the capac-
ity to reflect critically on one’s worldview when it is challenged by conflicting
sociocultural experiences (Paul & Elder, 2009). We know that the learning of
additional languages and cultures, with its capacity to move individuals away
from their ethnocentric view of the world (e.g., see earlier discussion regard-
ing cognitive dissonance and the concept of decentering) can stimulate the
development of such traits. The power of FL education to achieve such a laudable

educational mission is eloquently described by Legendre (1998):
Learning a language means learning to be closer to others. Learning a

foreign language means equipping oneself with intellectual tools for con-
fronting the real and the unknown, as well as personal enrichment through
a knowledge of other cultures and other views of the world. Learning also
means combating the ignorance that lies at the root of intolerance and
racism.
(n.p.)
We argue that this can best be achieved when programs are designed with per-
tinent thematic content, for example, content linked to themes around justice or
ethics that can problematize what is often unscrutinized or taken for granted.
There is no reason why FL programs should shy away from participating in such
an important intellectual venture.
Goal #4—Nurturing learners’ motivation and active participation in the
learning adventure:
If FL education is to play a more central role in the educational lives of learn-
ers, additional long-term goals must be adopted so that we can ensure that a
majority of learners will continue learning the language and familiarizing them-
selves with its associated culture(s) beyond the classroom and well beyond high
school and post-secondary study. With this in mind, FL education should be
designed to encourage a lifelong learning dynamic through the development
of programs that are likely to lure learners into a desire to want to know more,
to spark their curiosity, and to place them in a learning environment where
they will be actively engaged. This may best be achieved through the design of
inquiry-driven curricula, which can help learners remain active throughout the
entire learning process and provide the instructional space necessary for them
to think deeply about complex topics and develop their own opinions based on
their own analysis (see Cammarata, chapter 6, this volume).
We argue that this series of interconnected goals should be given primary
importance if the field is to harness its full potential for intellectual empower-
ment. Such goals require a move away from the traditionalist or linguistic view
of FL education and toward a view of language as a means with which to explore
content, that is, the realization that both language and content are two equally
important instructional foci. A type of FL instruction strongly committed to
such goals can provide the necessary triggers to engage students intellectually
while also allowing them to develop linguistically, thus offering a practical alter-
native to often intellectually sterile FL programs found in the mainstream. But
it can only do so if content selected for instruction is more than an excuse to
practice language with. For FL education to have any ambition to stir learners
from their intellectual slumber and effectively target the goals just described as
well as some of those included in certain national standards that are rarely if
ever touched upon (e.g., Troyan & Cammarata, 2014), content used to teach lan-
guage will need to be strategically selected. Moreover, the tasks proposed to help
learners manipulate such content will need to require them to think deeply and
engage in critical reflections about their place, roles, and responsibilities in soci-
ety. This is why we argue that the reform project we have in mind has very little
chance to become reality if we do not consider the use of well-adapted curricular
approaches such as content-based instruction, which is specifically designed to
target varied instructional missions at once, that is, the concurrent development
of content knowledge, language proficiency, and advanced literacy skills.
Curricular Choice Really Matters: CBI as the Engine

of FL Educational Reform
Originating in North America, content-based instruction (CBI) is an instructional
and curricular approach specifically designed to embed language instruction in
the context of content that is meaningful to learners. It has also been called
content-based language teaching (CBLT) (e.g., Lightbown, 2014). A similar
approach to language instruction, content and language integrated learning, or
CLIL, emerged in Europe in the 1990s and has been increasingly adopted in
other parts of the world. “As a way of marrying” CBI and CLIL, Martel (2013,
p. 1124) proposed a new label—content and language integration (CLI). We have
elected to use the term “CBI” because of its North American roots and because
it remains one of the most widely recognized labels associated with language
instruction that embeds a focus on meaningful content.
To be effective, CBI should involve the concurrent and balanced teaching of
both language and content. Thus, language in the CBI classroom should serve as
both “subject” (an agent that acts—that is, language that gives shape to meaning)
and “object” (that which is acted upon—or, language as form). In other words,
FL teachers need to integrate a focus on meaning and form in the classroom. Lyster
(2007) proposed “counterbalanced instruction” as a way to shift students’ atten-
tion between content and language, meaning and form (for a discussion on the
topic see: Cumming & Lyster, this volume).
A variety of program models fall under the CBI umbrella. Met (1999) orga-
nized different CBI programs along a continuum ranging from those that are
more content or subject matter driven to those that are more language driven.
Building on Met’s continuum, Tedick and Cammarata (2012) presented a matrix
with two intersecting continua, one representing the content- versus language-
driven nature of the program and the other representing the intensity of the
program with respect to instructional time. Thus, early total language immer-
sion programs would be considered both high time-intensive and highly content
driven, whereas a theme-based high school language program would be highly
language driven and low time-intensive. Such a conceptualization is useful
because it allows us to see the range of programs that fall under the CBI umbrella
in relationship to one another. This edited volume explores the curricular poten-
tial of low time-intensive, language-driven FL programs.
CBI represents a practical curricular model that could help FL educators
operationalize new instructional goals, such as (1) allowing learners to develop
increased expertise in varied disciplines as well as deepen their overall cultural
awareness by engaging in in-depth cultural explorations; (2) helping learners
think deeply about important ethical, social, and environmental issues and their
relationship with their own lives (e.g., Osborn, 2006); and (3) engaging learners
in developing a critical mind capable of identifying threats to democracy (Guil-
herme, 2002) and, in turn, enabling them to become valuable threads within the
democratic canvas.
The nature of content (i.e., themes and associated topics) in a CBI program
can vary considerably, from subject-matter areas such as science or social studies
(as in immersion education) to content themes in the conventional FL classroom,
and it should always engage learners cognitively (Met, 1991). The latter—content
themes in the conventional FL classroom—is what interests us in this edited
volume. We contend that the choice of content itself is of utmost importance if
we are to transform current “thinking-light” FL programs into “thinking-rich”
ones (Martel, chapter 5, this volume). The following section will elaborate on
this particular topic central to the effective implementation of programs that can
target the re-envisioned primary goals for FL education we described earlier.
Content Really Matters: The Case for a Focus

on Ethics and Justice
Content Selection Must Strictly Align with Our

Overarching Goals
We believe that FL education can act as a catalyst for developing cognitively
engaging and motivating curricula and that all FL teachers have the responsibility
not only to help individuals learn language but, also to take part in helping stu-
dents develop the critical thinking skills needed for the social, political, and eco-
nomic world in which they live. Adopting this view is not without consequences
and bears important implications for program development—it implies, among
other things, that we must make room for specific content to be taught within the
language curriculum. In other words, we must broaden the mission of our field so
that it may embrace content-oriented goals that can help students become (1) sen-
sitive to our impact, both positive and negative, on our local community and
environment; (2) aware of our rights and responsibilities as community mem-
bers of a democratic state as well as leading members of the earth’s biodiversity;
(3) tuned into the political nature of language (e.g., how language can be used as
a tool to oppress, include or exclude others), to name only a few.
The use of themes in the FL classroom related to ethics and justice, be they
social, environmental, or other (for illustrations, see exemplar chapters in this
volume), we contend, is particularly appropriate to help FL teachers take a much
more important role in the overall intellectual development of learners. To begin
our journey toward curricular enrichment that places ethics and social justice at
the core of FL instruction, we turn to Osborn’s (2006) “four thematic pillars of
world language education for social justice” (p. 61), which can be helpful to our
current discussion. The four pillars he proposes are Identity, Social Architecture,
Language Choices, and Activism. The four pillars around which key ethics and
social justice content-related themes are organized provide meaningful ground to
contextualize language instruction, as Osborn (2006) describes. Osborn (2006)
provides concrete examples that demonstrate relationships of these thematic pil-
lars to language course components (vocabulary, grammatical structures, and
language modalities or skills). For instance, the theme of Identity can lead to a
focus on language skills typically prescribed in introductory units of the curricu-
lum (e.g., personal pronouns, present tense, basic lexicon), while a focus on Social
Architecture would most likely call for the use of language structures typically
introduced later in the curriculum (e.g., the use of multiple past tenses for his-
torical perspectives and more). Activism would probably be best suited for more
advanced learners, as it naturally calls for more advanced language and literacy
skills (e.g., the language of debate, persuasion, and argumentation).
Osborn’s four pillars framework coupled with curricular and instructional
approaches specifically designed to concurrently target language and content
can transform the language classroom into a site providing both a linguistically
rich ground for developing proficiency and an intellectually stimulating ground
fostering inquiry, advanced literacy, and critical explorations. We believe that his
model provides a good example of the type of exercise most FL teachers as well
as program designers should engage in if the field is ever to effectively merge the
study of meaningful content with the learning of language skills.
An Illustration of What It May Look Like in Practice

Curricula oriented toward the exploration of ethical issues (e.g., social justice,
eco-justice) or philosophical/existential questions (e.g., concepts of fairness,
equality, justice, citizen’s roles and responsibilities) not only offer rich ground to
practice language within meaningful contexts, but they can also appeal to a wide
audience ranging from young adults to adolescents to younger learners, provided
that the teacher activates or builds students’ prior knowledge and heavily scaf-
folds instruction. For instance, younger learners could begin to reflect on their
place, role, and responsibilities within the greater society by exploring justice
within the family, school, local community, and environment. Regardless of
the curricular path chosen, such themes and accompanying topics are very well
suited to help learners prepare to be twenty-first century citizens.
To provide a concrete example of how FL teachers could begin to infuse their

curricular plans with themes related to social or environmental justice and eth-
ics, let’s consider the use of a common (yet increasingly scarce) resource: water.
Although taken for granted in most industrialized nations within the northern
hemisphere, potable water is a resource that is insufficient or difficult to access in
many parts of the world, causing much sorrow, sanitation concerns, and disease.
It is, by far, the most precious resource on Earth and is becoming increasingly
scarce as our climate changes. Access to and control of water has become a major
source of conflict around the world and a cause for many human tragedies and
social injustices. Water is, in this way, a potent theme that affords much potential
when it comes to exploring issues of ethics and social justice locally as well as
globally within the context of teaching and learning other languages.
Jill Pearson, a former French teacher, developed a CBI unit on this very theme
for her French III class. It provides a great illustration of the ideal balance between
content and language study fostered by CBI by providing learners with oppor-
tunities to increase their linguistic repertoire and practice using language within
the context of exploring cognitively stimulating content. The unit is available in
its entirety through the University of Minnesota’s Center for Advanced Research
on Language Acquisition (CARLA)—specifically, through the CoBaLTT project
(Content-Based Language Teaching with Technology, http://www.carla.umn.
edu/cobaltt).
The overarching goal of Jill’s unit was twofold: (1) to lead students on a
journey of exploring issues related to water consumption with the aim of help-
ing them gain insight into perspectives of water conservation at home (e.g.,
understand their personal responsibility by exploring their family use of water)
and elsewhere (e.g., gain insight into how and why different cultures use water
similarly and differently), and (2) to ensure that students develop skills in French
within this context by engaging in conversations; exchanging predictions, opin-
ions, commentaries, and information; and reporting on past activities (all these
being good examples of language learning goals). Jill’s unit also included two
additional missions that represent good illustrations of advanced literacy goals
we believe FL programs should embed: She wanted to make sure students could
demonstrate the ability to interpret authentic texts related to water use (develop-
ing critical reading skills) as well as to formally present information and ideas to
an audience (developing oral presentation skills).
Students’ CBI journey began with an exploration of the nature of water and
their relationship to it (e.g., water composition, cycle, amount of water use,
etc.). The first two lessons in the sequence brought students to explore water
usage within their own dwellings, first, to increase their awareness of how they
use water each day and, second, to help them gain an initial understanding of
which household activities consume more water than others. These lessons offer
a great illustration of how language practice can (and should always, we argue)
be meaningfully contextualized within tasks that build on students’ knowledge
and experiences and are cognitively rich and rewarding. During these lessons,
students were in charge of recording their family water usage at home and then,
using specific criteria to evaluate how much each everyday activity involving
water uses, compared their findings with the rest of the class before exploring
strategies to conserve water. While reporting, learners practiced using the past
tense structure of reflexive and pronominal verbs that take the less common
auxiliary être (to be) in the passé compose (French preterit), for example, Moi, je me
suis lavé les mains cinq fois (I washed my hands five times).
Later in the unit Jill led students to identify the unequal geographical dis-
tribution of water in other countries of the world. Doing so allowed her to
concentrate on raising students’ awareness of the fact that water conservation is a
global issue and on raising students’ awareness of the role that culture plays when
it comes to water usage. As was the case throughout the unit, during this phase
students increased their linguistic repertoire by having many opportunities to
practice using language in meaningful contexts. In her planning Jill considered
carefully the relationships between language and content objectives. Table 1.1
provides a list of content and language objectives included in lesson 4.
TABLE 1.1 Lesson #4: La consommation d’eau ici et ailleurs—perspectives sur l’eau (Water
conservation here and elsewhere—perspectives on water)
Content objectives Language objectives

Students will . . . Students will . . .
- demonstrate an understanding - make comparisons about water usage using the
of the wide disparity of per superlative: le plus d’eau (more water use), le
capita water usage across moins d’eau (less water use)
cultures - use reflexive, pronominal, and other regular and
- gain insight into other cultures’ irregular verbs in the present and to describe
practices around water use others’ quotidian activities with se laver les
(how they use water) mains/les cheveux/la figure (wash one’s hands/
- demonstrate understanding of hair/face), se brosser les dents (brush one’s teeth),
cultural perspectives different prendre une douche (take a shower), laver (wash),
from their own boire (drink), nettoyer (clean), faire la vaisselle
(wash dishes), faire la lessive (do the laundry), etc.
- express quantities in liters using numbers into
the hundreds
- make comparisons using the comparative plus
(more) + the adjective proche (near/close)
- share opinions using structures like à mon avis
(in my opinion), je pense que (I think that), and
je crois que (I believe that)
CoBaLTT Unit, University of Minnesota4
The water conservation theme is particularly potent because it can lead to

a multitude of interdisciplinary explorations that can be adapted to a wide
variety of learners with diverse levels of language proficiency. For example,
with a younger or less proficient student population, a unit focusing on raising
learners’ awareness of issues around water conservation could be initiated as
a simple geography lesson, which would involve students in matching coun-
tries with the percentage of water available to people. This task would require
relatively little linguistic knowledge (e.g., present tense, names and numbers,
simple question formation, prepositions of place) and would also reduce the
cognitive load if designed as a well-scaffolded, contextually embedded jigsaw
activity (Nunan, 2004). More proficient and/or older students could explore
more complex issues, such as geopolitical battles to control world resources and
their impact on human populations (e.g., exile, oppressions). When it comes to
controlling water resources, the case of huge dam projects undertaken around
the world, such as the Sarvar Savora Dam in India and the Three Gorges Dam
in China, whose construction alone is reported to have displaced more than
1.4 million people to date,5 could be used as anchoring themes to explore and
better understand world geopolitical tensions and their impact on human lives.
These explorations could play a key role in raising students’ awareness of their
place and responsibility within society and providing them with early exposure
to the type of critical/deep reflections that are essential to twenty-first century
intellectual development.
Finally, we would like to conclude this discussion by arguing that concerns
of ethics and justice can be traced within most disciplines and, thus, can act as
a thread that can help create and then tie together effective interdisciplinary
units. For instance, an exploration of the social injustices associated with access
to water resources as in the example provided earlier could not be done without
at least delving into geography (e.g., locating where water is scarce and abundant
in the world; locating conflicts related to water control) and mathematics (e.g.,
statistics related to people’s access to water, water cost, water consumption per
capita). Many other disciplines might also naturally end up connected to such
an exploration depending on the actual curricular angle selected. For instance,
knowledge related to meteorology might be important if climatic conditions and
changes in relation to water scarcity are explored. Historical content might be
relevant if specific cases of conflict over water resources or control are explored.
We cannot provide an exhaustive list of disciplines that could potentially be tar-
geted within such a unit, as there are too many possibilities to cite. In any case,
such interdisciplinary potential is particularly relevant because, as the field has
recently formally recognized, interdisciplinary knowledge is increasingly nec-
essary for learners to survive and thrive in todays’ increasingly technological
workplaces as well as increasingly culturally and socially complex multiethnic
communities (Gardner, 2006).
Conclusion
The main argument put forth in this chapter is that FL education as a discipline
can and, therefore, should play an important role within learners’ overall edu-
cational lives. We are convinced that the innate interdisciplinary nature of FL
education coupled with its consciousness-raising potential makes it a particularly
effective means to support the development of autonomous critical thinkers. In this
regard, FL education as a discipline represents a powerful catalyst for educational
change and posits itself as an essential educational component when it comes to
the development of learners’ intellectual sensitivity and awareness of their place,
role, and responsibilities within their world. For this to happen, though, changes
in philosophical vision must be accompanied by an important curricular revolu-
tion and educational reforms that could promote a dual commitment to learners’
cognitive and linguistic development, a commitment that can be best operational-
ized by a move away from traditional skill-focused planning and toward the use
of meaning-oriented curricular and instructional approaches. Integrating language
instruction with the development of critical thinking skills within the FL class-
room context can be done. As many chapters in this edited volume illustrate,
this integration can be realized through the exploration of complex societal issues
and the ethical questions that naturally stem from them, and through the use of
well-adapted curricular and instructional approaches such as CBI specifically engi-
neered to combine language and content-related instructional goals.
Notes
1. The national Foreign Language Resource Centers are federally funded and share the
common goal of developing resources to improve FL education in the United States.
See http://nflrc.msu.edu/lrcs.php for more information.
2. The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) unveiled the
ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines in 1986. They provide descriptions of what individuals
can do with language in all modalities (speaking, listening, reading, and writing) at
identified levels of proficiency. They were recently updated and made interactive and
are available online at http://actflproficiencyguidelines2012.org/
3. See, for example, ACTFL’s new World-Readiness Standards at http://www.actfl.org/
publications/all/world-readiness-standards-learning-languages. For information on
the influence of the Council of Europe in promoting plurilingualism throughout
Europe, see http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/default_en.asp.
4. The Content-Based Language Teaching with Technology (CoBaLTT) Project (http://
www.carla.umn.edu/cobaltt) was funded through the Center for Advanced Research
on Language Acquisition (CARLA) at the University of Minnesota from 1999 to 2006.
5. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17754256
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PART 1
Theoretical Perspectives
and Empirical Evidence
2
SOCIOCULTURAL THEORY AND
CONTENT-BASED FOREIGN
LANGUAGE INSTRUCTION
Theoretical Insights on the Challenge
of Integration
Richard Donato
What is the basic unit of verbal thought? . . . word meaning. . . . The conception of
word meaning as a unit of both thought and social interchange is of incalculable
value for the study of language and thought.
(Vygotsky, Thought and Language)
Introduction
A recurrent finding of research on content-based instruction (CBI) is that teach-
ers find CBI difficult to conceptualize, design, and implement, be it in tradi-
tional foreign language programs or in intensive content-based programs, such
as dual language and immersion.1 Among the various challenges that teachers
report when transitioning to a foreign language (FL) curriculum based on aca-
demic subject matter, the pedagogical goal of integrating language and content
stands out as the most common refrain (Cammarata, 2009, 2010; Cenoz, Gene-
see, & Gorter, 2014; Tedick & Cammarata, 2012). In this chapter, I argue that the
problem can be resolved through an understanding of a language-based theory
of learning and development (Wells, 1994) that views the integration of language
and content as socialization into discursive disciplinary practices. To this end, the
major tenets of sociocultural theory and affiliated theories will be presented to
explain some of the challenges that have been found to plague current and future
teachers in CBI programs.
This chapter addresses how language instruction incorporating academic sub-
ject matter can be conceptualized as an approach in which word meanings are
the basic units of verbal thought and the foundation of instructional interactions,
concept formation, and cognitive development. I explore how pedagogical prac-
tice informed by sociocultural theory can lead to the concurrent development
26 Richard Donato
of students’ cognitive, literacy, and linguistic abilities in the language classroom.

From these theoretical guiding principles, I provide recommendations for the
preparation of beginning teachers who find themselves in the tumultuous waters
of pedagogical change when transitioning from skill-based programs to a cur-
riculum in which language development emerges in the context of academic
subject matter learning.
A Brief History of the Theoretical Foundations of CBI

The earliest theory supporting language learning in CBI programs was based on
Krashen’s (1981, 1982) claim that the necessary and sufficient condition for sec-
ond language (L2) acquisition was comprehensible input targeted to a language
level slightly beyond the student’s current level of language knowledge (i+1). His
claim assured instructors that students, in their role as input processors, attended
to input subconsciously, integrating new language data from the input into exist-
ing interlanguage forms and syntactic structures. Early forms of immersion edu-
cation in Canada embraced this theoretical claim. Based on extensive research
in Canadian immersion classrooms, however, Swain and her colleagues docu-
mented that the provision of comprehensible input alone did not produce what
was intended by the theory (Swain & Lapkin, 1989). Although listening compre-
hension exceeded their non-immersion counterparts, immersion students’ pro-
ductive abilities in oral interpersonal communication and written literacy were
not advancing as predicted by the theory and were replete with ungrammatical
forms that hindered communicative intent. These erroneous grammatical forms
also appeared to be resistant to change rather than reformulated over time.2 Con-
testing the narrow view of input as the primary mover of language acquisition,
or “fuel for the engine of acquisition” to borrow Van Patten’s metaphor, Swain
(1985) proposed her now well-known output hypothesis. The output hypothesis
claimed that input was necessary but alone was insufficient for language learn-
ing and that explicit attention to language production (i.e., output) needed to
be a component of immersion programs for students to make steady advances
in their basic interpersonal communicative skills and cognitive academic lan-
guage ability (Cummins, 1979). The role of output is still today an important
and enduring foundational concept in immersion and content-based foreign lan-
guage programs.
Swain’s output hypothesis, now approximately 30 years old, represents an
important theoretical turn in our understanding of second language acquisi-
tion, in general, and content-based language programs, in particular. Around
the same time as the output hypothesis, developmental psychologists in the edu-
cational community turned attention to the work of Vygotsky and his Russian
colleagues in response to a growing body of cognitive psychology that they
claimed was devoid of meaning, agency, intentionality, and culture (Bruner,
1986; Lantolf & Appel, 1984; Van der Veer & Valsiner, 1991; Wertsch, 1985a,
Sociocultural Theory and CBI 27
1985b). Against this backdrop and in a climate of growing theoretical skepticism

about exclusively input-based approaches, researchers in second language acqui-
sition began to explore the contribution of Vygotskyan sociocultural histori-
cal theory to second language teaching and learning. Swain’s (1995) revision to
Krashen’s theory and to her own original formulation of the role of output was
no exception. Talk was reconceptualized from encoding and decoding messages
to cognitive and metacognitive activity, that is, as a thinking tool for meaning
making and for reflecting on what is said and how it is said. This turn in second
language acquisition theory (Block, 2003) led sociocultural researchers to inves-
tigate the role of speaking in cognition (Frawley & Lantolf, 1985), the conse-
quences of particular forms of social interaction to second language development
(Brooks & Donato, 1994; Donato, 1994, 2000; Hall & Verplaetse, 2000; Swain,
1995, 2006; Van Lier, 1996), and the integrity of learner language contrasted
to the widespread view that learner language could be analyzed and explained
as compensatory strategies for linguistic deficiencies (Firth & Wagner, 1997).
Interestingly, the same crisis in psychology that Vygotsky worked to overcome
in the early twentieth century was reflected during this paradigm shift in second
language acquisition theory and research. In contrast to Krashen’s emphasis on
unconscious acquisition, sociocultural theory sought to understand the concepts
and principles of individual agency, collective activity and the individual, and
the role of consciousness in second language acquisition.3
Grabe and Stoller (1997) were among the first, to my knowledge, to present
the theoretical relationship of sociocultural theory to CBI. In a brief discus-
sion of the topic, Grabe and Stoller posit three important concepts associated
with sociocultural theory that apply directly to additional language acquisition
in the context of content-based programs: the Zone of Proximal Development
(ZPD), private speech, and student appropriation of learning tasks.4 Although
their discussion of these three tenets is not extensive, Grabe and Stoller point out
that each concept is relevant to understanding how learning occurs in content-
based classes. They state that, through the assistance of teachers and peers in the
ZPD, students achieve support for developing greater cognitive and linguistic
complexity than they could achieve alone. Through the internalization of the
verbal guidance that students received from others during collaborative activity,
private forms of self-directed internal talk develop and serve individual plan-
ning, evaluation, and executive functions. Interactive learning tasks become sites
where students appropriate meaning (Wertsch, 1998) and control academic con-
tent, learning strategies, and language.
Since then, numerous other publications have referred to sociocultural concepts
to provide theoretical support for CBI. From my review of the literature, however,
only a few published works have embraced systematically sociocultural theory
as the theoretical framework for understanding additional language instruction
in the context of academic subject matter learning (e.g., Gibbons, 2003, 2015;
Walqui & VanLier, 2010). This observation is not to dismiss the important work
28 Richard Donato
of others who perceive the connections between sociocultural theory and CBI.
It is only to point out that some of the challenges that CBI teachers face may be
due to the lack of a coherent theory of learning and development that can inform
and explain content-based instruction. In what follows, I explain how some of the
intractable challenges of CBI teachers may be resolved through a more informed
understanding of sociocultural theory.5
Dichotomies versus Dialectics

In the 1920s, Vygotsky (1986) sought to resolve what he argued was a crisis in
psychology. The crisis, simply put, involved explanations of human behavior that
were either dichotomized into psychological processes resulting from external
material conditions acting on the subject to provoke a biological response (e.g.,
Pavlov’s well-known salivating dog experiments), or unconscious mental forces
that were largely unavailable for inspection except through the study of mental
pathologies (e.g., Freud’s psychoanalytic theory). In neither case did individual
agency, conceptualizations, and creative abilities play a significant role in psy-
chological studies of behavior; the individual’s consciousness was lost somewhere
in between the forces of external world and inner workings of the subcon-
scious mind. In the short time that he worked before his death at the age of 34,
Vygotsky (1979) proposed a unified psychology to explain human consciousness.
According to his theory, the social and individual, the material and mental, and
the lower biological and higher cultural forms of reasoning, perceiving, and
remembering are united in a dialectical process that mutually constitute and
transform each other. As the title of the seminal book compiling several of his
writings announces, Vygotsky located Mind in Society (1978) and, reciprocally,
society and culture in the minds of individuals. At the core of Vygotsky’s dialec-
tical method for studying human psychological processes is a search for relation-
ships that not only allows but requires the researcher to knit together what most
others assign to separate categories (Ollman, 2003).
The same dichotomous views of individuals’ psychological processes have
influenced theories of second language acquisition and, in some cases, approaches
to content-based instruction. The field of second language acquisition is replete
with polar opposite terminology intended to categorize learning and teaching
processes into separable categories—learning and acquisition, competence and
performance, procedural and declarative knowledge, explicit and implicit learn-
ing, deductive and inductive explanations, automatic and controlled process-
ing, and, in the case of CBI, language and content—or, as it is more generally
stated, form and meaning. As Byrnes (2009) points out, “Although no one would
argue with the need for contextualized foreign language instruction where stu-
dents learn how to make meaning through the various forms that the target lan-
guage offers, remarkably enough, we have not achieved (this type of ) instructed
foreign language development in a direct and principled way” (p. 2, emphasis
added). Additionally, many others working in CBI have argued strongly for the
inextricable link between language (form) and content (meaning). This idea
is, indeed, not new. What is lacking is conceptual clarity and a cohesive peda-
gogy (Cenoz, Genessee, & Gorter, 2014) about what it means to design, imple-
ment, and carry out a program that purports content and language integration.
Sociocultural theory and supporting linguistic and educational theories, such as
Systemic Functional Linguistics (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014), Cognitive Lin-
guistics (Littlemore, 2009; Tyler, 2012), and Dynamic Assessment (Feuerstein,
Falik, Rand, & Feuerstein, 2003; Poehner & Lantolf, 2005), may offer guid-
ance for addressing the challenge of form and meaning integration so frequently
documented in the literature.
Frontloading Language versus an Emergent View

of Language and Content Integration
If we conduct a random Internet search of the many sample templates for design-
ing a content-based lesson, we quickly find the ubiquitous introductory matrix
made up of boxes, two of which will always be identified with the labels Content
Objectives and Language Objectives (e.g., Echevarria, Vogt, & Short, 2012). The
language section of the template might be further subdivided into language that
is absolutely necessary for the presentation, understanding, and application of
the content (content obligatory language) and language that may be compatible
with the content of the lesson (content compatible language) but unnecessary for
the students to control in a productive way. This observation is not to dismiss
the planning tools that so many have painstakingly designed. Indeed teachers
need to be aware of the content and language objectives to teach purposively
and effectively (Lightbown, 2014). It is only to suggest that in the absence of a
theory that explains the relationship of language to academic content and con-
ceptual development, what is often observed in teachers’ use of these planning
tools is (1) language objectives reductively identified as vocabulary intended to be
frontloaded before instruction on the academic content of the lesson (Baecher,
Farnsworth, & Ediger, 2014; Bigelow, 2010), and (2) vague language analysis lack-
ing in understanding of the function of language and its relationships to the
academic subject matter (Schleppegrell, 2004; Unsworth, 2000). I will examine
these instructional tendencies from the perspective of sociocultural theory and
the dialectics of learning and development.
Situating Language Learning in Disciplinary

Language Practices
Disciplinary knowledge is constituted in and through language that is realized
in particular ways to represent the discursive practices of a discipline (Fang &
Schleppegrell, 2008; Unsworth, 2000; Young, 2009). What the planning tool,
30 Richard Donato
described earlier, may potentially create, however, is a view of content-based

instruction where language elements of the lesson are pre-taught to students out
of the context of the discipline. Clearly, scaffolding learners and their learning by
using carefully sequenced instructional tasks based on the context of the lesson
(e.g., using a concept map to brainstorm prior language and content knowledge
of an academic area) is necessary and useful in content-based foreign language
classes. The problem arises, however, when pre-teaching is conceived of practice
and rehearsal of the language needed for the upcoming lesson with no attention
to the relationship of language to the academic content objectives, a practice that
is sometimes observed in CBI classes.
Isolating and frontloading language from the situated learning of content is
incompatible with Vygotsky’s fundamental principle that thinking and speak-
ing are united and that acts of communication play a decisive role in concept
formation (Vygotsky, 1986, p. 100). Gibbons (2003) illustrated this fundamental
Vygotskyan principle in her sociocultural study of mediation in ESL science class-
rooms. In this study, Gibbons showed how the teacher’s talk encapsulated two areas
simultaneously, science and language itself. As students worked on and discussed
their science experiment, the teacher’s talk about the language of scientific report-
ing allowed students to make generalizations and express abstractions that were
not bound to the here-and-now context of the group activity. Consistent with
Vygotskyan theory, Gibbons (2003) states that “meanings are constructed between
rather than within individuals and are shaped by the social activity in which they
arise and the collaborative nature of the interaction” (p. 268, emphasis added).
In Cammarata’s (2010) phenomenological study of teachers implementing CBI
for the first time, teachers reported being challenged to teach what they perceived
as complex material to students with limited language ability. As one teacher
noted, in the past when she wanted to introduce students to a lesson on the theme
of “the house,” she knew how to go about presenting the vocabulary for furniture
by displaying images and eliciting student responses. His data also showed that
when implementing CBI, these same teachers tended to fall back on what they
knew how to do, in this case make use of images to rehearse thematic vocabulary
with the students before the use of this vocabulary in acts of communication.
What we can imagine is that for these teachers newly introduced to CBI, “falling
back” can result in teasing apart language from disciplinary content and context
leading to rehearsing vocabulary in preparation for the lesson. Additional sup-
port for this assumption comes from an important finding in Cammarata’s (2010)
well-documented study: Teachers believe in an ideal linear sequence of language
instruction that maintains that competence is required before performance, that
language learning proceeds in ways memorialized in their textbooks, and that
learning the language takes priority with content and context relegated to a sec-
ondary instruction goal. This thinking runs counter to Vygotsky’s educational
dialectics in which performance becomes a site for the development of compe-
tence through mediation in the form of others, objects, and ultimately the self.
The Role of Mediation in Sociocultural Theory

Mediation is a core concept in sociocultural theory and explains how individuals,
through the use of tools, create and transform their inner mental and outer physical
and social worlds. Meditational tools surround us in our daily lives, and their use
is often imperceptible. Physical tools, such as a computer, a smartphone, or a TV
remote control are directed outward and facilitate tasks quantitatively, in terms of
time and effort (e.g., using a GPS saves time by avoiding the need to stop and con-
sult a map), while simultaneously transforming them qualitatively, in terms of the
particular outcome (e.g., using the GPS changes the overall driving experience by
providing efficient routing and relieving the driver of the burden of remembering
a set of directions). Psychological tools (Kozulin, 2003) are directed inward; are
made up of various symbolic semiotic resources, such as charts, numbers, visuals,
and language; and are used to plan, carry out, talk through, think through, and
evaluate activity. Psychological tools, language being one of the most pervasive and
important among them, originate in history, culture, and the social environment
and are appropriated by individuals for use in mediating and shaping their own
internal mental activity. In this way, Vygotsky resolves dichotomous views of the
social and individual and argues for a dialectical unity of these seemingly discrete
sociological (social mind) and psychological (individual mind) categories.
The concept of mediation is based on Vygotsky’s view that an individual’s
mental, social, and material activity is shaped and supported by tools and signs
that have been historically and culturally created (van Lier, 2004; Vygotsky,
1978, 1986; Wertsch, 2007). Citing Francis Bacon, Vygotsky proclaimed that
neither mind alone nor hand alone can accomplish much without the tools that
perfect them (Bruner, 1986, p. 122). That is to say, an individual’s cognitive
and affective relationship with the world and others is not direct, but rather
indirectly assisted through various types of signs that have been inherited from
others throughout history, learned, and often transformed through their use in
recurring cycles of specific cultural and social practices. Vygotsky (1986) argued
that “[w]ords and other signs are those means that direct our mental operations,
control their course, and channel them toward the solution of the problem con-
fronting us” (pp. 106–107). Based on this orientation, mediation can be defined
as a self-directed or other-directed process resulting in voluntary control over
one’s social and mental world through the use of cultural artifacts, concepts, and
activities (Lantolf & Thorne, 2006).
In educational settings, cognitive development most regularly occurs through
the mediation of language in dialogic encounters that motivate, have a discern-
able and worthwhile purpose, and are culturally meaningful to the participants.
Consistent with the work of Vygotsky, Sfard (2012) states that thinking can be
most usefully defined as the activity of communicating, developed through media-
tion in dialogic relationships with others. This mediation, in turn, leads to an
individual’s modifications of public or private discursive activity, what Sfard
32 Richard Donato
defines as development. She explains that from this dialogic perspective, devel-
opment is not to be understood as uniquely an individual achievement since
change in discourse is the product of collectively mediated human actions.
Moreover, the view of development as changes in ways of talking in communi-
ties of practice (Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, 2002) makes no claim on the
inherent “general abilities” of the individual. Rather, the individual’s discursive
development is understood as a collaborative achievement that can be traced to
the history of the collective’s efforts to engage, rather than marginalize, the indi-
vidual in the activities of the community (Sfard, 2012, p. 3).
What do semiotic mediation, psychological tools, thinking as communicat-
ing, and dialogic relationships in communities of practice have to do with CBI?
Socialization into the discursive practices of an academic content area requires
mediation by an expert member of the community. In other words, rather than
talk of integration of language and content, which appears to be difficult for
teachers to comprehend and enact, a sociocultural perspective on conceptual
development is one of dialogic mediation of disciplinary discourse through talk,
task, and text,6 a point I will return to in the conclusion of this chapter. As
Young (2009) points out, language instruction is not just about learning lan-
guage; it is developing sociocultural and historical discourse practices through
recurrent participation in various types of interactive practices with more com-
petent members of the community.
In content-based classrooms, teachers mediate language learning by using lan-
guage as a way to explain concepts, support students’ attempts to use the new
language, and interact with students in developmentally appropriate ways. In this
way, language as a mediating tool is more than mere input to the students for
mental processing. Rather, it is a way to establish a supportive learning relation-
ship with the students, allowing them to perform beyond what they can do inde-
pendently and, in the process, develop conceptual understanding of the tasks in
which they are engaged. Sociocultural theory claims that the quality of mediation
is consequential to what is learned.
Evidence of the Effects of Content-Based Language Mediation

In a study of a sixth grade Spanish CBI class that I conducted with our Early Lan-
guage Learning research team (Pessoa, Hendry, Donato, Tucker, & Lee, 2007), we
found evidence of the powerful effects of skillful mediation by the teacher on stu-
dents’ content learning and language development. In this study, the discourse of
two Spanish teachers in the same school and at the same grade level, teaching the
same lesson, and sharing the same number of years of teaching experience were
carefully analyzed for the ways in which mediation of language was provided in
the context of a science unit on renewable energy resources. What was found was
that the two teachers differed significantly in how the language of science was
introduced and used throughout the lesson. Grace’s goal was to develop students’
conceptual knowledge of the benefits of various sustainable energy resources. She

provided disciplinary language in context, reformulated student utterances in the
direction of academic language, and drew attention to the students’ wordings
of the meanings that they tried to express. In her class, thinking science and learning
the language of science occurred simultaneously. As Schleppegrell (2004) states,
the kinds of conceptual knowledge that children develop depend on their social
experiences and ways of interacting with others, with language as the primary
semiotic system through which these interactions takes place.
James’s mediation contrasted rather dramatically with the type of content and
conceptual mediation that Grace routinely offered her students. James admitted
in interviews that he struggled with CBI and did not view himself as a science
teacher. A routine interactive practice observed in James’s class was learning
vocabulary from the content area in the context of games and worksheets dis-
connected from the overarching concepts of the academic content of the les-
son. When James worked with the topic of energy resources, he often asked
students to translate sentences that he provided or that the students offered in
English about the content. His questions were largely display questions followed
by explicit error correction, and classroom talk was based on formulaic and rou-
tinized patterns of interaction. The analysis of classroom interaction provided,
therefore, clear evidence that for James, academic content was only a vehicle to
practice the vocabulary and grammar to be learned. For Grace, academic content
served the larger purpose of constructing concepts in Spanish about the impor-
tance of renewable energy sources for environmental protection. To understand
the effects of these two different discursive constructions of CBI, we conducted
an end-of-year assessment of student achievement in these two classes.
Results of End-of-Year Writing Assessment

We asked ourselves what the effects of these two contrasting approaches to CBI
might be on the cumulative achievement of children who received two very
different types of mediation in a content-based course, one focused on concept
development supported by attention to academic language and one that focused
primarily on the language of the content area. We posited that in a class where
mediation was focused specifically on vocabulary, accuracy, and grammatical
control, these students would outperform Grace’s class, where attention to gram-
mar was conducted in the context of making meaning about energy resources
and where rehearsing and practicing vocabulary in the form of isolated games and
requests for translation were absent. We also assumed that control of content in
meaningful ways would be a challenge for James’s students. To test our assump-
tions, students were asked to respond in written Spanish to the following prompt:
You are an agent of the Environmental Protection Agency and have been
given an assignment. Important officials from several Spanish-speaking
34 Richard Donato
countries are meeting to discuss natural resources, their uses, and their
effects on the environment. Your mission is to review the attached pictures
of various resources and their uses and describe them in Spanish for these
visiting officials. After describing them, you are to evaluate them, stating
which is better, worse, safer, or more dangerous and why (what are the
effects or non-effects of each resource on the environment?).
Results of the assessment did not entirely confirm our assumptions. Grace’s
students outperformed James’s student in all areas of the written assessment—
language function, appropriateness of text type, rhetorical impact, vocabulary
depth, comprehensibility, and grammatical control. Moreover, a double-rated
analysis using a rubric for each feature of the assessment revealed that the dif-
ferences were statistically significant (p < .005). When scores were compared,
James’s top-scoring student on the assessment had a score that was equivalent to
the student who scored the lowest in Grace’s class.
What also was revealing about these two groups of students was that only in
Grace’s classes did students evaluate the various energy sources depicted in the
prompt using comparative forms of adjectives, the language form (compara-
tives) and function (comparing and evaluating) of this content-based unit on
environmental energy. In James’s class, although comparative expressions were
isolated from the content of the lesson and explicitly practiced, his students
were unable to use this knowledge to describe and compare various energy
resources. While Grace’s students had not received the same amount of explicit
instruction on comparative structures and were made aware of the structure
only in the meaningful context of the unit, it was her students who were able
to access comparative structures for evaluating and justifying their thinking on
the writing task.
The findings of this study are clear. James’s practice of separating the lan-
guage of content from concepts was not an effective means of socializing
students into disciplinary ways of thinking and communicating. Indeed,
mediation occurred in both classes, but the object of mediation differed in
important ways. In James’s class, mediation was focused on the language of
the content area. In Grace’s class students’ conceptual development and con-
tent knowledge simultaneously derived from acts of communication that uni-
fied content, concept, and language. What the results of this study illustrate
quite dramatically is that, as Lantolf and Johnson (2007) argue, language
learning takes place in acts of communication that are mediated by others,
self, and various tools. Referencing Leontiev (1981), they state that learning
the language is not the prerequisite to a student’s ability to communicate.
Rather, communicative abilities are “formed and reformed in the very activity
in which they are used—concrete, linguistically mediated social and intel-
lectual activity” (p. 878).
The Semiotics of Disciplinary Content and Concepts

The second unintended outcome of the way we visualize and conceptualize
planning for CBI is the under-specification of language resources related to the
meaning-making resources of the discipline. Without understanding how semi-
otic systems, most notably language, construct concepts in disciplinary ways
of communicating, any attempt to identify the language of an academic con-
tent area will remain ad hoc, idiosyncratic, and hypothetical. The challenge
of designing CBI units of work and of preparing teachers to understand how
language and academic content are inextricably bound requires a theory of lan-
guage, which, as Byrnes (2009) argues, has not been represented in language
education in any systematic way.
In her introduction to the special issue of Linguistics and Education devoted to
a systemic functional linguistic perspectives on instructed FL acquisition, Byrnes
(2009), echoing Wesche and Skehan (2002), points out that CBI labors under
inadequate or nonexistent definitions of how language relates to disciplinary
concepts. This lack of clarity, in turn, leads to inappropriate specifications of lan-
guage objectives, among other vexing problems. Byrnes argues that a systemic
functional approach to understanding the language that constructs particular
discursive practices addresses these challenges by offering, as a theoretical frame
of reference, a theory that understands language as fundamentally being about
meaning making, that is, about language and content.
Language and Content Connection in History Texts

An example from history texts will illustrate the importance of a functional
approach to the identification of language required for successful integration
with the historical content of texts and historical thinking. History texts are
dense with information and often lack explicit elaborations and clear connec-
tions between events, making them difficult to interpret for students (Beck &
McKeown, 1994; Fang & Schleppegrell, 2008). Lexical items notwithstanding,
when preparing a CBI lesson on history, teachers might anecdotally conclude
that the “past tense” is the logical language objective when studying history.
After all, history is what has already happened, and past tense seems to be a
form that would appear frequently in historical texts. As Fang and Schleppegrell
(2008, p. 39) point out, such a language objective, however, will not lead stu-
dents to develop historical ways of thinking and to conceptualize and interrogate
historical texts as causal relationships, a more substantive goal and cognitively
engaging approach during a content-based unit on history. Moreover, causal
connections between events do not manifest themselves exclusively through
the tense of the verb, nor are they always explicitly marked (e.g., signaled with
words like because, so, therefore, as a result, then). Rather, causality is most often
36 Richard Donato
constructed in historical texts through the juxtaposition of sentences and clauses

in which the use of modal auxiliaries (e.g., would and could ) expresses probable
and potential consequences of existing actions, circumstances, and conditions.
For example, the causal relationship between the early American Tea Act, which
refunded taxes to the East Indian Company to ship tea to colonies, and the result
of this tax refund on reductions in the cost of exporting tea to the colonies and
in illegal smuggling, is expressed in one textbook in the following way: The Tea
Act refunded four-fifths of the taxes the East India tea company had to pay to the colonies.
The East India Company tea could now be sold at lower prices than smuggled Dutch tea
(Appleby, Brinkley, & McPherson, 2000, p. 65). The potential for lower prices
and a reduction in smuggled Dutch tea, indicated by could, was a direct result
of the Tea Act, a meaning that was implied through sentence juxtaposition and
the use of the modal could rather than through the use of causal connector (e.g.,
therefore). As Achugar and Schleppegrell (2005) note, “understanding the role
of juxtaposition in the construction of causal reasoning and being able to recover
the implicit connections is important for student readers” (p. 311).
Using the framework of Systemic Function Linguistics (Halliday & Matthies-
sen, 2014) for his examination of several leading history textbooks, Fitzgerald
(2014) found that the primary way that causality was signaled was through the
use of asyndetic constructions. Asyndetic constructions imply causation between
two sequentially proximal sentences without an explicit link that would indicate
such a relationship, with modality being one among several language resources
that signals cause and effect across clauses. Moreover, in his sample of history
textbooks, Fitzgerald’s (2014) study found that causal asyndetic constructions are
used more frequently than causal conjunctions.7
Understanding the language resources for expressing causality in historical texts
leads to improved historical thinking and historical conceptual development in stu-
dents, be it in the history classroom or in CBI lessons that make use of history as the
core subject matter. What this previous example suggests is that integration may be
a challenge simply because CBI has not embraced a theory of language that makes
visible the relationship of content to language as a meaning-making resource in a
particular disciplinary genre. As Vygotsky (1986) has stated, “the use of the word . . .
maintains its guiding function in the formation of genuine concepts” (p. 145). Lan-
guage and content cohere and this unity cannot be unlinked without distorting or
compromising concept development. In other words, according to this view, words,
learned and used in context, are the building blocks of rational thought and tools for
making meaning in disciplinary ways of knowing and speaking.
Mediating Language and Content in Dialogic Relationships

If integration is best understood as mediation in dialogic instructional relation-
ships and if language is defined scientifically as resources for the instantiation of
particular disciplinary discourses, the question that still remains relates to how
effective mediation of linguistically constituted content and concepts is carried

out in practice. On the one hand, presentation of language detached from con-
tent does not adhere to the tenets of the sociocultural theory of learning and
development. On the other hand, developing a conscious awareness and control
of these language resources is central to the sociocultural approach to instruc-
tion and the primary mission of schooling, or what Lantolf and Poehner (2014)
call the “pedagogical imperative.” The answer to this paradox may be found in
Vygotsky’s concept of the Zone of Proximal Development.
The Zone of Proximal Development

A major contribution of Vygotskyan theory of development that sets it apart
from the mainstream developmental psychology is that Vygotsky maintains
that individuals are not restricted to only one identifiable level of development
measured through independent performance on various psychometric measures.
Vygotsky’s concept of the ZPD emphasizes that in each learner there are two
developmental levels—what students can do on their own (their actual develop-
mental level) and what they can do with assistance from other more competent
individuals, external tools, and ultimately the self (their potential developmental
level). The interactional work that takes place based on what individuals can do
alone and what they can do with help is called the individual’s ZPD.8 Effective
mediation that leads to potential development requires, therefore, activating stu-
dents’ respective ZPDs.
To illustrate this concept in the context of CBI and its role in assessment of
language development, consider a learner who composes an essay in a foreign
language without and with mediation. This learner can potentially produce
two qualitatively different essays under the two conditions. In the unmediated
condition, the learner’s essay might lack precise disciplinary ways of presenting
information, miss important elaborations, or be composed without attention to
sentential cohesion and topical coherence. With mediation, the same student
might improve and produce a stronger written account incorporating the crite-
ria listed earlier. The importance of this differential performance is that a valid
assessment of students’ ability cannot be achieved by observing only what they
can do alone. A better assessment of their ability is to understand how students
make use of mediational tools and assistance of various kinds to improve their
performance, how tools introduced into the interaction are taken up or ignored,
and how students develop over the course of mediated interactions. This type of
assessment requires careful observation of how mediation is carried out, used,
and transformed by the learner in the moment-to-moment interactions with the
teacher. This process is what Vygotsky refers to as microgenesis, the foundation of
current work on Dynamic Assessment (Lantolf & Poehner, 2014; Poehner, 2007).
One goal of effective mediation is to ensure that the assistance we offer
learners is usable and attuned to their respective ZPDs. If mediation is beyond
38 Richard Donato
the reach of learners, it cannot be used to move foreign language development

forward. If mediation is redundant and not needed by the learner, no language
development will take place. For this reason, to work in students’ ZPDs means
diagnosing what the students know and what kind of mediation is needed
to move beyond their current understandings. And, of course, this implies
differing ZPDs for students in a single class and differentiating the kind of
help that is provided, especially in today’s linguistically and culturally diverse
classrooms.9 Lantolf and Thorne (2006) describe this diagnostic function of the
ZPD in this way:
The ZPD is not only a model of the developmental process, but also a
conceptual tool that educators can use to understand aspects of students’
emerging capacities that are in early stages of maturation. In this way,
when used proactively, teachers using the ZPD concept as a diagnostic
have the potential to create conditions that may give rise to specific forms
of development in the future.
(p. 267)
Two Studies of Dialogic ZPD Activity in CBI Classes

To illustrate the concept of dialogic ZPD activity in a CBI class, I present two
classroom-based studies (Davin, 2013; Troyan, 2013). I selected these two studies
for three reasons. First, the participants of the study are students of approximately
the same age (10–11 years old) who have studied Spanish as a foreign language
for the same amount of time in the same elementary and middle school. Second,
both studies were carried out during lessons that were based on academic sub-
ject matter content. To be more specific about these lessons, Davin’s study was
conducted during a unit of study on Argentina, and Troyan’s study took place
during a unit on Segovia during which students learned about the importance
of historical monuments and landmarks. Third, the two studies represent two
different forms of mediation in the ZPD. In the case of the class on Argentina,
mediation was provided with pre-scripted graduated prompts from implicit hints
to explicit information about WH-questions to elicit content-rich information
from an Argentinian class visitor. In the class studying historical monuments,
mediation was provided during a cycle of instruction where students discussed
the meanings and wordings of historical monument descriptions in unedited
texts, jointly constructed monument descriptions in writing with the teacher,
and later independently wrote their own historical accounts of important cul-
tural monuments. In both classes, the instructor collaborated in dialogue with
students to assess the students’ actual development level, to discover their ZPDs,
and to mediate their future potential. Additionally, the research findings of the
two studies indicated that, because of the mediation they received, students in
both classes made significant progress in their oral and written language about
substantive academic content.
Mediating meaning making for a content-based interview: Dynamic Assess-

ment. Dynamic Assessment (Haywood & Lidz, 2007; Poehner, 2007) is based on
the sociocultural concept of mediation and involves a particular type of interac-
tion between teacher and learner that fuses supportive and graduated assistance
(i.e., teaching) with observations of the changes in the amount of assistance a
learner needs to complete a task (i.e., assessment of the learner’s growth in self-
regulation). Assistance is said to be dynamic because learners are initially provided
with implicit cues that are gradually made more explicit depending on the needs
of the learner. In this way, teacher feedback is contingent upon the learners’ grow-
ing understanding of the task. This approach to feedback differs from how it has
been traditionally constructed in the research literature. Traditional models of
feedback are isolated and studied as a single type of feedback move (e.g., implicit
remodeling of the incorrect form) in response to the learners’ utterance. Feedback
in the framework of dynamic assessment involves sequences of feedback moves,
either emergent or scripted, as illustrated below in the Davin (2013) study. Dur-
ing a dynamic assessment, feedback is provided based on the history of learners as
they change in the amount of support they need in a specific interaction or across
several interactions. In this way, dynamically assessing learners can be clearly situ-
ated within the sociocultural approach to instruction.
Using a Dynamic Assessment (DA) approach, Davin (2013) prepared a series
of prompts to assist fifth grade students with their predictable lexical and gram-
matical challenges while constructing questions in Spanish for an interview with
a native speaker from Argentina. A unique feature of the Davin study is that it
is among the first to measure the effects of DA during whole-class instruction
in a content-based lesson. Through purposeful dialogue with the whole class,
the teacher assessed students’ current level of development and provided assis-
tance whenever students experienced difficulty in developing their repertoire
of Spanish questions. This assistance took the form of five types of prompts
that moved from highly implicit signals of an error (Prompt 1: Pause and give a
quizzical look) intended to invite self-repair. If self-repair was not forthcoming,
increasingly more explicit cues (Prompt 5: Provide the correct answer for the
student) were offered. The following interaction from Davin’s study illustrates
the teacher’s mediation of one student as she attempts to formulate a question
about contemporary singers in Argentina.
Interaction 1
ANNIE: ¿Qué es tu cantante favorita?
“What is your favorite singer?”
TEACHER: (Prompt 1: Pause with questioning look)
ANNIE: (silence)
TEACHER: ¿Qué es tu cantante favorita?
(Prompt 2: Repetition of entire utterance with source of prob-
lem signaled with louder tone of voice)
40 Richard Donato
ANNIE: Oh! ¿Quién es tu cantante favorita?

“Who is your favorite singer?”
(Davin, 2013, p. 312)
As Interaction 1 illustrates, the student needed two levels of mediation to

formulate the correct question indicating that the student required a minimal
amount of mediation to formulate the correct utterance. Other examples of
interactions provide evidence of differing student ZPDs in the class through
the variable levels of assistance that were required for individual students. For
example, although Alex could construct an accurate content question, in con-
trast to Annie, it took him four levels of prompts to solve his language problem
for requesting information on sports teams in Argentina (Prompt 4: Provide
a forced-choice option). Additionally, using whole-class mediation during a
content lesson provided the teacher with a systematic way to assess student
development of the language of a cultural content lesson by tracking over time
the reduction in the number of prompts needed to formulate a question in
Spanish. Davin (2013) states that providing mediation in this way allows the
teacher to construct a group ZPD inviting all students to observe interactions
and participate privately or publically. Moreover, this study demonstrates how
the use of DA during a content-based lesson allows for the seamless integra-
tion of language and content while simultaneously remaining focused on the
cultural context of the lesson and the specific functions of language needed in
context.
Mediating meaning making of historical monuments in written texts:
Genre-based pedagogy. Troyan’s study (2013) also illustrates mediation in the
ZPD during a content-based lesson but differs from the Davin study in two
important ways. First, the mediation provided by the teacher is emergent rather
than scripted with graduated prompts from implicit to explicit assistance. Sec-
ond, unlike Davin’s study, which focused on preparing students for an oral
interaction, the goal of the lessons in Troyan’s study was to develop students’
literacy in the written genre of historical landmark texts. Based on the work of
Rose and Martin (2012) and Fang and Schleppegrell (2008) and their extensive
work on the genres of primary and secondary school subject matter, Troyan
conducted a genre analysis of written texts dealing with historical monuments
and tourism. His analysis identified five probabilistic features of these texts:
(1) a title, (2) an introductory sentence enticing the reader to learn more about
the landmark, often in the form of a construction using the superlative (e.g.,
Since 2010, Burj Khalifa in Dubai holds the record for the world’s tallest building. It
is classified as megatall ), (3) a series of historical facts, (4) references to architec-
tural detail; and (5) a compelling reason and invitation to visit the site. It is
noteworthy that Troyan’s analysis goes beyond anecdotal linguistic specifica-
tion of description. Without the careful genre analysis that Troyan conducted,
a teacher might prematurely conclude that, to describe a landmark, all that
students need to learn are adjectives. Indeed, attributes are needed to describe a
monument but, from a genre perspective, simply focusing on adjectives would
never enable students to produce or interpret information-rich and compelling
landmark descriptions intended to provide historical detail and entice tourism.
In his study, Troyan designed his historical landmark unit by carefully ana-
lyzing the functional stages of texts about cultural monuments. These stages
later became reference points for students to create their own written texts that
excite, inform, and invite.
What Troyan’s study also illustrates is how the language of content can
become the focus of attention during a CBI lesson without necessarily separating
language from the context of the lesson proper. That is, the discursive genre of
writing about landmarks becomes the core material of the CBI lesson, is simul-
taneously the contents and vehicle of instruction, and maintains language and
content connections in direct ways. As Troyan (2014) states, “a focus on genre
and the functional language involved will help the teacher specify exactly the
type of writing that students will need to do, transforming the underspecified
[prompt to write] several paragraphs into a clear description of the genre that
students will need to produce for the presentational task” (p. 17).
During the genre-based intervention, Troyan made use of the Teaching-Learning
Cycle for mentoring disciplinary genre developed by a group of Australian
systemic functional linguists who refer to themselves as the Sydney School of
Linguistics. This cycle of instruction prepares students with relevant content
knowledge of the topic, explicit attention to the probabilistic language patterns
in academic texts, authorial stance in relation to the reader, and textual orga-
nization.10 Following the genre deconstruction phase of the cycle, the teacher
collectively constructs a text with students on some aspect of the academic con-
tent of the lesson about which students have familiarity and content knowledge.
Finally, students are asked to create their own texts, independently drawing on
the meaning-making resources that were learned during the deconstruction and
joint construction phases of the lesson.
The Teaching-Learning Cycle is consistent with sociocultural theory because
of its emphasis on developing conscious awareness and control of purposeful
genre-specific language resources. Additionally, instruction on academic literacy
practices, as opposed to only interpersonal forms of daily communication, is also
a major goal and purpose of CBI. The procedures also incorporate ZPD activ-
ity during the joint construction phase in which the teacher assesses students’
actual level of development and provides responsive assistance to enable students’
higher levels of conscious control of language and content. Troyan incorporated
each stage of the Teaching-Learning Cycle in his study, collected baseline data
on student written texts, and compared them to student independent construc-
tions at the conclusion of the unit. What he found was that after participation
in the genre-based unit, all students made statistically significant improvements
(p <. 001) on their written texts, albeit not to the same degree.11 Moreover, the
42 Richard Donato
longitudinal nature of Troyan’s study and the variability in student performance

provide clear evidence of literacy development in the ZPD and not just textual
reproduction. In this study, CBI became the site for the development of advanced
academic literacy skills in which students explored language as a tool to express
and elaborate their thinking about historical monuments in written disciplinary
discourses.
Enacting ZPD activity in CBI lessons is clearly hard work. What both these
studies illustrate is that ZPD activity is not simply a benign social interaction
where one member ostensibly assists another through the completion of a peda-
gogical task. To create and energize a ZPD experience requires careful moment-
to-moment assessments of where students are in their development, contingent
assistance given at a particular moment in instructional time, and the willingness
to adjust assistance dynamically as students change. Both studies show that ZPD
interactions during instruction enables the language of content to be made vis-
ible to students, to be the focus of attention at the service of meaning making in
academic subject matter, and to be available as a resource for future learning and
performance. Vygotskyan educational dialectics are also illustrated in these two
studies. As students learn how content is construed through explicit focus on the
language of disciplinary practice, these content-specific/genre-specific language
resources enable students to further expand and deepen content knowledge, lit-
eracy skills, and conceptual understanding.
Implications for Preparing Teachers for CBI Programs

Sociocultural theory offers guidance concerning the types of instructional skills,
knowledge, and dispositions required for a teacher to be successful in a content-
based program. Based on the major sociocultural concepts of learning and devel-
opment, I make three recommendations for initiating teachers to the experience
of integrated content and language learning. The three recommendations involve
preparing teachers to observe, analyze, and incorporate the type of talk, texts, and
tasks that support the integration of language and content in CBI programs.
Mediating Content Talk in CBI Classrooms

Sociocultural research has shown the value of students-teacher and student-
student discursive collaboration in supporting language learning and develop-
ment. From a sociocultural perspective, language learning is more than the mere
provision of input to students who act as solitary processors of what they hear
and understand. Mediation is central to understanding how collaboration leads
to learning and development through the use of various cultural tools, artifacts,
and practices, discursive interactions being one of the most pervasive and ame-
nable to examination and analysis among them.
To prepare teachers to meet the challenges of integration, teachers’ attention

needs to be drawn to the consequential uses of talk during instruction, and the
particular discursive moves that lead students to the adoption and appropria-
tion of ways of speaking in the context of content lessons. To this end, teach-
ers should become proficient in the types of interactive procedures used during
Dynamic Assessment (Poehner, 2007; Poehner & Lantolf, 2010) in which media-
tion through contingent and graduated assistance is provided simultaneously as
students attempt to communicate. Consistent with sociocultural theory, Dynamic
Assessment is a way for teachers to move beyond the linear view that language
mastery is required before language use. Further, the practice of Dynamic Assess-
ment illustrates how higher forms of human cognition, including symbolic
systems such as language, is a socially mediated process brought about in collab-
oratively constructed talk-in-interaction where language supports the exploration
of content, and content simultaneously becomes a site for language development.
Understanding the Language of Texts in New Ways

Preparing a CBI teacher also requires a reconceptualization of the ways that
spoken and written texts create meaning in the disciplines, what is termed the
mode continuum in Systemic Functional Linguistics. The grammatical rules of
thumb that permeate language textbooks for the generation of grammatically
correct sentences needs to be replaced with a scientific view of language that
uncovers the language resources frequently used for spoken and written disci-
plinary practices. The work of the Sydney School (Fang & Schleppegrell, 2008;
Rose & Martin, 2012) is relevant here and complements the sociocultural view
of the functional and guiding use of words in concept formation and abstraction
(see Chapter 11 in Van der veer & Valsiner, 1991). To this end, teachers need
knowledge of functional grammar for analyzing texts, as observed in the Fitzger-
ald (2014) and Troyan (2013) studies. This functional linguistic knowledge will
enable teachers to select useful texts for instruction and to identify the contex-
tualized language focus of content-based lessons. In the same way that teachers
mediate students’ language in collaborative interactions, teachers’ knowledge of
particular language features of texts will mediate their own planning practices.
Reconfiguring Pedagogical Tasks for CBI

Engaging academic tasks are essential in CBI classrooms that provide students
with opportunities for interaction with the teacher and each other, with the
appropriate level of challenge, and with a purposeful outcome so that language
and content learning can emerge as a goal of the task. One way that novice CBI
teachers can experience sociocultural principles of learning and development in
action is to introduce academic content into skill-based tasks commonly used
44 Richard Donato
in language instruction. To this end, the use of content-based information-gap

tasks and the use of contrasting cultural images create conditions for thought
and language to merge and for exploration and internalization of the academic
lexis of a discipline. In both cases, it can help teachers begin to understand how
academic content can be fused with language learning and become a site for rich
discussions where language development can take place.
Information-gap tasks, which promote student-to-student oral communica-
tion but often fall short of meaningful and purposeful activity, can easily be
re-purposed by changing their goal from rehearsal of thematic vocabulary (e.g.,
completing a floor plan with rooms of in a house) or repetitive grammatical
structures (e.g., identify the price of certain objects) to sharing information that
is based on interesting academic content knowledge. Transforming the use of
visuals, which are commonly used by teachers in the presentation of vocabu-
lary, from language practice to content exploration is another way to introduce
novice teachers to CBI. Using a series of images of a cultural product or practice
provides occasions for students to hypothesize, discuss, and learn about cultural
perspectives beyond superficial cultural representations. (Barnes-Karol & Bro-
ner, 2010; Kramsch, 1993; NSFLEP, 2006). Exploring various and contrasting
images of cultural products and practices also have the added benefit of embed-
ding language that is culture specific and introducing students to their historical
significance.
In both cases, content-based information-gap tasks and use of contrasting cul-
tural images create conditions for thought and language to merge and for explo-
ration and internalization of the academic lexis of a discipline. These tasks also
require supportive collaboration where Zones of Proximal Development are cre-
ated and where mutual language assistance is provided in context at the service of
the academic content objective.
Conclusion
Content-based instruction is a paradigm case for the application of sociocultural
principles to pedagogical practice. The theory offers insight into the ubiquitous
challenge of integrating language and content and provides a framework for
explaining and understanding how thinking is born through words and how
words realize thought (Vygotsky, 1986, p. 251) through mediation in social
interaction, the most pervasive form of mediation in classrooms.
To overcome the challenge of integrating language and content in CBI requires
transforming teachers’ beliefs about instruction, in particular the belief that lan-
guage learning is a linear process that requires unlinking language from content
before it can be used productively as a tool to explore compelling and challeng-
ing academic subject matter. Preparing teachers with a deep understanding of
the talk, tasks, and texts of CBI is one way to address the widespread finding
concerning the challenge of integration. The work of Lyster and his colleagues
on counterbalancing contextualized form-focused and content-based instruction

in immersion pedagogy is currently addressing this issue (see, for instance, Cum-
ming & Lyster, chapter 4 this volume). Additionally, those working with the
systemic functional linguistic approach to academic literacy education through
the implementation of the teaching and learning cycle, discussed and illustrated in
the Troyan study, also maintain that teachers need to be equipped with functional
knowledge of the language of academic texts and pedagogical ways to make
students aware of the meaning-making potential of particular language choices.
The problem of optimal integration will not be resolved until it is under-
stood that thought is not simply expressed in words; it is realized in them
(Vygotsky, 1986). Language, therefore, needs to be reconceptualized as func-
tions and choices (Unsworth, 2000) that construct disciplinary texts, thinking,
and concept development. Classroom instruction also needs to move away from
the teacher-fronted versus student-centered dichotomy. Rather, the classroom
should become a site where students’ current level of development meets their
future potential through appropriate forms of moment-to-moment mediation
by the teacher and by each other. In this way, the classroom is simultaneously a
place where instruction and assistance, as it has been defined in this chapter, is
provided in the context of students’ meaningful exploration of academic subject
matter.
Content-based instruction in its various curricular forms holds great promise
for improving language instruction. In this chapter, I have tried to show that if
approaches to CBI are based on traditional notions of lesson planning, instruc-
tional delivery, and classroom interaction, integration will remain a challenging
goal and vexing pedagogical problem. Sociocultural theory and research find-
ings from this perspective provide evidence that language and content linkages,
fundamentally important to CBI, can be understood and enacted through an
educational praxis (Lantolf & Poehner, 2014) in which teachers’ instruction is
theoretically based while, at the same time, a reflexive activity that informs,
deepens, and elaborates the theory. In this way, teachers of CBI can create class-
room environments where language, content knowledge, and concept develop-
ment can emerge as a matter of course.
Notes
1. In this chapter I use the term language to mean foreign and second language learn-
ing and the term content-based instruction to refer to language programs that provide
students with instruction intended to develop academic subject matter knowledge
while simultaneously supporting additional language learning. Although program-
matic differences exist in time devoted to instruction, teacher preparation, curricu-
lum integration, and the degree of focus on academic content, from a theoretical
perspective, the principles of language learning and concept development apply
across a variety of content-based program models.
2. What is quite remarkable is that this theory seems to still be espoused today and
can be seen in approaches such as Processing Instruction, the Natural Approach, and
46 Richard Donato
Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling (formerly known as Total

Physical Response Storytelling, or TPRS).
3. Clearly this brief statement does not do justice to Vygotsky’s theorizing on the crisis in
psychology of his time. For a discussion of the “crisis,” see Lantolf and Thorne (2006).
4. For a discussion of the difference between appropriation and internalization, see
Wertsch (1998).
5. When sociocultural theory is invoked as a framework for a particular instructional
approach, it is often reductively defined as learning in social context. Indeed, this
is one aspect of the theory. Sociocultural theory is much richer, however, and to
understand fully the social dimensions of the theory requires a broader knowledge
of related sociocultural concepts and advances in the field.
6. The tripartite representation of talk, task, and text has been introduced as a frame-
work for curriculum development and instruction in several academic areas. The
earliest reference to this concept can be found in Patthey-Chavez and Clare (1996).
7. Other types of asyndetic constructions include relational, mental, and verbal pro-
cesses with mental processes of cognition, desire, perception, and emotion used
approximately 58 percent of the time in historical texts to mark causal relationships
(Fitzgerald, 2014).
8. The classic and most often cited definition of the ZPD is
The distance between the actual development level as determined by indepen-
dent problem-solving and the higher level of potential development as deter-
mined through problem-solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with
more capable peers. (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 86)
9. Some sociocultural scholars (e.g., Chaiklin, 2003; Lantolf & Thorne, 2006: Swain,
Kinnear, & Steinman, 2015) have pointed out that because the ZPD is such a popular
concept it has been frequently misused to refer only to establishing supportive social
interactions for the completion of pedagogical tasks. This problem with this limited
conceptualization of ZPD activity is that it does not take into account the overarch-
ing goal of instruction in the ZPD, that is, the individual’s development of portable
concepts leading to self-regulated mental functioning across various analogous tasks
(i.e., without extensive assistance from external tools or others). A second objection
that has been raised is that the ZPD is often referred to as a location rather than
an activity. The ZPD is best understood as a dynamic, dialogic, and emergent activity
that creates bidirectional change in students because of expert mediation and change
in mediators and their meditational means because of students’ moment-to-moment
responses. In this chapter, whenever possible, I emphasize the dynamic activity-
oriented meaning of the ZPD.
10. Within Systemic Functional Linguistics, these three areas of meaning are called
respectively the Ideational (representing experience), Interpersonal (enacting a social
relationship), and Textual (presenting texts in context) metafunctions of language.
11. For a detailed description of the quantitative and qualitative analyses that were con-
ducted on a sample of student written texts, see Troyan (2013).
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3
SCAFFOLDING ADVANCED LITERACY
IN THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE
CLASSROOM
Implementing a Genre-Driven
Content-Based Approach
Marianna V. Ryshina-Pankova
Introduction
The field of foreign language (FL) education is confronted with many challenges
today: FL departments are being closed on university campuses, FL programs are
disappearing from schools, and consequently FL professionals face an unfavorable
job market. In the face of these challenges various calls for curricular reform and
reconceptualization of the goals of study beyond linguistic learning and oral pro-
ficiency and in terms of achieving multicultural competence and multiple litera-
cies have emerged (e.g., MLA 2007 report). At the same time, the very construct
of literacy has undergone a dramatic change. Rather than being defined as the
ability to read and write, literacy is now understood in much broader terms and
refers to active participation in social practices typical of various cultural settings,
including those of the academy and the profession (e.g., Gee, 1998). In the con-
text of FL instruction, literacy has come to mean exploration of these practices
and multicultural perspectives on them through engagement with authentic FL
texts that represent these academic and professional discourses (e.g., Byrnes &
Maxim, 2004; Kern, 2000; Swaffar & Arens, 2005).
The attempt to reconceptualize FL teaching and learning in terms of literacy
development is a significant step forward crucial for enabling students to use a
FL competently in a multilingual and multicultural world. It is also necessary for
asserting the importance of FL study for humanistic learning valued in secondary
and tertiary education settings. However, while an orientation toward literacy as
sociocultural practice can form a felicitous overarching framework for achiev-
ing the new goals of FL study, in and of itself it is too broad to be effective in
organizing a FL curriculum and implementing pedagogy that address human-
istic learning goals by integrating language and content, language and culture,
52 Marianna V. Ryshina-Pankova
and language and critical thinking learning through the study of texts. In fact,
the use of a literacy-oriented approach presents educators with the following
challenges in FL instruction: the problem of defining the principles of content
selection, the problem of content and language sequencing, and the problem of
a language- and content-integrating pedagogical approach that would lead to
literacy.
The identified problems all relate to the task of scaffolding learner literacy
development, which my contribution to the volume will specifically address.
I start with the conceptualization challenge (Section 1) and focus on the concept
of genre as a notion that can (1) help operationalize literacy development by
linking social processes and language use and (2) serve as a crucial curricular
building block instrumental for selecting and sequencing materials and integrat-
ing content and language. In the section that follows (Section 2), I illustrate the
theoretical discussion by demonstrating how, in a thematic unit located in a
content-based course at the advanced level of instruction, genre and genre pro-
gression enable one to integrate content and language learning, and target criti-
cal thinking development. I then turn to the realization challenge (Section 3) and
briefly report on the experience of implementing a literacy-oriented genre- and
content-based curriculum in my home department at Georgetown University.
And finally, I conclude by discussing the teacher education challenge (Section 4) that
necessitates careful scaffolding of instructor expertise in an integrated literacy-
oriented program.
Operationalizing Literacy Development in Terms

of a Trajectory of Genres
The Concept of Genre

The question that we pose in this section is the following: How can FL instruction
address and enhance student literacy development as learning the typical ways of
doing (i.e., cultural practices), knowing (content), and saying (language) in the
foreign cultural world? Stated differently: What theoretical construct could allow
instructors to conceptualize language learning both as a fluid process of partici-
pating in cultural practices and knowledge construction and as a static product
of these practices as in texts? Such a twofold look at language learning requires
a new conceptualization of language as reflecting and construing social reality
for which FL professionals can turn to the systemic function theory of language
(SFL) (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004; Martin & Rose, 2003). In contrast to a com-
mon conceptualization of language as a “thing” to be acquired, this theory views
language as a meaning-making potential that gets actualized in situated texts
as instances of cultural situation types. These cultural situation types have also
been described as staged, goal-oriented, social processes in which speakers engage
verbally as members of culture, or genres (Martin, 2009; Martin & Rose, 2008).
Scaffolding Advanced Literacy 53
In the SFL model of language (see Figure 3.1), genres emerge at multiple lev-
els: at the level of the context of culture as a way to achieve culturally significant
communicative purposes in a staged manner; at the level of the context of situa-
tion as a purposeful action within a specific activity or field, in engagement with
other discourse participants or tenor, and through particular semiotic channel or
mode ; at the semantic level as “instances of social meanings” related to the con-
textual variables of field, tenor, and mode; and at the linguistic level where these
generic purposes, situational variables, and meanings are construed in language
through texts by means of various linguistic systems.
Thus, if one follows this model, the analysis of linguistic realizations helps one
describe the situational and cultural context of language use, just as the analysis of
the contextual factors can help predict the peculiarities of language (Halliday &
Hasan, 1989).
Table 3.1 gives an illustration of the ways the aspects of context and content
relate to the aspects of language use for the familiar genre of written recipe.
The communicative goal of this genre is achieved through the textual stages
of Ingredients, Cooking Instructions, and Serving Suggestions and the use of
Context:
Genre
Register (field, tenor,
mode)
Content:
Semantics (ideational,
interpersonal, textual
meanings)
Content:
Lexico-grammar
Expression:
Phonology
Expression:
Phonetics
FIGURE 3.1 Stratified model of language, based on Halliday and Matthiessen, 2004,
p. 25.
TABLE 3.1 Aspects of Context and Aspects of Language in a Recipe Genre
Aspects of Context; Semantics Aspects of Language Use

Genre: communicative purpose Stages: Ingredients, Cooking Instructions,
Giving instructions Serving Suggestions
Field: nature of activity Verbs of cooking, nouns referring to food,
Cooking circumstances of manner, time
Tenor: relationship between participants Imperatives
Formal; expert–user
Mode: role of language Listing, adverbs of time, graphic layout
Written; constitutive
imperatives as a language resource that realizes instructions. The nature of activ-

ity is construed through verbs of cooking, nouns referring to food, and cir-
cumstances of manner (as in stir gently). The relationship between participants
is construed in terms of formal instructing (use of formal imperatives). And the
role of language as constituting the activity through a written medium is real-
ized in a particular layout of recipes (a column with ingredients, followed by
text) and chronological structuring of instructions through listing (e.g., 1. 2. 3.)
or adverbs of time (e.g., first, next).
Addressing the Learning of Cultural or Thematic Content

and Language through Genre
Inasmuch as the concept of genre encompasses the contextual, semantic, and
lexicogrammatical planes (Figure 3.1), it provides practitioners with a model of
culture (Martin & Rose, 2008) that is most explicitly language based. Within
such a model, there is no need to separate the social and the semiotic, as the social
is in fact semiotically construed, with language being the most powerful of the
semiotic means. There is also no need to separate language and language use or
semantics and pragmatics. Semantics or the entire meaning potential of the sys-
tem is constituted by pragmatics as instances of language use, with instances and
the system appearing on the two ends of the continuum rather than being rigidly
contrasted (Matthiessen, 2006).
Such a model of language as social semiotic has important implications for lan-
guage learning and teaching. First, it views language learning as learning through
contextually based instances that represent instance types or genres and lead to grad-
ual approximation toward the meaning potential that can, however, never be fully
reached. Thus, one can never “know” the language but only can use it in certain
situations: the greater the range of those situations, the more this “know” entails.
Applying this conclusion to FL instruction, the notion of genre legitimizes, so to
say, the teaching of instances of genres as texts. Exposure to an increasingly greater
number of instances as texts affords exploration of both, the meaning-making
language resources that constitute some parts of the language system, as well as the
system of situational contexts that constitute a foreign culture (Matthiessen, 2006).
Second, knowing the language in terms of using it in certain instances has to
do with being able to deploy language resources to make meaning in these situ-
ations about something and for or with someone. In other words, knowing the
language presupposes knowing to construct meaningful content through it—the
greater the range of contents, the more capable the language user. This implica-
tion is particularly important for organizing a content and language integrated
FL program where one of the most challenging problems has been selection of
the right curriculum building block.
For example, the traditional approach to language teaching has used grammar
rules or language structures as its curriculum building unit, thus giving prefer-
ence to the formal aspects of language. In communicative language instruction,
it has been communicative situations, whereby the contextual aspects were in
greater focus. In the pragmatics-oriented approach, the communicative func-
tions have been emphasized (see, for example, the notional-functional syllabus,
Wilkins, 1976), but not necessarily the impact of specific cultural contexts on the
realization of the functions through a choice of particular language forms. And
finally, content-based instruction often privileged exploration of domain- or
discipline-related themes, taking for granted the ability to use appropriate lan-
guage resources that constitute these themes (see Byrnes, 2005, for an overview
of various approaches to content-based instruction).
In contrast to these approaches to FL instruction, it seems that, from the theo-
retical standpoint, the concept of genre characterized by its multi-stratal nature
(Figure 3.1) is best equipped to address the disconnect between language form,
content, and context. Because genre is constituted via the various links between
subject matter or social activity (e.g., remembering the past), discourse participants
(e.g., writers and readers), and communicative goals (e.g., to narrate a sequence of
events and share one’s attitudes and perspective on them) that are realized through
textual organization and lexicogrammatical use, it can play an instrumental role
in conceptualizing content in content-based instruction as discursive. In other
words, content can be defined as language use in texts emerging from specific
cultural contexts, and, conversely, language can be seen as a purposeful construer
of content in these contexts.
From the practical perspective, the SFL-based genre theory has been success-
fully applied to foster academic literacy development and content learning in
various instructional settings. In Australia, where the genre-based pedagogy
originates, it has been used in the primary and secondary school contexts to sup-
port instruction in science, history, and English by helping teachers and learners
understand connections between language and knowledge construction in these
content areas (e.g., Callaghan, Knapp & Noble, 1993; Christie & Derewianka,
2008; Christie & Martin, 1997; Coffin, 2006). In the United States, this theory
has been recently adopted both for teaching subject areas in K–12 in English in
contexts where English is learners’ native language (e.g., Brisk, 2015; Gebhard &
Harman, 2011; Harman, 2013; Schleppegrell, 2004) and for developing literacy
among college-level second or heritage learners (e.g., Bunch & Willett, 2013;
Colombi, 2009; Schleppegrell & O’Hallaron, 2011; Schleppegrell & Oliveira,
2006). In bilingual education in Europe, known as CLIL (content and language
integrated learning), the genre approach has been employed for programmatic
structuring and creating a “multilingual genre map across the curriculum”
(Lorenzo, 2013, p. 385). Finally, the SFL-inspired genre-based curriculum and
pedagogy constitute the basis of at least two FL programs in the United States: at
Georgetown and Emory (see more on this in Sections 3 and 4).
Drawing Connections between Situations and

Advanced Language Use
Exactly how social processes as genres and situation types relate to advanced
language use can be demonstrated by juxtaposing the situational and linguistic
characteristics of advanced literacy settings. From the perspective of contextual
characteristics, advanced literacy activities are characterized by two different
types of distance in the relation between aspects of situation and language use:
experiential and interpersonal (Eggins, 2004). With regard to the experiential
distance, in some situations language accompanies experience (i.e., conversing
at dinnertime) or renders it as it happened in time and place (narrating). By
contrast in others, like in advanced literacy tasks such as an argumentative essay,
language constitutes the social process and thus no longer renders experience as
is. Instead, it reconstrues it interpretatively, re-creating the social context entirely
through text. With regard to the interpersonal distance, in some social processes
discourse participants are close to each other, both in time and space and in
terms of a familiar personal relationship. By contrast, in the activities character-
istic of advanced literacy contexts, discourse participants, for example, writer of
an argumentative essay and her readers, are distanced from each other, both in
terms of geographical (the audience is not immediately present and cannot give
feedback) and psychological space (the writer addresses non-intimates).
These types of situational distance typical of advanced literacy contexts are
construed through language use in which the relationship between wordings and
meanings is indirect, incongruent, and metaphorical. The following two ways to
construe the meaning of the Nazi time for contemporary Germans demonstrate
the differences involved in congruent versus incongruent formulation (the second
example is taken from an argumentative essay by an advanced learner of German):
When people in Germany remember the Nazi time, they still feel uneasy
about it.
The Nazi time in Germany still leaves an obvious and significant wound in
contemporary German society.
The contrast between the sentences can be noted on three levels: contextual, seman-
tic, and linguistic. In terms of contexts of use, the first sentence is more likely
to occur in an oral mode in a class discussion, while the second sentence can be
expected to appear in a written essay. Semantically, in the first sentence there are
two situations that involve generic participants (German people) and two processes
(remember, feel uneasy) that are connected temporally (when). In contrast, the second
sentence presents only one situation that involves an abstract participant (Nazi time)
and a metaphorical process (leave a wound). Finally, linguistically, in the first sen-
tence, participants are rendered through nouns, actions through verbs, and the tem-
poral link between the situations through a conjunction. Thus, in this sentence, the
relationship between semantic and linguistic categories is congruent because the
prototypical function of the grammatical class of nouns is to refer to people or
things, of verbs to refer to actions, and of conjunctions to refer to logical relations.
In contrast, in the second sentence, linguistic realizations of the constituents of
the clause (participant and actions) are metaphorical. The abstract participant that
in fact refers to a conglomerate of situations and not just one entity or person(s) is
expressed through an abstract noun (The Nazi time). Within this context, the pro-
cess is construed as a so-called range or scope construction (Halliday & Matthies-
sen, 2004, pp. 192–193), where the meaning is actually also concentrated in the
noun (leaves a wound ) and not in the verb. Incongruity results from using gram-
matical categories, in this case nouns, in a non-typical way, not to refer to single
entities or people but to refer to semantically more complex phenomena or situa-
tions. In systemic functional theory, such incongruent constructions are referred
to as grammatical metaphors (GMs) (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004). In linguistic
terms, Halliday has described the shift toward GMs as a move from dynamic and
verb-dominated to the static and noun-dominated discourse. Semantically, GMs
allow for a different type of meaning making where the transitory and dynamic
nature of experience is objectified in language in terms of stable entities (nouns,
nominalizations) that can be reflected on, evaluated, and interpreted.
Understanding the Move toward Advanced Literacy in

Terms of Linguistic and Cognitive Challenges Associated
with Incongruent Genres
The construct of GM helps elucidate the shift toward advanced literacy. The
nature of this shift is not only linguistic, realized as a preference for nominal
style in language, but importantly also semantic, understood as incongruity called
for by the communicative demands of literacy contexts where learners have to
use language to learn content and construct knowledge in a particular thematic
domain. This means that the source of difficulty that characterizes advanced lit-
eracy genres is not purely linguistic; it is also conceptual. The cognitive challenge
results from the remapping between the categories of experience and their con-
strual through language means.
This move into incongruity has been identified as a crucial aspect of develop-
ment in various contexts: English as a native language, second language, and FL
learning. For example, in English as a native language, it is precisely this increase in
incongruity that has been shown to contribute to the challenge of transition from
primary education to secondary education where one starts exploring disciplinary
content (Christie & Derewianka, 2008; Halliday, 1993). At this point of schooling
and literacy development, learners have to shift from construing experience in
narrative terms by chronologically rendering the flow of real events to reconstru-
ing it in disciplinary terms as abstract categories and various types of relationships
(e.g., cause-effect or taxonomic) between them. With regard to genres, learners
have to come to terms with the requirements of the account genre that renders
events in terms of not only temporal sequences (as in a recount) but also causality
and explanation genre that presents causes, consequences, and evaluations of social
phenomena (Christie & Derewianka, 2008; Coffin, 2006).
Similarly, successful transition into tertiary education can be seen in terms of
overcoming the challenge of further increase in incongruity where there are even
fewer connections between experience as is and the way it is reconceptualized
through language. The prevalent genre at the college level is that of argumenta-
tion and discussion. The goal of these genres is interpretation of reality in terms of
various perspectives on it. This means that the discussed events are no longer pre-
sented as chronological or cause-effect sequencing but as a textually constructed
ordering of the interpretations, explanations, and evaluations of these events.
As pointed out earlier, a more reflective stance is enabled through the use of
incongruent grammar or GMs where processes are turned into things and states by
means of nominalizations or abstract nouns that are connected to each other inter-
pretatively (e.g., these actions demonstrate the plausibility of the hypothesis), evaluatively
(e.g., his statement was provocative), or causatively (e.g., acceptance of this position led to
more openness in the debate). Thus, GMs as well as grammatical relations they enter
into constitute powerful resources of literacy indispensable for knowledge con-
struction in advanced literacy genres (Schleppegrell, 2004).
Finally, in the FL context, the use of GM has been shown to underlie the pro-
gression from the early-advanced to advanced level of instruction in a content-
and genre-based curriculum, as demonstrated in Byrnes’s (2014) longitudinal
study of various composition tasks by learners of German and in Ryshina-
Pankova’s (2006, 2010) investigations of quasi-longitudinal cross-sectional writ-
ing tasks. The data analyses in these studies point to a dramatic increase in the
use and functional deployment of GM realized as nominalizations as learners
move from the lower to the higher levels of language proficiency.
Sequencing Content and Language Learning

Using a Genre Approach
If genres as instances of meaning making in specific cultural contexts are the
building blocks, how could one arrange them on the continuum from congruent
to incongruent semiosis (i.e., production of meaning)? The genre model addresses

this challenge by offering a systematic approach to sequencing instructional
materials that simultaneously takes into account communicative goals, aspects
of contexts, and linguistic features. Learning content or culture and learning
language can be scaffolded in terms of the continua of distance within contex-
tual categories of field and tenor (as explained in Section 1). The progressions
in genres as configurations of these variables can be described as a movement
from personal, explicitly dialogic, mundane, and oral-like to increasingly public,
implicitly dialogic, domain-based, and written-like communication.
In practice, these sequencing principles have been applied in the context of the
subject of history (e.g., Coffin, 2006) or English (e.g., Macken-Horarick, 1998)
learning in schools. Because both history and English can be considered the pro-
totypical humanities content subjects, work done in these disciplines seems to
be highly relevant for fostering content and language learning in the context of
content-based FL instruction. Coffin’s (2006) sequencing of historical content
into a progression from personal recounts, to biographical recounts, to historical
recounts, to historical accounts, to factorial and consequential explanations, and,
finally, to argumentation as expositions, challenges, and discussions, has been used
in the curriculum in my home department (Ryshina-Pankova, 2013) to structure
progression of genres across levels and to some extent of texts in thematic units
inside a particular level that I exemplify in the following section.
Fostering Content, Language, and Critical Literacy

Learning through Genre: An Illustration
This section aims to illustrate the use of genre and genre progression within a the-
matic unit in a course offered at the advanced level (after approximately 265 hours
of instruction) of the content and language integrated curriculum (http://german.
georgetown.edu/undergraduate/curriculum/overview). The unit is devoted to the
topic of Civil Courage and Opposition in Nazi-Germany and Today, which is one of
three themes in the course dealing with culturally salient issues in contemporary
German society.
Teaching Language and Content through Genre

The unit that culminates in a learner-produced argumentative essay (Erörterung)
on the issue of civil courage scaffolds learner content and language learning
through a sequence of increasingly more complex genres, in line with Coffin’s
(2006) framework.
Table 3.2 presents the progression in genres as a shift: moving from inves-
tigation of the theme as third- and first-person Jewish and German narratives
about instances of civil courage in the introductory phase, to explanations and
interpretations of the events through a reflection, and finally to two argumen-
tative expositions by historians, one supporting and the other one challenging
TABLE 3.2 Progression in Materials within the Civil Courage Thematic Unit
And When We Win Only an Hour, P. Narrative (third-person perspective)

Schneider (2001)
Public speech by the witness of the Narrative and reflection (first-person
Rosenstrasse events, R. Gross-Pisarek (1999) perspective)
Rosenstrasse film, M. von Trotta (2003) Filmic narrative (various perspectives)
Preface to And When We Win Only an Hour, Explanation, reflection
P. Schneider (2001)
Heroes without Names, N. Stoltzfus (2008) Argumentative exposition
Miracle and Reality, C. Habbe (2002) Argumentative exposition
an interpretation of the so-called Rosenstrasse protest as a successful opposition

movement. Thus, the content is explored as a rich tapestry of voices (Germans,
Jews, and Americans as participants and witnesses of the events and as contempo-
rary commentators and subject experts), a variety of foci on particular aspects of
events (e.g., list of events vs. cause-effect vs. interpretation), and various increas-
ingly complex textual patterns (chronological structuring vs. thesis-evidence).
From the language teaching standpoint, exploring content in the form of
such progression of genres means continuous scaffolding of language resources
necessary to fulfill the goals of these genres. Learning about the events of the
Rosenstrasse protest takes place through relating particular language forms to
the historical meanings in the various narratives in the first part of the unit. For
example, students are asked to identify historical participants and processes they
were involved in and relate them to their construal in language with the help of
the following graphic organizer (Table 3.3):
TABLE 3.3 Linguistic Realizations of Participants and Processes within the Topic Civil
Courage and Opposition in the Nazi Time and Today
Jews People who helped
People the vulnerable Jews the helpers
the persecuted the rescuers
the relocated the virtuous Germans
the murdered the supporters
those in hiding the respectable ones
the despised the citizens who offered housing
the rescued the silent heroes
Activities seek help help
depend on be prepared and willing to rescue
trust the helpers protect
hide rescue, save
go into hiding free (verb)
stand by those in need
risk one’s life
act nobly
This table helps learners discuss the events and, at the same time, expand
their vocabulary related to this historical content. The grammatical focus in
this unit is on the form and use of nominalized participles that help refer to the
participants of historical actions not only as Jews or Germans, but also in a very
precise descriptive way (e.g., the persecuted ). Nominalized participles that refer
to participants are a common feature in various other texts of the unit, as well.
Students are asked to identify them again in the last argumentative text Miracle
and Reality by Habbe and explain their form and their use by filling out the fol-
lowing table (Table 3.4):
TABLE 3.4 Participants in the Rosenstrasse Events as Nominalized Participles in Miracle

and Reality
The Jews in the Reference to what activity? Reason for the choice of the
Rosenstrasse event Active vs. passive referring term
the imprisoned to imprison—to get in the context of a brief
imprisoned summary of events, provides
information on what happened
in a concise way (Jews were
put in prison)
the arrested to arrest—to get arrested provides a contrast with the
events in focus: release vs. arrest
the ones related to to become related provides a reason for being
Aryans by marriage sent home in the context of
discussing factors that impacted
the result of the Rosenstrasse
operation
the ones married in a to get married provides a reason for being sent
German mixed marriage home
the affected to affect—to get affected helps include both prisoners
and their family members in
their fear of the future actions
of the Nazis
Historical content is further explored linguistically from the standpoint of

how it is shaped as particular genre structures. Students learn history as narrative
as they focus on the chronology of events by dividing these texts in line with
the temporal expressions. At the same time learners are asked to notice the shift
from chronological recounting of events to their evaluation and interpretation
as change in language use that now involves characterization of people and their
actions, mostly in terms of moral judgments. Table 3.5 that is based on the speech
by a witness of the Rosenstrasse event, Ruth Gross-Pisarek (1999), demonstrates
how learners can be guided to link various types of generic structuring to their
linguistic realizations in texts.
TABLE 3.5 Linguistic Construal of Historical Events as Chronology, Interpretation, and

Evaluation of Participants and Processes in the Speech by Gross-Pisarek
Narrative part of What happened?

the speech: When?
On Sunday evening, ........
February 27, 1943 ........
On Sunday ........
Whenever we came ........
In the night between ........
March 1 and 2
On the early ........
morning of May 6
Interpretative part Evaluation
of the speech
The event: the week as activities as qualities
from February 27 to
unquestionably
March 6, 1943
extraordinary event
The people: women rescue families brave, steadfast
and men could have escaped
a door stood open, but only a few
could walk through
tried to protect their men and children
to protect them from the worst
to protect them from being deported
and killed
built a protecting wall around them
leave behind something valuable
Nominalized activities: Nominalized qualities:
disguise, deceit, and fraud callousness
clever and self-assured appearance courage, loyalty
decency and dignity
something invaluable
Furthermore, the genre analysis of the ways historical meanings unfold in

argumentative texts leads to a focus on GMs (grammatical metaphors), often
expressed as nominalizations, that help condense and package specific events as
objectified abstractions that can be related to other events and further explained,
interpreted, and evaluated. In the Heroes without Names and Miracle and Real-
ity, the two argumentative texts in the unit, students identify instances where
dynamic events appear as static abstractions realized through nominalizations
that are juxtaposed with other events or evaluated, frequently through other
nominalizations. On the one hand, this exercise expands learner vocabulary
through such key words in the semantic field of the Civil Courage unit as opposi-
tion, opposition measures, act of opposition, dissent, demonstration, street protest, inci-
dents, coup, arrest, release, and their collocations (e.g., to put up resistance). On the
other hand, identification of these GMs allows learners to see how they func-
tion as a crucial resource for thesis statement (Table 3.6; GMs are bolded) and
for linking and unfolding argumentative meanings in texts (Table 3.7; dynamic
events are italicized, GMs are bolded; links between argumentative meanings are
represented by arrows).
The next emphasis in teaching language through historical content is on strat-
egies that present this content as a tapestry of perspectives and arguments about
the meaning of particular events. Learners are explicitly directed to recognize
linguistic resources that construe historical content as authorial opinion as well as
opinions of other experts about these events. To this end, they identify verbal or
mental processes, nominalized verbal or mental processes, and circumstances as
sources of mental or verbal processes that are used in the texts to introduce what
others think about the events (Table 3.8). Learners discuss the choice of these
resources with regard to the ways the authors signal support or distance from
these opinions (e.g., compare claim that expresses distancing vs. provides evidence
that signals alignment).
TABLE 3.6 Grammatical Metaphors and Thesis Statement in Two Argumentative Texts
Thesis statement in Heroes without Names Thesis statement in Miracle and Reality
The Rosenstrasse demonstrations may The release of 2,000 Jews from
not have been anything more than a gesture, Nazi custody was long seen as a
and collective street protests are perhaps miracle . . ., not quite justified.
not in the same league as resistance
in the form of a coup.
Nevertheless . . . modest street protests
were furthermore a form of protest for
ordinary citizens, which in some cases
actually swayed the Nazis to relent.
TABLE 3.7 Grammatical Metaphors and Linking of Meanings in Two Argumentative

Texts
Heroes without Names Miracle and Reality
On October 11, 1943, roughly 300 A week after mass protests began, the first of the
women protested on the street in prisoners were sent home. TThe courageouss aact of
Ruhrstadt Witten
n... resistance was unmatched in n the
t Third Reich.
The happenings (Vorkommnisse) However, these legendary events nt (Geschehen)
in Witten are particularly remarkable, apparently took place according to the Nazis’
because . . . plan.
TABLE 3.8 Linguistic Construal of Historical Content as Opinions about It in Two

Argumentative Texts
Verbal and mental processes Verbal and mental processes Verbal and mental
as nominalizations processes as circumstance
debate (about . . .) the historian Ekkehard Klausa according to Gruner
belief (that . . .) writes . . . in line with Gruner’s
thesis mentions assessment
interpretation concedes claims as per Gruner
assessment the leader of the memorial to
evidence German resistance Peter Steinbach
historical scholarship proclaims . . .
documentation the author Georg Zivier judges . . .
reporting the Berlin historian Wolf Gruner
research efforts comes to the conclusion . . .
the historians drew the
conclusion . . .
the American historian argues . . .
but his colleague Gruner provides
evidence
TABLE 3.9 Summarize the Contrastive Opinions of the Experts Cited in Miracle and
Reality
Source Opinion
Zivier Evaluates the protest in Rosenstrasse as an unequaled, courageous act of
resistance.
Goldhagen Claims that Germans could have also protested elsewhere, and if they had
acted as courageously as these women, then the murder of Jews would
have been limited.
Gruner Asserts that the release of the Jews was premeditated and the protests
were thus unnecessary. The Nazis proceeded according to their own
ingenious plan. He does not wish to relativize the unique act of resistance
of women. However, he does not consider these protests as a symbol of
successful German resistance to the anti-Jewish measures. It was not really
an effective form of opposition, according to Gruner.
At the same time, in conjunction with a discussion of these opinions and

voices in class, learners spell out the nominalized verbal processes (e.g., explain
what the debate or the belief is actually about) and summarize the substance of
the opinions introduced by the language means identified in the previous table.
Table 3.9 gives an example of such scaffolding for the Miracle and Reality text.
Furthermore, instruction on the textual resources used in argumentation
about the meaning of historical events includes demonstrating to the students
how the contrast between less and more credible opinions is rhetorically set up
in these argumentative texts through various means: through the use of a par-
ticular ordering of perspectives on the events, from less plausible to the ones that
the author is invested in; and through the use of such concessives as but, however,
indeed . . . but, one might think . . . but, as in the following examples from the two
argumentative texts of the unit:
The courageous act of resistance was unmatched in the Third Reich. . . .

However, these legendary events apparently took place partly according
to the Nazis’ plan.
(From Miracle and Reality)
The Rosenstrasse demonstrations may not have been anything more than a
gesture, and collective street protests are perhaps not in the same league as
resistance in the form of a coup. Nevertheless . . . modest street protests
were furthermore a form of protest for ordinary citizens, which in some
cases actually swayed the Nazis to relent.
(From Heroes without Names)
The final emphasis in instruction on the realization of authorial opinion and per-
suasion of the reader concerns the use of modalized expressions that help authors
present their perspective on history in a more polite and less confrontational way.
Learners focus on examples of modalization that involves the use of modal verbs,
modal adjuncts like probably, and the use of hypothetical statements with Subjunc-
tive II, the past subjunctive used to express uncertainty or an unreal condition in
German, to refer to potential scenarios:
The Rosenstrasse demonstrations may not have been anything more than
a gesture, and collective street protests are perhaps not in the same league
as resistance in the form of a coup.
Today it is probably too daring to admit . . .
According to Gruner, an effective opposition would have formed earlier
and among broader circle of the population.
(From Miracle and Reality)
Critical Literacy through Genre

While the goal of advanced literacy pedagogy is to enable learners to use lan-
guage to participate and function in an increasing variety of contexts and reg-
isters, including academic and professional settings, such participation should
not result in a compliant reproduction of social practices. The definition of

advanced literacy should necessarily include critical ref lection and engage-
ment that make it possible to question and potentially change these literacy
practices. Unsworth (2001) provides a useful definition of critical literacy that
includes the ability to decode and reproduce literacy practices, but surpasses it
in that learners develop “an understanding that all social practices, and hence
all literacies, are socially constructed” (p. 15). In other words, a crucial part
in learning language as a meaning-making tool used to achieve communica-
tive goals in various contexts has to do with learning to discern how selection
of particular language resources (1) helps privilege certain points of views,
(2) gives voice to particular discourse participants, and (3) at the same time,
neglects or excludes other perspectives and other voices from being heard.
The curricular model based on a genre-based approach promotes development
of critical literacy as defined above in that it supports a detailed analytical
approach toward literacy practices and their products by positing a dialectical
relationship between language and social context and offering an extended
apparatus of various categories, a “metalanguage” (Macken-Horarik, 2008), to
describe links between them.
As has been demonstrated in the discussion of the approach to literacy scaf-
folding within the Civil Courage theme, the pedagogy around the texts that stu-
dents read and discuss focuses on identifying and describing these links with the
help of such categories: for example, by attending to the connections between
social purposes and the staged structure of genres and varying lexicogrammati-
cal realizations (e.g., use of expressions of chronology or GM) that support such
generic staging. Through the exploration of texts as genres, like arguments in
support of a particular interpretation of historical events, learners are guided in
their discovery of specific language resources that are instrumental for present-
ing a partial stance as objective and for unfolding an argument as attitudinal
prosody that carefully leads readers toward acceptance of the authorial viewpoint
(e.g., reference to the voices of other experts, juxtaposition of opinions through
concessive structures, etc.).
Such an analytical approach toward language in context helps demonstrate to
the learners the constructed nature of literacy and develop their ability for criti-
cal distancing from texts and their messages, thus steering them away from trust-
ing any text as objective truth. At the same time, the critical aspect of advanced
literacy has to do with the increased potential to have one’s own voice heard
gained as a result of pedagogy that promotes conscious and strategic use of lan-
guage resources with the goal of reaching specific objectives in social contexts.
A discussion (Erörterung) writing task at the end of this unit serves exactly this
purpose: It is designed to guide students’ critical engagement by asking them to
reflect on the statement that asserts that the success of a dictatorship, just as the
success of a protest movement, depends not on the great leaders but rather on the
civil virtues of simple citizens.
To summarize, the discussion about the use of the genre model in this section
has demonstrated ways in which this approach can be instrumental in developing
advanced literacies as an ability to make meaning in various contexts, including
the specific content or subject area-related meanings, as well as critically distance
oneself from established literacy practices and products. What would implemen-
tation of such a curriculum approach involve? The next section addresses the
challenges of curricular revision toward a genre-based model and provides some
recommendations for initiating and sustaining the reform.
Implementation of the Approach: Lessons Learned
The Many Challenges of Implementation

Implementation of the genre-based literacy approach may require a major revi-
sion of the entire program as has been the case at my department (see Byrnes,
2001; Byrnes, Crane, Maxim, & Sprang, 2006; Byrnes, Maxim, & Norris, 2010;
Byrnes & Sprang, 2004; Crane, 2006; Eigler, 2001; Ryshina-Pankova, 2013). To
succinctly summarize this transition, the reform of the program required a com-
plete change (1) of materials that would no longer be determined by the text-
books and would reflect the necessary genre and literacy orientation; (2) of the
pedagogical approach toward materials, away from a random focus on gram-
matical form and toward an explicit focus on meaningful content and language
integration through engagement with texts; (3) and finally of assessment prac-
tices and instruments so that they would be able to capture literacy development
as spelled out in the goals of the program. Each area presented challenges for the
practitioners.
For example, when it came to materials development, the decision was made
to give up textbooks (except for the introductory level already heavily supple-
mented with additional materials) and collect texts as genres that would help
learners explore particular thematic foci related to various aspects of German
culture and history. Despite the benefit of being informed about the principles
of curricular progression, selection of texts appropriate for each level and their
sequencing remained a challenge. It required numerous meetings and discussions
about various content foci and texts that took place within joint faculty–graduate
student groups responsible for each respective curricular level. While engaging
in the task of developing materials, instructors had to fulfill several goals at the
same time: find texts that would be authentic, represent different modalities
(include visual and auditory texts), enable learners to explore an interesting and
relevant topic under focus, and display generic and lexicogrammatical features
appropriate for the level as a whole and for a smaller unit inside a course, in
particular.
With regard to the pedagogical approach that would provide guidance for
teachers in content and language integrating practice, curriculum developers
had to create worksheets and notes on instructional sequences that employed

the genre model. These pedagogical materials addressed connections of texts
and their particular target language features to aspects of contexts, whereby the
focus on specific formal features was motivated by their saliency as meaning-
making resources in the original texts. And finally, the changes in curricular and
pedagogic practice necessitated the development of new assessment instruments.
Specifically, teachers had to create text- and genre-based speaking and writing
tasks (Byrnes, Crane, Maxim, & Sprang, 2006) that would evaluate learner per-
formance, in terms of both content and language, at various levels of curricular
practice, that is, within thematic units, as well as during the final tasks at the end
of each course.
No matter the area of curricular reform targeted, no change could have been
accomplished without collaboration among all participants involved, that is,
faculty members and graduate students. This cooperative work involved the
development of a common knowledge base that included reading about and
appropriation of theoretical concepts, some of which were addressed earlier, and
the building of a common discourse related to the genre and literacy basis of
the curriculum. Drawing on this experience, Byrnes (2001) points out that the
success of collaboration in curriculum work is contingent on two major factors.
First, there is a need for a strong presence of a leader who initiates the reform and
introduces the other participants to fundamental readings and practices within
literacy curricula and content-based pedagogy and further expands the team’s
knowledge base through workshops and joint discussions. Second, the project of
reform has to become an intellectually stimulating opportunity (and not only
teaching practice!), whereby faculty can engage their research and content-based
expertise (see also Byrnes, 2013). It seems that it is particularly the literacy and
text orientation nature of the genre approach that can provide a common frame-
work for both linguists and literature and culture researchers, and that has the
highest potential for motivating and uniting experts on both sides of the typi-
cal divide (see, for example, Allen & Maxim, 2013; Barrette, Paesani, & Vinall,
2010; Byrnes, Maxim, & Norris, 2010; Levine & Phipps, 2012; the MLA, 2007,
on the discussion of the bifurcated departmental structures).
Lessons Learned from Practice: A Few Recommendations

for Implementation
To implement change within FL secondary instructional settings, language
teachers could use the conceptual framework of the genre model as well as the
existing evidence of its successful application to advocate for the approach in
their schools and school districts. The compatibility of the approach with the
existing curricula would probably be greatest in the FL Advanced Placement
(AP) or International Baccalaureate (IB) courses that are already oriented toward
learning language and culture through engagement with texts. At other levels of
FL instruction in schools, the approach can be piloted within one instructional

unit to be further showcased and used to persuade colleagues to adopt the model.
This recommendation applies to any settings, K–12 or collegiate education.
As a daunting and time-consuming process, a curricular reform does not have to
encompass the entire program from the start. In my department, it was initiated
within one course and then slowly extended toward other levels in the program,
the ones below and the ones above. It is important to remember that curriculum
renovation is a long-term project that requires agreement on the programmatic
goals and their realization, and considerable time, effort, and commitment from
the curriculum development team.
Our own practice confirms that curriculum construction is an evolving
endeavor that requires constant maintenance and revision, even now when the
bulk of the curriculum is firmly in place. For example, because the knowledge
base in our department has been continuously growing and materials continue
to be revised, the foci on linguistic features in the worksheets have to be further
refined in order to better reflect the connection between language and content.
Furthermore, tasks have to be modified as a result of these ongoing changes
(see, for example, Mozgalina & Ryshina-Pankova, 2015, on the changes in the
curriculum since its inception). However, the payoff is also worth it. Maxim,
Höyng, Lancaster, Schaumann, and Aue (2013), who have recently successfully
implemented and reported on a new literacy-oriented curriculum, also in a Ger-
man program, have eloquently summarized the importance and even the inevi-
tability of the genre-based curricular reform described here:
If we aim to develop learners with advanced German cultural literacy and

programs that demonstrate the centrality of foreign language studies for
a liberal arts education, then we need curricula that provide a transpar-
ent and coherent learner pathway that allows students the opportunity to
achieve advanced abilities in the language and to become familiar with
genre-based textual analysis to such a point that they will be able to con-
tinue that type of reading and thinking and arguing once they leave the
institution and move on to their next destination.
(p. 15)
Preparing Future Teachers for Conceptualizing and

Implementing a Literacy-Oriented Genre-Based
Curriculum
As noted earlier, curricular reform that reorients FL programs toward the long-
term goal of developing multiple literacies as a result of content and language
integration across all curricular levels can take place only if future teachers
have sufficient expertise and enthusiasm to initiate change and are committed
to program restructuring. The important question of educating the future FL
professionals who will be capable of renewing secondary and tertiary FL pro-

grams has been raised in various recent publications (e.g., Allen & Maxim, 2013;
Johnson & Golombek, 2011a). One of the central themes in this discussion is the
emphasis on teacher concept development that should be linked to and in fact
guide classroom practice (e.g., Dunn, 2013; Nauman, 2013; Willis Allen, 2013).
Concept development can be considered crucial in teacher education because
scientific concepts act as mediation tools that can allow teachers to overcome the
constraints of everyday activities and help them “problem solve across instruc-
tional contexts” (Johnson & Golombek, 2011b, p. 5).
Genre has precisely the potential of being a powerful concept in teacher edu-
cation, as it provides a link between a theory of language and culture and ways
this theory can bear on actual content and language integrated teaching. On the
one hand, the concept of genre as realization of culture encompassing all other
levels of the language system ( Figure 3.1) is a theoretical one. It fosters one’s
understanding of the systemic connections between language and social life,
broadening instructors’ view of what language and language learning are. On
the other hand, the concept of genre is a practical pedagogical construct that can
be applied at various levels of curricular practice: as a building block for the con-
struction of curricular trajectories toward advanced literacy, as an approach to
detailed structuring of pedagogical events, and as an instrument for assessment.
In our program, both theoretical and practical underpinnings of the concept
of genre are explored with graduate students through the readings and discus-
sions within the course Literacy and FL Teaching that functions as a required
“methods” course. But beyond this, graduate students learn about the powerful
application potential of the concept through various professional activities. As
preservice teachers, students observe classes taught in the curriculum and discuss
their observations in reflective written reports. These provide instructors with
an opportunity for verbalization (Galperin, 1989, cited in Johnson & Golombek,
2011b) that mediates their professional development by helping them draw con-
nections between theoretical constructs and actual teaching activities. As prac-
ticing teachers, graduate students continue to expand their understanding of
the genre approach through participation in workshops, materials development
projects, and biweekly level meetings led by the director of curriculum. Inter-
actions with more experienced colleagues regarding these activities, as well as
class observations and discussions of class video-recordings constitute important
mediation tools in the Zone of Proximal Development (Vygotsky, 1978). These
conversations facilitate noticing and conceptual reorientation thus fostering the-
oretically based but practice-oriented learning.
In other words, it is the curricular framework itself that provides a supporting
environment for graduate students, as they learn what integrated and advanced
literacy-oriented FL instruction means. In fact, when in spring 2014 faculty and
graduate students were asked to respond to a questionnaire about the genre-
based approach, they underscored the importance of the common curriculum
and noted that jointly conducted curricular work played a key role in support-
ing their instructional decisions. And yet, there is still space in the program for
further improvement in the integration of language and content, which could
be done through (1) the revision of worksheets that enable learners to explore
this link in discourse interpretation and production, (2) the introduction of new
texts through materials development, and (3) the reformulation of speaking and
writing genre-based tasks where this integration is further refined.
The challenge of teaching within a genre-based approach has been described
by some instructors in the questionnaire in terms of a struggle to find those lexi-
cogrammatical features in texts that are crucial for realization of communicative
purposes of these genres, in other words, those through which connections to
salient textual and contextual meanings are most apparent. One student teacher
describes the process of overcoming this challenge in the following way:
After selecting a few different texts per topic . . . we first identified the
generic stages in the texts; then we looked for lexicogrammatical charac-
teristics of each stage (such as, tense forms, temporal and discourse mark-
ers, conjunctions, active and passive voice, indirect speech, etc.); once a
pattern was identified, we focused on phrasal and textual reconstruction
through these lexicogrammatical characteristics; we ended by evaluating
the usefulness of our findings for practical application in matrices.
At the end, the quote points to yet another crucial task, namely, that of translat-
ing the knowledge gained as a result of the genre analysis into pedagogy as a
process of creating scaffolds for learners to discover the form-meaning connec-
tions and use them in their own production.
The difficulty of addressing form-function links in instruction is seen by
another instructor as a challenge not “to revert to form-based, rule-governed
explanations when introducing and explaining new grammar items in the intro
class . . . since students ask for rules that they can apply when using the lan-
guage.” This teacher, too, finds a solution in tying grammar explanations to
discussions of texts as genres:
When we were working with the “Klassenfahrt” text [a recount of a class

trip to Berlin] . . . we were able to identify the text’s communicative
purpose by looking at the syntactical structure of the sentences, which
highlighted the time phrases by placing them at the beginning of the sen-
tences. . . . We looked at syntax and the use of time phrases on a textual
and sentence level, and saw this use as reflective of the text’s communica-
tive function to recount an experience chronologically.
Continuous thinking about content and language integrated instruction that is

at the center of the genre approach turns teaching and learning into a process
of discovery. An experienced teacher in the program, who is a literature expert,

highlights this aspect of the approach by giving the following example. As a
result of the particular curricular emphasis on the meaningfulness of language
forms, she was able to see the use of passive voice in the genre of autobiographi-
cal narrative while utilizing an authentic text by the German bard singer Wolf
Biermann (1992) in the context of a unit on two German states. The work with
this text led to a class reflection on how the author selects passive voice as a par-
ticular linguistic resource to construe the major changes in his life as events “that
he had no control over/was forced to accept or . . . that he was able to influence/
shape actively.” Reflecting on the impact of such discoveries on her students and
her further teaching practice, this instructor comments,
It felt really good to not just go through the routine of the grammatical
forms of the passive—students were attentive, took notes, underlined in
their texts. On the spot, I actually had the idea for a task in which I would
ask students to write about their own lives or the life of someone they
know, making conscious choices about the use of the passive or active
voice in doing so.
The potential of the approach to turn teaching into an intellectual enterprise is

further evaluated as deeply satisfying:
I find it exciting that after all these years of learning to teach in a way that
integrates content and language, the approach continues to open up new
ways of looking at texts that I have taught many, many times. The example
above on the “Vita” [by Biermann] is one such case. I had taught the text
many times before, yet during one particular semester and in the classroom
while working with the text, it was almost an “epiphany” for me to realize
how powerful the choices of active or passive voice can be when we talk
about our own lives. Are we presenting our lives as being shaped by out-
side forces which do, of course, exist, or are we presenting them as much
as possible as of our own doing?—a philosophical question brought to the
fore by working on the passive voice with students in Advanced German.
Coda
In this chapter, my intention was to demonstrate ways in which advanced literacy
can be defined in terms of a relationship between the ability to construct knowl-
edge in a certain culturally and historically relevant content area in an academic
setting and the use of particular type of linguistic resources to do so. While the
content and language connection is crucial for the definition of advanced liter-
acy, an even more important aspect of it is well-developed meta-awareness about
ways specific language or, more generally speaking, semiotic resources construe
content in ideologically strategic ways. In other words, advanced literacy encom-

passes the ability to treat this connection between content and language criti-
cally through approaching interpretation and use of linguistic means as powerful
resources that help give voice to certain positions and downplay other ones.
Developing advanced literacy requires a particular theoretical framework that
allows one to conceptualize language in its connection to culture and social life.
It also requires a clear vision of the practical implementations of such concep-
tualization in advanced FL instruction throughout multiple curricular levels. In
the chapter, I argued that it is through the construct of genre that both of these
requirements can be fulfilled. Adopting the genre approach for the purposes
of curricular revision can be challenging, a complicated enterprise, indeed. It
necessitates the development of an extensive knowledge base and requires that
this one be shared with colleagues and translated into practice within various
contextually determined constraints. However, this is a project worthy of under-
taking, which has been confirmed by the success of genre-based curricula in
various contexts.
From the perspectives of teachers, whether they are applied linguists or lit-
erature and culture experts, K–12 or college instructors, the implementation of
a genre-based curricular model can prepare them well for the demands of FL
programs that have now been actively seeking ways to overcome the separation
of language and content teaching and establish their value more firmly in their
respective institutional settings. The genre theory and pedagogy present FL pro-
fessionals with an approach that is intellectually stimulating, as it is instrumental
for conceptualizing and implementing systematic connections between language
teaching, academic literacy development, and instruction in the content area or
in the area of personal and research interests and expertise. Sustaining these rich
connections will be crucial for fulfilling the overarching humanities learning
goals of FL study in school and collegiate contexts.
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4
INTEGRATING CBI INTO HIGH
SCHOOL FOREIGN LANGUAGE
CLASSROOMS
Joy Cumming and Roy Lyster
Introduction
The purpose of the present chapter is to explore the feasibility and effectiveness
of implementing content-based instruction (CBI) as an instructional approach
in a very specific and under-researched context: namely, high school classes of
French as a foreign language (FL) in New York State. Defined as “an approach
to instruction in which students are taught academic content in a language they
are still learning” (Lightbown, 2014, p. 3), CBI comes in many shapes and sizes.
Met (1998) described a wide range of different CBI settings along a continuum,
varying from content-driven second language programs at one end to more
language-driven programs at the other end. Although CBI is considered to “offer
as close to a comprehensive environment for second language development as is
possible in the classroom” (Wesche & Skehan, 2002, p. 227), research in support
of this has for the most part been conducted at the content-driven end of the
continuum in programs such as immersion, leaving open many questions about
its feasibility and effectiveness at the language-driven end of the continuum in
the non-immersion FL K–12 context.
Counterbalanced Instruction
The rationale for integrating CBI into an otherwise language-driven program
in the present study derives from the notion of counterbalance. Counterbal-
anced instruction accounts for the dynamic interplay between form-oriented
and meaning-oriented approaches to FL teaching. It does so by shifting stu-
dents’ attention between language and content, specifically toward language if
the classroom is primarily content driven, as is often the case in immersion
78 Joy Cumming and Roy Lyster
classrooms, or toward content if the overall classroom context is predominantly

language driven, as with many FL classrooms (Lyster, 2007).
Counterbalanced instruction has usually been invoked to explain the benefits
of integrating a form-focused component into French immersion programs in
Canada (Lyster, 2007). This is because immersion students who have been primed
by their instructional setting to be meaning-oriented learners benefit from form-
focused instruction designed to increase their awareness of form. Otherwise,
students whose primary concern is learning content can do so without precise
syntactic and morphological knowledge of the target language (Swain, 1988),
by drawing instead on “vastly greater stores of schematic and contextual knowl-
edge” (Skehan, 1998, p. 26).
Yet the converse is also true: Students in traditional FL programs who have
been primed by their instructional setting to be form-oriented learners benefit
from content-based tasks designed to reorient their attention toward meaning.
Counterbalancing their form orientation in this way contributes to their com-
municative abilities by averting an overemphasis on attention to form, which
may jeopardize their capacity to process other equally important aspects of the
input (Tomlin & Villa, 1994). In this sense, counterbalanced instruction is based
on Skehan’s (1998) argument that pushing learners who are either form ori-
ented or meaning oriented in the opposite direction is likely to strike a balance
between the two orientations in ways that promote accuracy, fluency, and com-
plexity in target language development.
The notion of counterbalance is encapsulated by the term content and language
integrated learning (CLIL), which is a form of CBI increasingly implemented in
Europe and elsewhere. CLIL embodies many characteristics similar to the present
study’s FL context and learning objectives (e.g., Coyle, 2007; Coyle et al., 2010;
Lasagabaster & Sierra, 2010; Mehisto, Marsh, & Frigols, 2008; Ruiz de Zarobe &
Jiménez Catalán, 2009).
Challenges in CBI
To design the present study, we took into account many of the challenges iden-
tified by previous studies conducted in similar FL contexts as well as the many
useful recommendations made by the researchers. For example, Kong and Hoare
(2011, p. 323) proposed the inclusion of the following features to guide CBI:
1. Appropriately challenging content;

2. Content objectives targeting the understanding of concepts and relation-
ships between concepts;
3. Related language objectives to support language development;
4. Instructional strategies that push students “to process the content in sufficient
depth using the appropriate academic language, explicitly taught as necessary.”
Integrating CBI into FL Classrooms 79
This line of research and development has emphasized the importance of orga-
nizing content around knowledge relationships (e.g., cause and effect, com-
parison, hypothesis, definition) in order to promote a cyclical unit structure
where learners are pushed to explore content from different and increasingly
more complex perspectives. Such an approach avoids using content only as a
vocabulary resource for practicing grammar and instead encourages the use
of subject-specific vocabulary that goes hand in hand with deeper learning
of the content (e.g., Chang & Xia, 2011; Hoare, 2010; Huang, 2003; Kong,
2009; Kong & Hoare, 2011; Mohan & Huang, 2002; Pessoa, Hendry, Donato,
Tucker, & Lee, 2007).
This bridging of content and language, however, is not an easy task to under-
take. Several studies have pointed out the challenges faced by teachers as they
take on the additional responsibility of teaching content without sufficient
content-specific knowledge (Cammarata, 2009, 2010; Cammarata & Tedick,
2012; Hoare, 2010; Kong, 2009; Pessoa et al., 2007). A related challenge also
expressed in the research is the lack of appropriate CBI resources and the result-
ing strain on teachers’ preparation time (e.g., Hoare, 2010; Lingley, 2006; Pessoa
et al., 2007). As explained by Cammarata (2009),
For CBI, teachers need to create curricular units that are much more
detailed than those commonly required in traditional settings. The result-
ing increase in preparation time (at least at the introductory level) is per-
ceived as a real constraint in a profession in which time is always an issue
and the lack of time for preparation is already a great source of anxiety.
(p. 571)
In addition, the shift in pedagogy necessary for FL teachers to implement CBI has
sometimes led them to perceive CBI as a threat to their preestablished teaching
styles and systems or as an overwhelming, rigid teaching pedagogy (Cammarata,
2009, 2010).
Rationale and Research Questions

The present study investigates the effects of using a counterbalanced approach to
CBI to integrate a primary focus on content and a secondary focus on language
into a French FL secondary school classroom in New York State, whose orienta-
tion prior to the study had a primary focus on language with a secondary and
occasional focus on content. The overall purpose of the study was to explore the
feasibility of shifting to a more content-driven FL teaching and learning experi-
ence, while responding to Cammarata’s (2009) observation that “CBI has long
been identified as a highly effective approach to L2 and FL education. . . . Yet
it remains rarely implemented in most conventional FL programs in the United
States today” (p. 560). The present study was thus designed to address the fol-
lowing research questions:
1. What are the effects of integrating a strong primary focus on content with a
secondary focus on language in predominantly language-focused New York
State French FL classrooms?
a) Is it feasible to integrate a primary focus on content in a language-

focused FL classroom context?
b) Do students benefit from this focus on content and, if so, how?
Methodology
Context and Participants

The present study was carried out in a small public high school in rural upstate
New York, specifically in two French III classes that were typical of FL classrooms
in this context: language driven, with content themes to provide context for
language practice, in addition to occasional cultural content. The participating
French teacher was a native speaker of a European variety of French who had
more than 25 years of teaching experience at the time of this study. Also partici-
pating were her 27 students enrolled in two sections of French III. These students
were tenth and eleventh grade adolescents (15–16 years old) in their fourth or fifth
year of studying French who came from English L1 households. Students enrolled
in French III had chosen this course either as an elective or to fulfill graduation
requirements for the New York State Regents Diploma with Advanced Designa-
tion. Students at this level were chosen because their background in French was
considered sufficiently high to facilitate the implementation of a CBI unit with
less scaffolding than would be required for less advanced learners.
Instructional Intervention
The topic of the CBI intervention was Les problèmes de l’environnement (Envi-
ronmental Issues), which was chosen in collaboration with the participating
teacher, based on the positive reaction that her students in the previous year had
with an environment-themed mini-unit she taught. After consulting relevant
intermediate-level environmental resources in French—especially at the Biblio-
thèque et Archives du Québec in Montréal—and with the help of the science
teacher at the participating school who volunteered as a content resource person,
a list of key environmental issues and topics was generated. A total of 20 key
environmental topics were chosen and grouped into four main categories:
1. Earth (waste, chemicals, fossil fuels, desertification, deforestation);

2. Air (climate change, global warming, ozone depletion, air pollution, wind
energy);
3. Fire and energy (forest fires, nuclear energy, solar energy, geothermal energy);
4. Water (oil spills, water pollution, overconsumption, overfishing, acid rain,
flooding, hydroelectricity).
The intervention lasted approximately 6 weeks and consisted of 40 minutes per

day, 5 days a week in each class. The strategy adopted for planning the unit took
into account various approaches that explicitly included both content and language
goals. Specifically, a triple focus on content goals, language goals, and learning
skills/cognitive goals (Coyle et al., 2010; Mehisto et al., 2008) was utilized as a
guideline within the framework of counterbalanced instruction (Lyster, 2007).
The content focus directed the progression of the unit, which was broken down
into three main phases (for a detailed account, see Morgan, 2013, pp. 49–53):
1. Phase 1 consisted of an introduction to environmental issues with an empha-

sis on cause-and-effect patterns as well as on comparing and contrasting
issues. Sample activities included content comprehension questions with
visual aids, cause and effect group puzzles, current-event environmental video
clip activities, SmartBoard matching activities with terms and corresponding
images, and a SmartNotebook sorting game in which items were grouped
into categories. Students also completed six content-based homework assign-
ments online through Edmodo (https://www.edmodo.com).
2. Phase 2 involved expert group projects in which students researched a chosen
issue in more depth, using an array of resource books made available in French.
They then shared their topic with other classmates by using Glogster (http://
www.glogster.com) to create a Glog (i.e., graphical blog), which served as an
interactive multimedia image to teach their peers about their specific topic.
3. Phase 3 was devoted to proposing solutions to environmental issues and cul-
minated in the creation of a Public Service Announcement as a final group
project, with the aim of convincing others to be environmentally conscious.
During this phase, there was collaboration between the two French classes
and two of the science teacher’s science classes, which involved a sharing of
their projects on the environment. Similar to Phase 1, this phase included
a series of review stations with content-based activities located around the
room in which students participated in groups of three that moved from one
station to another, including a video station where they listened to two envi-
ronmentally related music videos in French and then responded to related
questions, and a computer station where they completed an online survey in
French to determine their carbon footprint and how to reduce it.
Throughout the three phases, the participant teacher’s classroom format was
integrated as much as possible, with some modifications to maintain the French
content-focus goal of the study and to accommodate the unit’s schedule. For
example, her regular “bell-ringer” warm-up activities were adapted to review
environmental issues on a daily basis, and her “5 Questions” routine, which
usually targeted francophone culture, was reoriented as an environmental trivia

game. This was a desire of the teacher to help ease the transition of the new unit
so that it fit into her classroom routine and so some familiarity within the week-
to-week format was maintained before, during, and after the intervention unit.
During the intervention unit, the first author participated as a teaching assis-
tant. Although the preliminary research plan was to involve her as a nonpartici-
pant observer, the participating teacher expressed an interest in having her play
a more collaborative role in the classroom. As a result, the first author took on
an active role in the intervention by explaining content-specific concepts and
acting as a content specialist.
New vocabulary was introduced on a need-to-know basis so that language
was used as a tool for grasping the content rather than an end in itself (Cloud,
Genesee, & Hamayan, 2000; Coyle et al., 2010; Fisher, Frey, & Rothenberg,
2008; Gibbons, 2002; Mehisto et al., 2008). A two-page double-sided vocabu-
lary guide was created for students, based on the environmental topics being
covered and the most common terms that would be discussed within each topic.
The vocabulary was listed in French, with simple explanations in French, as well
as possible synonyms or an example sentence using the term. The vocabulary
terms were also grouped according to the four main subcategories (earth, air,
fire, and water).
The unit was composed of lessons and tasks with a primary focus on con-
tent and a secondary focus on language, co-designed by the classroom teacher
and the first author in consultation with relevant resources (Cloud et al., 2000;
Coyle et al., 2010; de Graaff, Koopman, Anikina, & Westhoff, 2007; Echevar-
ria, Vogt, & Short, 2008; Fisher, Frey, & Rothenberg, 2008; Folse, 2006; Lyster,
2007; Mehisto et al., 2008; Vogt & Echevarria, 2008). While the primary focus
was on environmental issues, a secondary language focus targeted (a) noun end-
ings as a clue to grammatical gender and (b) informal versus formal uses of tu/
vous imperative verb forms. The relationship between noun endings and gender
attribution was selected as a minor linguistic target because two specific endings
appeared quite frequently during the environmental unit: namely, nouns end-
ing in -tion (as in la pollution), of which 99.9% are feminine, and nouns ending
in -ment (as in l’environnement), of which 99.6% are masculine (Lyster, 2006).
Second-person imperative verb forms were selected as a minor linguistic target
because they occurred in obligatory contexts during the environmental unit,
specifically during the final phase focusing on solutions and explaining to others
what they can do to help the environment.
Data Collection and Analysis

A mixed-methods research methodology was used, with data collected through
pre-intervention classroom observations, a set of pre- and post-intervention mea-
sures, student questionnaires, field notes taken during the intervention, teacher
interviews, and student interviews. Quantitative and qualitative data-gathering

methods were combined to support one another, with the overall goal of strength-
ening the study (Creswell & Plano-Clark, 2007). All qualitative data were ana-
lyzed through a content analysis approach where observational notes and interview
answers were coded and examined for predominant, recurring themes. In this way,
a broad, holistic understanding of the feasibility of integrating a focus on content
into a language-focused learning context was sought. The quantitative data played
a supporting role, as a way to better understand what language and content gains,
if any, were made as a result of the content-focused intervention.
Classroom Observations
Part A of Spada and Fröhlich’s (1995) Communicative Orientation to Language
Teaching (COLT) observation scheme was used while observing the two French
III classes during a 5-day period prior to the intervention. This allowed (a) the
students to become familiar with the researcher’s presence and (b) the researcher
to better assess the content and/or language focus of this particular classroom
context. The “content” portion of the COLT scheme was specifically chosen and
used for the purpose of evaluating to what extent the two French classes were
meaning and/or form focused during a typical unit. The data were analyzed
by using the content focus(es) and length of each activity to calculate the mean
percentage of time spent during class on each category.
During the instructional intervention, observational notes were taken by
the first author, describing the overall classroom atmosphere and how students
responded to the primarily content-based tasks and activities, as well as any
other information that seemed pertinent at the time. The lessons in the unit
were video-recorded using a stationary camcorder in order for the researcher to
play back, verify observational notes, and later provide verification of coding as
needed. The video recording was strictly for supplemental support of observa-
tional notes and not for transcribing or coding of the video data itself.
Interviews
Before, during, and after the intervention, interviews were conducted with the
French teacher in English (in which she is fluent). A semi-structured format in
which open-ended questions guided the interview allowed the teacher to elabo-
rate and explore certain topics in depth when inclined to do so. Pre- and post-
intervention interviews were approximately 25 minutes in length, while the three
conducted during the intervention were approximately 11–12 minutes in length,
with the goal of gaining a better understanding of the teacher’s thoughts on the
unit’s progression. In addition, post-intervention interviews were conducted with
students in order to elicit their opinions and personal thoughts on the progres-
sion and overall outcome of the meaning-focused unit. Student interviews were
semi-structured and approximately 10 minutes in length, with 22 of the 27 stu-

dent participants volunteering from the two French III sections. Finally, the sci-
ence teacher at the school also agreed to a post-intervention interview, because she
collaborated with the participating French teacher and the researcher throughout
the unit, acting in a supportive role to answer content-specific questions. All
interviews were audio-recorded and subsequently transcribed by the first author.
Questionnaires
Questionnaires were administered to students on three occasions during the
6-week intervention: at the end of Weeks 2, 4, and 6. The questionnaire asked
students to rank each activity completed during the previous two weeks on a
5-point Likert scale in terms of (a) how much they liked each activity, (b) how
much they felt each activity helped them learn French, and (c) how much each
activity applied to their life beyond the French classroom. In addition, there were
three open-ended questions regarding participants’ understanding of the previ-
ous weeks’ key concepts, followed by a space for additional comments.
Learning Assessments
A nine-page assessment comprising four tasks was administered on three occa-
sions: as a pre-test immediately before the intervention, as an immediate post-
test following the 6-week intervention, and as a delayed post-test 11 weeks later.
Following other studies of instructed second language acquisition and in order
to look for transfer effects, this pre–post-test design used contexts for the lan-
guage measures that were unrelated to the theme of environmental issues. This
design feature is important to highlight because if the assessments had been for
classroom assessment purposes (actually grading students), then, following the
principles of a CBI curriculum, the measures should have targeted both content
knowledge and language knowledge in an integrated manner. Because we were
interested in transfer effects above and beyond the topic of environmental issues,
our assessment tasks were designed as follows.
Tasks 1 and 2 both assessed students’ knowledge of gender attribution in
French while Task 3 assessed their use of second-person imperative verb forms.
Tasks 1, 2, and 3 each had two equivalent versions (Form A and Form B) to avoid
test-retest and boredom effects. Half the students, randomly selected, completed
the assessments following the ABA sequence across the three testing sessions,
while the other half completed the tests following the BAB sequence. These
assessment tasks were intended to measure any language development that might
have occurred during the intervention as well as any gains made in the stu-
dents’ content knowledge. Results from both sections of French III were analyzed
together as one group, comprising a total of 81 assessments—3 from each of the
27 participating students (i.e., pre-, post-, and delayed post-tests)
Tasks 1 and 2 were both adapted from Lyster (2004) to assess students’ knowl-
edge of gender attribution in French. On each version of Task 1, there were
48 items, each of which included a noun preceded by a masculine and a feminine
article, along with an image to serve as the noun’s referent. Students were asked
to circle the right article. Task 2 was a cloze exercise designed as a reading activ-
ity, requiring students to assign grammatical gender to target nouns embedded
in a coherent text. Students were asked on Form A to read a text about different
ways of spending a vacation; on Form B, they read two short texts: one about
how the heart works and the other about violence on television. The texts on
each form contained 30 target nouns preceded by the masculine and feminine
forms of the definite or indefinite article. Students were again asked to circle
the appropriate article. Tasks 1 and 2 had both been used in previous research,
yielding high coefficients of reliability of .86 and .90, respectively (Lyster, 2004).
The results of Tasks 1 and 2 were combined as one measure and analyzed using
inferential statistics to detect any change in students’ accuracy over time.
Task 3 assessed informal versus formal uses of tu/vous imperative forms in
French. Students were asked to look at a map of Old Montreal with an indicated
route highlighted and to write how they would direct, first, their friend and,
second, an older gentleman to go from one location to another. On Form A,
students were prompted in French to give directions from the Champ-de-Mars
metro to the Musée Saint-Urbain, and on Form B from the Marché Bonsecours
to Champ-de-Mars metro. Scores were based on how many written sentences
showed correct imperative use and were analyzed descriptively in terms of the
means at each testing time; unlike Tasks 1 and 2, however, Task 3 did not lend
itself to inferential statistical analysis.
The focus of Task 4 was on content, assessing students’ knowledge of envi-
ronmental issues. There was only one version of Task 4, and unlike the previous
tasks, it was written in English and solicited student responses in English. Stu-
dents were asked to write a short-answer list of any environmental issues they
had learned about or were aware of, adding any supporting information, key
terms, or other known information next to each issue. This task was analyzed
through a quantitative tallying of listed environmental issues, where each issue
listed received 1 point and each piece of supplemental detail received 1 point. As
with Task 3, the progression of mean scores over time is considered descriptively,
without tests of significance.
Results
Classroom Observations
Results of the COLT scheme used during a 5-day period preceding the instruc-
tional intervention revealed that the largest percentage of observed class time
involved activities with a shared focus on language and content, accounting for
46% of the total time. Regarding class time with an exclusive or primary focus,
29% entailed a focus on language and 21% on management. An exclusive or
primary focus on content made up the smallest amount of time, at only 4%.
Language and content thus tended to co-occur, but the classroom context over-
all contained a stronger focus on language than on content. The majority of the
dual focus on language and content occurred during the “5 Questions” trivia
competition that students played twice a week and that targeted general franco-
phone culture and history. Such a content focus was typical of the participating
classroom and can be considered as content on a basic level, but not at the same
level of depth as the content-based unit implemented in the present study.
After examining and coding the observational notes taken during the 6-week
intervention, three main themes appeared:
1. Students expressed frustration with the large amount of French being used
throughout the unit, mainly at the beginning then decreasingly so over
time.
2. A perception that the unit’s pacing was rushed and a sense of a time crunch
were predominant throughout the entire unit, equally prevalent from start
to finish.
3. A slow but clear sense of students making a positive progression with both
language and content was observed throughout the unit.
Teacher Interviews
The brief interview with the consulting science teacher revealed (a) a general
positive opinion and (b) the challenge of time. When discussing the collabora-
tion, the teacher said, “It was better than I expected. I think most kids were very
engaged.” Talking about one of the benefits of the collaboration and collabora-
tions in general, she mentioned how she “like[s] students to see all the different
content areas and that really, we are interconnected.” The challenge of a lack of
time and the importance of flexibility were both mentioned by the teacher dur-
ing her short interview.
Analysis of the five interviews conducted with the French teacher (i.e., one
before, three during, and one after the intervention) gave rise to several themes.
The first theme was an overall positive outlook both on the content-based unit
itself and on students’ progression throughout the unit. Even before the unit,
although the teacher was concerned that it might be too advanced or techni-
cal for students and thus frustrating, she held a positive opinion overall. In the
pre-unit interview, she described it as a “rich experience” that helps students to
make connections to the “real world.” This positive outlook continued through-
out the unit, with the teacher mentioning during Interview 2 that she liked the
review stations since the students “were starting to put everything together,” and
making several positive remarks in regards to students’ progress: “I really feel like
they are picking up quite a bit of content and quite a bit of French.”
The teacher specifically expressed in Interview 3 that her feelings about the
expert group projects were positive and maintained her overall positive opinion
of the unit during the post-unit Interview 5, stating that “[it] kind of acted a
little bit as a boost and it just pushed everybody because we raised the bar but
still kept it realistic.” Looking back on the unit, the teacher stated how she was
impressed and thought that the unit really maximized learning and played a
positive role in helping instill “better confidence, better language skills” in the
students, and an academic classroom atmosphere that continued after the end of
the unit. As she explained, “[In] all respects, I feel like it’s been really beneficial.”
She also mentioned how a content-based unit would be especially beneficial for
stronger students since the added content would ensure that they wouldn’t reach
a plateau and would instead continue to be challenged.
The French teacher acknowledged enjoying the format and structure of the
unit. She liked how the environmental unit was blended with and integrated
into her regular classroom format, in addition to how a very specific classroom
routine was set up during the introductory Phase 1 of the intervention unit.
During the post-unit Interview 5, when asked what really worked well, the
teacher replied that, along with the review stations, “I really liked the balance of
everything,” and “I really like that format because I like that kind of structure,
especially at the beginning.”
Another prominent theme was a sense of rushed timing and the challenge of
staying on schedule and covering everything planned. During Interview 2 the
French teacher stated, “I feel like we’re a little bit rushed, and I’m hoping that it
doesn’t reflect on the students, just because we’re on such a tight schedule.” She
said later in the same interview that she would not delete anything, but would
stretch the time frame to add an extra day between topics so that students could
practice more. In Interview 3, she commented that “[s]ometimes I felt a little
rushed, but that’s been the constant” yet added that, at the same time, it was good
to be pushed to stay on schedule. She added: “I feel like sometimes I will tend to
want to rush us a little bit because we have to accomplish this or this or that, but
I don’t feel like the kids are stressed at all.” In Interview 5, she acknowledged that
the most challenging part of the unit was time, explaining that it was discourag-
ing to have spent time preparing the lesson activities without being able to use
all of them due to time constraints.
Another recurring theme involved students’ psychological barriers. In the
pre-unit Interview 1, the teacher mentioned students’ lack of confidence as a
general barrier, anticipating that students will think “they have to understand
every word, and that’s going to be a major barrier for them to get it.” She
also acknowledged that she saw the unit as being “something pretty advanced
and pretty technical.” However, during and after the intervention unit, her
comments were more in reference to how students were progressing and over-
coming their initial lack of confidence. In Interview 2, she explained that,
“[a]t the beginning, it was a little bit painful; they wanted to know the English
meaning of everything, and then as we went along, they got more and more
comfortable.” In the post-unit Interview 5, when asked what the most chal-
lenging part of the unit was for students, the teacher replied, “[A]t the begin-
ning, it was a little iffy,” thus encapsulating the initial challenge of switching
to a primary focus on content in FL classrooms. She then explained that, dur-
ing the introduction to the unit, some students “would get frustrated because
they didn’t have all the meanings there, so they expected a little spoon-feeding
and we didn’t do it.” She concluded that, in the end, “they got used to it and I
think that was okay.”
Concern regarding the challenges of teaching content-based units appeared
most frequently in post-unit Interview 5. First, when asked what she would do
differently and why, the teacher mentioned her concern about content knowl-
edge, stating that “because of [her] lack of knowledge, some of the content [she]
might either simplify or not go as much in depth.” In addition, the teacher indi-
cated that, even though “it’s quite doable . . . at level 3 or 4” when most students
are in their fifth or sixth year of French, she was still concerned about finding
a topic that would draw students in. She had also expressed concern, in Inter-
view 2, about the difficulty of finding authentic, up-to-date, visually appealing
information at her students’ level, stating that she did not have the same access to
books as the first author did living in Montreal and being able to borrow books
from the Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales.
Student Interviews
Students expressed a positive outlook regarding the content-based unit, the prog-
ress they made, and content-based instruction as generally offering a meaning-
ful connection. Several students’ comments reflected a sense that it was easier to
learn French through content and that it helped them learn more than usual both
because, as one student explained, “it was on topics that we already knew about”
(Student 10) and because “you weren’t just learning the words, you were actually
applying it to help bring it to life and understand” (Student 9). Students frequently
commented on making meaningful connections to something bigger that applied
to their own lives, as expressed by one of the students: “It wasn’t just for language—
it was for science, and our world” (Student 25). Several comments revealed a per-
ception of increased participation and also confidence, which appeared to stem
from the students’ ability to utilize their previous L1 knowledge of environmental
issues as well as their knowledge of English-French cognates. The Public Ser-
vice Announcement group project was identified as the students’ favorite activity,
owing to the sense of freedom and choice it gave them as well as the opportunity
it provided to personalize the project in a way that made it their own.
French was repeatedly described throughout students’ interviews as being the

most difficult and challenging aspect of the intervention. As Student 16 put it,
the French component of the unit was the hardest because “you had to focus on
two things, instead of just either the French or the [environmental] problems.”
Some students also specifically mentioned the amount of environmental terms
and information covered in French during Phase 1 as “a lot at once” (Student 6).
Also, several students specifically referred to the “5 Questions” activity in French
as being the most difficult, as reflected by Student 15’s comment: “The 5 Ques-
tions was definitely the hardest, trying to keep up and understand in English
what they were saying, and also figure out what the answer is.” However, several
students also related that they could see the greater benefit of learning language
through content, and that it became easier with time. For example, Student 21,
agreeing with the other two students in her interview group about the challenge
of learning content in French, added:
I agree. I think it was—at first it was challenging, and at first you didn’t get
as much out of it, but as the unit went along, we learned, it was actually
really beneficial to learn it in French, and to be able to understand, like, as
you went along, you could just tell, everything got easier.
Several students stated that they wished they had had more of a chance to prac-
tice writing. These comments were in reference to a summative environmental
writing assessment students were asked to complete after the end of the inter-
vention unit as part of an end-of-unit test. Students clearly did not feel prepared
for this since the unit itself had not included any formal written practice. In
addition, some students expressed concern about the duration of the unit, with
comments varying between positive, ambivalent, and negative. Student 16 com-
mented: “I can’t really think of anything to change because it’s one of the few
units I liked, throughout. It did seem kind of long, though.” Time, however, was
also mentioned by some students as one of the strengths of the intervention unit
since it gave students the chance to really deal with the content topic in depth,
with some students even sharing that French class took the time to cover the
environmental issues in more depth than in science class. As Student 4 explained,
“[i]t felt rushed in science class, and in French it wasn’t so much.”
Questionnaires
The results of the questionnaires, which were administered on three occasions
at 2-week intervals during the 6-week intervention, will first be presented as a
quantitative analysis of the students’ highest rankings on the 5-point Likert scale
and then as a qualitative analysis of their responses to the open-ended questions.
The qualitative analysis will refer to the respective administrations as Time 1,
Time 2, and Time 3 in order to portray the evolution of the comments between
Times 1 and 3 concerning what students had learned, what they hadn’t under-
stood, and what they would still like to learn.
Students’ ranking of activities revealed that they liked the two main projects
the most (Glogster expert project: 4.2; Public Service Announcement (PSA) proj-
ect and presentation: 4.3 and 4.2, respectively), along with the environmental
short film (4.5), video clips (4.2), and games at the SmartNotebook review sta-
tion (Vortex: 4.2; Hot Spot: 4.1). In terms of what students thought was most
helpful for their French, the two main projects (Glogster expert project: 4.3; PSA
project and presentation: 4.1 and 4.1, respectively) and the Week 1 introduction
activities (comprehension check: 4.3; topic questions: 4.1; cause and effect puz-
zle: 4.1) were ranked highest. The Glogster expert project, with a score of 4.3, far
outranked the other activities in terms of students’ opinion of its applicability to
their lives outside the French classroom and was the only activity ranked above 4
in this category, with the PSA final project and SmartBoard review station tying
for the second highest ranking (3.9). When comparing all three categories, the
Glogster expert project received the highest overall ranking, with the PSA proj-
ect also ranking high in all three categories.
When asked what they had learned during the previous weeks, the students’
responses reflected a clear shift toward a focus on content during the progres-
sion of the intervention. At Time 1, 13 students expressed a focus on language,
mostly stating that they learned a lot of French words about the environment.
However, this language focus decreased over the course of the unit, with 5 stu-
dents expressing a focus on language at Time 2 and only 1 at Time 3. Similarly,
whereas 9 students wrote a content-focused response at Time 1, 16 students
expressed a focus on content at Time 2, and 25 at Time 3, with many students
specifically commenting on how they had learned a lot about their expert topic.
Students typically commented they had learned “a lot about what [they] can do
to save the environment” and about environmental solutions.
When asked what they had not understood during the intervention, students’
responses revealed a clear progression in their understanding. Whereas 11 stu-
dents at Time 1 responded that they had understood everything, this number
increased to 18 by Time 3. Some students explained that they had not understood
everything, but either “got the basic idea of it all” or got it with help or after
further explanation. In addition, of the 9 students who mentioned not under-
standing something at Time 1, several specifically mentioned not understand-
ing something because of all of the French being used. As one student stated,
“Sometimes I didn’t understand the questions being asked and it confused me
when everything was in French.” However, as the unit progressed, the number
of students specifically referring to French as an obstacle to their understanding
was reduced to only one at Time 3. Finally, when asked what they wanted to
learn more about, students’ responses implied a genuine interest in the interven-
tion topic, with most students consistently expressing an interest in learning
something more about the content (23 at Time 1 and 26 at Time 3).
Learning Assessments
Grammatical Gender
The comparison of students’ mean scores yielded by Tasks 1 and 2 revealed mini-
mal differences from pre-test (69.9%) to immediate post-test (71.1%) to delayed
post-test (71.5%). When students’ pre- and post-test results were represented in
a histogram and Q-Q plot, using the Bonferroni method to adjust the p value
for multiple tests, both failed to show normality. Therefore, a Wilcoxon Signed
Rank Test was used to analyze the pre- and post-test scores, the results of which
confirmed that the 6-week content-based intervention did not lead to statisti-
cally significant changes in students’ ability to accurately assign grammatical
gender (Z = –.269, p = .788).
A more detailed examination of students’ gender attribution skills was con-
ducted, comparing their scores on specific noun endings in Task 1. The two
noun endings that appeared as a secondary language focus during the interven-
tion (-ment and -tion) were compared to two other noun endings that were not
focused on during the intervention: -e(t)te and -age. The latter were selected
because they do not follow the oft-cited yet often misleading rule of thumb
whereby nouns ending in e are feminine—a rule the participating teacher men-
tioned having taught to students. Nouns with each of these endings occurred
five times on both versions of Part 1, so accuracy scores for each ending ranged
from 0 to 5. Students indeed tended to identify nouns ending in e as feminine
and nouns not ending in e as masculine, leading them across all three testing
times to accurately identify nouns ending in -ment as masculine (4.5  4.5  4.7)
and those ending in -e(t)te as feminine (4.6  4.7  4.7), while inaccurately
identifying nouns ending in -tion as masculine (1.0  1.5  1.4) and those
ending in -age as feminine (1.0  1.0  0.9). Again, these results indicate that
students’ gender attribution skills remained steady across all three testing times.
Imperative Forms
With respect to the mean number of correct instances of second-person impera-
tive verb forms used in Task 3, there was an increase between pre-test (M = 8.8)
and post-test (M = 12.4), followed by a slight decrease at the delayed post-test
(M = 11.5). Further analysis of the results revealed that the number of students
making a tu and vous distinction remained fairly constant (pre-test: n = 19; post-
test: n = 21; delayed post-test: n = 18), whereas the number of students distin-
guishing between tu and vous and additionally carrying that distinction into
the appropriate conjugation of the verbs showed an increase over time (pre-test:
n = 6; post-test: n = 10; delayed post-test: n = 12). We associate the increases
with the observation that imperative forms had a more explicit presence in the
intervention than noun endings. As previously mentioned, during the solutions
portion of the unit, students actively practiced and reviewed how to use impera-
tive forms to tell someone what to do and not to do to be environmentally
friendly. Thus, when the need to focus on language was an inherent part of the
communicative task, some improvement in language use was detected by our
descriptive analysis, but not tested statistically.
Content Knowledge
A comparison of the number of environmental issues identified by students in
Task 4 revealed an overall increase across the three testing times: 10  17 13.
With this quantitative result in mind, a more qualitative breakdown of the stu-
dents’ identification of environmental issues sheds further light. Specifically
comparing students’ pre- and post-test lists, a clear increase in the level of scien-
tific language and the level of detail—cause-effect relationships, pros and cons,
definitions and examples—was evident. As an apt representation of the growth
shown by students, Student 16 mentioned “ozone damage” on his pre-unit list,
but refined his scientific language to “ozone depletion” on the post-test and
further elaborated by adding that “chemicals are released and ozone depletes.”
Similarly, Student 11 wrote “oil” in her pre-unit list but further expanded after
the unit by writing “oil spills kill millions of animals each year.” This same stu-
dent included a question on her pre-unit list (“How can we gather energy with-
out contributing to environmental issues?”), which she answered to some extent
after the unit: “Solar energy is expensive but helpful; wind energy is an alterna-
tive energy; nuclear energy creates toxic products.” Overall, students’ post-test
lists contained a more sophisticated and detailed level of scientific lexis. Thus,
even though the intervention unit was a content-based unit in French, students’
ability to express their knowledge of environmental issues through English was
enhanced.
Discussion
The present study examined the feasibility and effects of integrating a primary
focus on content, with a secondary focus on language, into FL classrooms with
an otherwise primary focus on language and a secondary and occasional focus on
content. The challenges and benefits that arose from the data collected through-
out the intervention are detailed next.
Challenges
Some clear challenges to integrating a CBI unit were evident in various data
sources. First, timing was a recurring challenge, appearing as a theme in all
sources of qualitative data. Both the first author and the participating teacher felt
rushed with the amount of content that needed to be covered in the given time
in order to stay on schedule. The science teacher also mentioned lack of time
as a major obstacle to collaboration. These findings are consistent with previ-
ous research highlighting the major challenges of implementing CBI units (e.g.
Brinton et al., 2004; Cammarata, 2009). As Brinton et al. (2004) stated, “Given
the demands of both language and content mastery, CBI is usually characterized
by severe time constraints, necessitating continuous decision-making . . . about
what to emphasize and what to leave to chance” (p. 252).
Interestingly, timing was also brought up in student interviews as a minor
theme, but embodied a less negative sense than in the other data. While students
did mention that the unit was longer than was normal for French class, with a
couple suggesting it could be shortened, others clearly stated how they thought
the length was a strength since it allowed substantial coverage of the topic. No
student mentioned feeling a time crunch or lack of time, with a few students
even mentioning the opposite, describing how the added time in French class
was positive since it allowed them to cover the topic in more depth, whereas in
science they had “just skimmed over it” (Student 9). Clearly, time was a source
of stress from the teachers’ perspective, but this was not felt by the students.
Students’ psychological barriers proved to be another challenge to CBI imple-
mentation, although not insurmountable. Whereas many students were frus-
trated, anxious, and/or a bit overwhelmed at the start of the unit, they were
able to overcome their initial frustrations and lack of confidence as the unit
progressed. As students became more familiar with the intervention—including
the content and routines—their affective filters were lowered and they were able
to make some substantial progress. This was reflected in students’ responses to
the open-ended questionnaire items, in which they referred to their frustrations
during the first week with all of the French. However, their feelings of “this is
too much French and I don’t get it” rapidly dissipated over the remainder of the
unit. This initial frustration has been previously noted, for example, by Wesche
and Skehan (2002): “Students struggling to master new concepts and conceptual
skills through a language in which they have limited proficiency” is a common
feature among all CBI contexts (p. 220).
The teacher voiced concern about what content topics she would feel com-
fortable teaching, which has been reflected as a challenge by several other studies
(e.g., Cammarata, 2009; Dale & Tanner, 2012; Pessoa et al., 2007). Several studies
have proposed solutions to this, from developing short projects to ensure that
content and language teachers have a chance to closely collaborate, to setting
aside a small portion of the teachers’ weekly schedule to support content and
language collaboration (Dale & Tanner, 2012; Dalton-Puffer, 2007). As well,
the teacher’s concern about where she would secure content-based resources on
her own has been identified by previous studies as a key hurdle to implement-
ing CBI (e.g., Brinton et al., 2004; Pessoa et al., 2007). As suggested by Brinton
et al. (2004), “The selection and adaption of materials . . . is a major undertak-
ing” and so the creation of “an ongoing materials bank, in which teachers can
deposit materials and share resources with others” is a critical need (pp. 92–93).
Sharing resources and not having to revert to starting from scratch would allow
teachers “to devote more attention to instructional delivery rather than curricu-
lum and material design” (Pessoa et al., 2007, p. 117). The accessibility of quality
content-based resources would greatly help to empower teachers interested in
implementing content-based units, and would alleviate the trepidation that holds
many back from taking the leap to try something new.
Benefits
The primary recurring theme present throughout all the data corpora was that
of very positive perceptions of the intervention unit. These positive perceptions
were expressed as such in the observational notes, French teacher interviews,
student interviews, and Task 4 of the learning assessment. Specifically, many
students described feeling a sense of progress in their own acquisition of both
content and language and this was evident in Task 4 of the assessment, with
students using a more specific, academically rigorous lexis in English as a result
of the French content-based unit. This is noteworthy since it indicates that stu-
dents utilized and strengthened their common underlying proficiency of content
knowledge (Cummins, 1980/2001).
Another key theme was the sense of a meaningful connection between the
content and something bigger (e.g., applied to students’ lives outside of school, to
science, to the world, etc.). The French teacher made several references to this,
but the theme was most prevalent in the students’ interviews. Students expressed
their interest in learning about the world outside of the classroom and also
acknowledged their sense of accomplishment in doing so in French, in spite of
the initial challenges. These findings are reflected by Wesche and Skehan (2002),
who stated that CBI programs “tend to be highly appreciated by students for
their relevance and by participating staff for the satisfaction of effectively helping
students to prepare for life after language instruction” (p. 225).
Classroom Implications
The present study opens up a number of notable classroom implications. Primar-
ily, the intervention unit implemented throughout the present study (for details,
see Morgan, 2013) can assist other FL teachers to envision how they can integrate
a content-based unit themselves that best meets the needs of their students and
that they feel comfortable with. Related to this is the finding that patience in
consistently using the target language in spite of initial frustrations is worthwhile
in the long run and results in student gratification and motivation. Second, a
larger question arises from the findings: If the integration of content-based units
is feasible in this particular secondary FL classroom context in New York State,
how might this finding be put to good use in this state and others like it where
FL classes and teachers are facing drastic downsizes and cuts? If FL classrooms can
be seen as contexts where a counterbalanced approach that deliberately integrates
both language and content can occur, perhaps this offers the opportunity for FL
teaching to regain some of its diminishing standing and make a comeback as
a core subject with important connections to make across the curriculum and
within society.
Conclusion
The present study aimed at exploring the feasibility of integrating a content-
based unit into a FL classroom in a North American high school context. Data
from all sources converge to confirm that integrating content-based units into FL
classrooms is indeed feasible, with teacher and students alike, in the end, appreci-
ating the benefits inherent in the challenges, and students exhibiting an improve-
ment in their ability to express knowledge of environmental issues. Moreover, the
results of our language assessments indicated that students maintained the same
level of accuracy in assigning grammatical gender throughout the intervention
and showed some increase in their accurate use of imperative verb forms.
Although challenging on many levels, implementing a content-based unit
into a typical language-driven FL classroom not only proved feasible in this study
but also had the added benefits of enhancing students’ content knowledge while
increasing their confidence in using the target language without jeopardizing
linguistic accuracy. Most importantly, students claimed to make a meaningful
and deep connection with the content-based instruction, owing to its authentic,
rich level of content that aimed to challenge them both cognitively and lin-
guistically while creating “a genuine, immediate need to learn the language”
(Lightbown & Spada, 2013, p. 211). The generalizability of these findings is of
course tempered by the active role played by the first author in co-designing and
implementing the CBI intervention in tandem with the participating teacher in
FL classrooms that would otherwise have no such assistant. We hasten to add,
however, that FL classrooms in many international contexts do indeed bring
main teachers and language assistants together in collaborative partnerships (see
Dafouz & Hibler, 2013).
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PART 2
Curriculum Development
for the Thinking-Oriented
Foreign Language Classroom
5
TAPPING THE NATIONAL
STANDARDS FOR THOUGHT-
PROVOKING CBI IN K–16 FOREIGN
LANGUAGE PROGRAMS
Jason Martel
[The college-age foreign language learner1] has entered a phase in his intellectual
development in which he inclines to reflection rather than formal training. He
is hungry for thought-provoking subject matter. He wants to understand him-
self and the world about him. Courses which are predominantly concerned with
elementary linguistic drill [. . .] are therefore quite unrelated to the student’s most
vital intellectual needs.
(Hafkesbrink, 1946, p. 453)
Introduction
Despite the introduction of the Standards for Foreign Language Learning over a
decade ago (National Standards in Foreign Language Project [NSFLP], 1999; the
Standards henceforth), which called for a shift from language as object of study to
subject for meaningful, culturally relevant communication beyond the confines
of the classroom (see Tedick & Walker, 1994), it seems that the essence of foreign
language as an academic subject remains largely the same. Progress has been
made in some domains, such as the integration of authentic texts (Glisan, 2012),
yet the subject’s curricular foundation—scope and sequence documents based on
grammatical structures—persists, having been (somewhat sneakily, I might add)
dressed up in thematic and pseudo-communicative clothes (Martel, 2013b). This
is well exemplified by the heavy focus on the Present–Practice–Produce (PPP)
model in current textbooks (Ellis & Shintani, 2014), which consists of declara-
tively presented grammatical rules starting with the “simple” before progressing
to the “harder” as a route to second language acquisition (SLA). It is not surpris-
ing that change has been slow to come to foreign language, given that grammar
constitutes one of the features of its “deep structure”—that is, the common/
pervasive beliefs and practices that characterize the subject (Burke, 2011). One is
102 Jason Martel
left to wonder, however: if it is becoming more and more clear from lackluster
outcomes data (CASLS, 2010; Moeller & Theiler, 2014) and from repeated calls
for change from scholars (e.g., Reagan & Osborn, 2002) that traditional ways of
teaching foreign languages are not working as well as desired, when is enough
enough?
In the present chapter, I urge us to turn our focus to an additional and related
curricular feature in dire need of change: our subject’s non-linguistic content.
For far too long, foreign language has been a thinking-light subject, in which
learning is often distinguished by the parroting of grammatical structures. In
such a paradigm, content is treated as an afterthought, an excuse to practice lan-
guage rather than a means to help learners develop cognitively. If we want for-
eign language to be (and believe that it can indeed be) as relevant, engaging, and
horizontally aligned as possible,—that is, as significant as other school subjects as
it claims to be (Martel, 2013b),—then we must do something different: we must
choose content that is thought provoking. It is my opinion that the Standards
have been untapped in this regard and can serve as a catalyst for the selection of
thinking-rich non-linguistic foreign language content.
As an alternative to the grammatical syllabus, I have followed several inf lu-
ential scholars (e.g., Grabbe & Stoller, 1997; Lyster, 2011; Met, 1991; Tedick &
Cammarata, 2010) in touting content-based instruction (CBI; Martel, 2013b).
I continue to support this approach as a viable alternative, while turning our
gaze in this chapter to the nature of the content we choose.2 It seems fair to
say that CBI is beginning to permeate traditional foreign language spheres;
in other words, it is “in the air.” In addition to the support it receives from
my own and other scholars’ writings, the United States’ most inf luential for-
eign language organization has begun to expect that foreign language teach-
ers know how to plan and teach at the interface of language and content, as
evidenced by the newest version of the American Council for the Teaching of
Foreign Languages (ACTFL)/Council for Accreditation of Educator Prepara-
tion (CAEP) Program Standards for the Preparation of Foreign Language Teachers
(ACTFL/CAEP, 2013).
Critical Thinking and Foreign Language: A State of Affairs

In order for foreign language to thrive as a subject, we must engage our stu-
dents in thinking that goes beyond recall and comprehension. In other words,
we must help them learn how to think critically. As expressed earlier, foreign
language curricula in the United States have been historically conceptualized
in a thinking-light fashion. I will defend this claim first with some empirical
data, then with a metaphorical conceptualization of foreign language, and finally
with an example of one state’s unpacking of the Standards. When making refer-
ence to critical thinking here and throughout this chapter, I adopt Liaw’s (2007)
definition: “[C]ritical thinking involves the use of information, experience, and
Tapping the National Standards for CBI 103
world knowledge in ways which allow L2 learners to seek alternatives, make

inferences, pose questions, and solve problems, thereby signaling understanding
in a variety of complex ways” (p. 51). Thinking of this sort corresponds with
the upper echelons of Bloom’s Taxonomy, which includes analysis, synthesis, and
evaluation (Bloom & Krathwohl, 1956).
Some Empirical Data

The study I conducted for my dissertation research, which examined the identity
negotiation of a Spanish student teacher named Anna during her yearlong prep-
aration program, provides empirical data regarding the thinking-light nature
of foreign language instruction. Using concepts from the literature on teacher
socialization (Zeichner & Gore, 1990) and symbolic interactionism (Reynolds &
Herman-Kinney, 2003), I examined the identity positions suggested to Anna in
the form of messages about foreign language teaching conveyed by significant
others (e.g., her students, her mentor teacher) in her high school student teaching
placement. One of the salient identity positions was that of “easy teacher.” At
the end of the school year, Anna stated, “I [. . .] think there’s an expectation that
learning doesn’t need to be taken seriously. A lot of my kids would remark, like,
‘Why can’t you just make this an easy class? Why are we doing all this work in
here?’ ” (Martel, 2013a, p. 114).
Furthermore, Anna wondered if her students’ desire for an easy class was a
mind-set: “that either students don’t want to think critically or they’ve kind of
been schooled into believing they can’t, like that there’s always just a right or
wrong answer” (Martel, 2013a, p. 115). This position surfaced during a reflec-
tion on a Spanish lesson she observed that was taught by one of her mentor
teacher’s colleagues. For this lesson, students were asked to put 20 events related
to preparing for a trip into a logical order. When the students finished their
work, she was shocked not only to see the teacher present a definite answer as
if there were only one possible answer, but also that the students did not chal-
lenge her answer. About this episode, Anna stated, “I feel like maybe that’s the
problem with school is that students get used to there being discrete answers to
everything and they don’t really develop the ability to think” (Martel, 2013a,
p. 116). By characterizing the students she observed as passive recipients of an
imposed subjective order and the activity in which they were engaged as pro-
moting black-and-white thinking, she highlighted a greater problem with school
in general, beyond foreign language education: that it often does not teach stu-
dents to think critically.
A Metaphorical Representation
In a potent 2011 article, Burke discussed the beliefs and rituals (i.e., practices)
that have long characterized the subject of foreign language. The former includes
104 Jason Martel
teaching to the four skills and teaching for mastery of language/grammatical

accuracy (pp. 5–6), while the latter includes using translation grammar practice,
non-contextual explicit grammar teaching, thin/stereotypical culture teach-
ing, and using English (pp. 7–8). In this conceptualization, there is little room
for students to critically engage with non-linguistic content, given grammar’s
ubiquity in the curriculum. Burke offers a somewhat bleak perspective of the
subject’s state:
From my observations over the years in a variety of U.S. schooling contexts,

it seems that the committee’s3 suggested focus on grammar, translation,
repetition, reading at sight (emphasizing translation again), native-like
pronunciation, and covering a certain amount of material have molded
the deep structure of modern U.S. world language curriculum. These same
structures appear to be prominent, even dominant, in many world lan-
guage classrooms today.
(p. 5, emphasis added)
Citing the work of Tye (2000), Burke argues that change “will only occur when
society wants something different from its schools” (Burke, 2011, p. 3) and will
most likely have to occur from the bottom up, that is, at the teacher/school level.
I have argued elsewhere (Martel, 2013b) that a bottom-up approach to reform
in French (foreign language) has not been successful to date, and that top-down
reforms may ultimately be necessary if significant change is to happen. In other
words, it has not been enough to rely on individual or small groups of teachers
to effectuate institutional change; rather, it might have to be initiated by educa-
tional policy makers at the state and/or federal level.
Burke’s notion of deep structure is echoed in Reagan and Osborn’s (2002)
description of the development of the Standards. They state:
In the case of foreign language education, the national standards have been
far less controversial [than the social studies standards], in part because the
standards themselves are the product of foreign language educators who
took their task seriously and produced standards that presupposed a com-
mitment to meaningful language learning on the part of the polity (see
National Standards in Foreign Language Education Project, 1996). It is
with this assumption, though, that the problem arises, because it is by no
means clear that the general public really shares this commitment.
(p. 8)
One is thus left to wonder to what extent the Standards, with their call for a focus
on the development of meaningful communicative abilities, actually represent
what happens in foreign language teaching, or whether Burke’s deep structure is a
more accurate characterization.
A Case of Unpacking the Standards

The Standards were developed during the 1990s proficiency movement and
resulted from the collaboration of several associations and educators from elemen-
tary to tertiary levels. The Five Cs that comprise the Standards—communication,
culture, communities, connections, and comparisons—leave space for inter-
pretation rather than mandating specific methods of implementation (Bartz &
Singer, 1996). It is thus possible for one nationally organized document to
lead to variable unpackings, ref lecting different local values, priorities, and—
notably—conceptions/beliefs about how second languages are best taught and
learned.
At the same time that the Standards were coming together, the Articulation
and Achievement Project, a New England–based initiative, was formed with
the goal of “translat[ing] the proposed general standards for foreign language
education into well-defined performance standards for successive grades in the
school-to-college continuum” (Jackson et al., 1996, p. 15). A major product of
the initiative is the Language Learning Continuum, a tool based on analyses of
student work that “describes what students in grades 7–14 should know and be
able to do as a result of their foreign language study” (Jackson et al., 1996, p. 16,
emphasis in original) and that indicates how to move from “(1) the stated out-
comes to (2) course goals and objectives and to (3) the day-to-day teaching that
is the heart of students’ foreign language learning experience” (p. xiii).
The Language Learning Continuum articulates five stages through which
language learners pass, and movement in and out of the stages depends on factors
such as age, methodology, teacher effectiveness, and learner capabilities (Jackson
et al., 1996). A close look at the function category (“what students can do with
the language”) of the five stages reveals, in my consideration, a limited view
of students’ cognitive abilities and learning potential. Where Stages 1, 2, and 3
include functions such as express, understand, describe, use, clarify, narrate, and iden-
tify, it is not until Stages 4 and 5 that one sees in earnest functions that require
substantial critical thinking, like compare and contrast, substantiate and elaborate,
convince and persuade, and analyze and critique.4
Based on this organization, it would seem that the creators of the Language
Learning Continuum found the learners whose work they analyzed to be unable
to express critical thought in the target language until the later stages of their
studies, as reflected in the lower-level nature of the functions that dominate
Stages 1 through 3 (e.g., understand, describe). Does this mean that students with
limited foreign language proficiency are incapable of doing meaningful think-
ing? How could this be the case if they are engaged in critical thinking in their
first language(s) in other classes they take during the school day? I hold that the
Language Learning Continuum underestimates learners’ cognitive capabilities
and that action geared toward reviewing documents unpacked from it is neces-
sary in order to shield students from less-than-stimulating learning experiences
106 Jason Martel
that neither engage them intellectually nor motivate them to continue studying
a foreign language.
The Massachusetts Foreign Language Curriculum Framework of August 1999
(Massachusetts Department of Education, 1999) reflects the Articulation and
Achievement Project’s influence. Given that culture often serves as content in
foreign languages classes (Jackson et al., 1996; Reagan & Osborn, 2002), it fol-
lows to look specifically at the culture strand of this framework with an eye
toward critical thinking. A quick scan of this strand reveals two clear—and, I
would argue, disadvantageous—influences of the Project. First, Stages 1–3 are
dominated by the function identify (13 of 19 substandards), accompanied sec-
ondarily by other functions such as use, demonstrate, and describe—all of which
are cognitively undemanding. It is not until Stage 4 that the indicator analyze
appears—a more cognitively demanding function that requires breaking down,
comparing, contrasting, and so on. Are teachers thus discouraged from asking
their students to analyze texts using the target language until the end of their
formal study of that language? Are students incapable of analyzing in the target
language at the beginning of their study?
Second, the culture strand only articulates four stages, seemingly in response
to the Project’s claim that high school students rarely enter into Stage 5. However,
a closer look at the qualifications under the framework’s stages reveals that Stage
3 is attainable by students “at the end of grade 10 in a PreK–10 sequence/grade 12
in a 6–12 sequence” and Stage 4 by students “at the end of grade 12 in a PreK–12
sequence” (Massachusetts Department of Education, 1999 p. 41). Therefore, the
document infers that the majority of students who study foreign languages in
Massachusetts—ones who start in grade 6 or later, if not in grade 9—will only
reach Stage 3. It is thus conceivable, according to the framework’s articulation,
that teachers/textbooks who base their curricula squarely on the framework will
not ask their students to do meaningful thinking in and with the target language
during their tenure as learners. Curricular planning of this sort only reinforces
the chasm that exists between many foreign language courses and other courses
in school (e.g., history, language arts), in which students are more frequently
pushed to think on deeper levels.
Granted, this may be an over-literal and dramatic reading of the Language
Learning Continuum and the Massachusetts Foreign Language Curriculum
Framework. However, if the situation that I describe here is not the intent of
these documents’ authors, why are they structured in this manner? Why not cre-
ate standards that ask students to use the target language in engaging and intel-
lectually challenging ways at all levels of language study? Following Gibbon’s
(2009) “high challenge, high support” perspective, which holds that “students
need to be challenged to do things that they can do only with support so that
they can move their learning forward” (Lightbown, 2014, p. 47), it is my firm
belief that low-proficiency students can find creative ways of expressing deep
thoughts with limited proficiency with teacher assistance and that teachers must
therefore engage learners in doing critical thinking despite their limited profi-
ciency. This, I would argue, is a foundational tenet underlying the implementa-
tion of CBI in traditional foreign language programs.
Putting Critical Thinking at the Forefront of Foreign

Language Education Using CBI
In the previous section, I painted a picture of foreign language as a stubbornly
thinking-light subject (see Burke, 2011), despite calls over the years for change
(e.g., the Standards). As stated in the introduction, I argue that this conceptual-
ization of foreign language must be confronted if the discipline is going to sur-
vive as part of the academic core and that the integration of thoughtful content
can assist in this endeavor. Following this argument, I justify in this section the
use of CBI as a vehicle for integrating critical thinking into the foreign language
curriculum via the selection of thoughtful content. In doing so, I align with
scholars (e.g., Met, Moeller) who have often pointed to the link between critical
thinking and CBI. Met (1991), a long-standing proponent of CBI, states:
Language learned through content has the [. . .] advantage of allowing an

integration with higher order thinking tasks, so that students may com-
municate about thoughts, not just words.
(p. 282)
Similarly, Moeller (1994) adds: “[I]ntegrating subject matter through content-

based foreign language instruction requires students to think deeply in their
striving to synthesize information to express themselves” (p. 538).
This section contains two parts. In the first, I review research that has inves-
tigated the link between CBI and thinking. In the second, I make a case for the
implementation of CBI for social justice reasons. In both of these sections, and
throughout the rest of this chapter, I advocate for thoughtful CBI—that is, an
approach to language teaching that not only integrates language and content,
but also uses texts and classroom treatments of texts in ways that inspire students
to think critically.
Research at the Interface of CBI and Thinking

A small amount of research has investigated the link between CBI and thinking.
While modest, this research base reveals the exciting potential of CBI for foster-
ing critical thinking, supporting Met’s (1991) and Moeller’s (1994) earlier claims.
Kennedy (2006) conducted cutting-edge brain research that supports the link
between CBI and critical thinking. She notes:
[T]he growing understanding that brain activities are directly linked by

a network of neurons that simultaneously perform a variety of operations
108 Jason Martel
suggests that education must broaden its scope to integrate language learn-
ing across the entire school experience. The tendency for the brain to
consider the entire experience and to search for meaningful patterns calls
for thematic, content-based inter-disciplinary language instruction at all
levels.
(p. 480)
Furthermore, she argues that “higher level activities promoting application, anal-
ysis, synthesis, and evaluation” allow students to “move information into long-
term storage” (p. 479). Along these lines, Reagan and Osborn (2002) identify
the cognitive value of “interdisciplinary links,” claiming that “such connections
more accurately represent the reality of the nature of knowledge” (p. 74).
Where Kennedy’s (2006) study dealt with the nature of the brain, other
studies have looked at critical thinking outcomes in content-based classrooms.
Working with junior high English as a foreign language students in Taiwan,
Liaw (2007) designed a curriculum drawing on language arts, math, science,
and social studies that she implemented as a facultative enrichment program
on weekends, with the goal of fostering students’ critical thinking. In order to
measure student learning, she used multiple data collection methods, including
a critical thinking test and class work (e.g., a response letter to the protagonist of
a simplified version of Tuck Everlasting [Babbitt, 1975]). Her analysis of these data
revealed that students deployed critical thinking skills in their writing but that
the pre- and post-scores on the critical thinking test were not statistically signifi-
cant. Concerning student writing, the principal source of data for exemplifying
critical thinking was the letter writing task, which was analyzed using Bloom’s
Taxonomy. Although this analysis demonstrated the use of critical thinking, it
was unclear whether the task itself prompted students to think critically and
whether the skills they deployed were previously acquired or acquired as a result
of the intervention. Therefore, Liaw’s findings, albeit promising, remain some-
what tenuous.
Departing from the position that often in CBI students receive lots of infor-
mation but are not asked to do deep thinking with that information, Gibson
(2012) studied the gains in critical thinking among students in a sheltered course
whose theme was language revitalization and planning. Curiously, he did not
clearly specify the age of the participants or the target language involved. The
course was divided into three phases, two of which were reported on: a pre-
sentation of the content and critical thinking skills development activities. The
latter included identifying components of a language revitalization policy, com-
paring and contrasting two hypothetical language revitalization policies, and a
decision-making task. After each phase, the researcher administered two writing
exercises: the first asking students to compare and contrast linguistic situations in
Ireland and Navarra and the second to make decisions about language revitaliza-
tion endeavors in Navarra. According to the analysis, students made statistically
significant gains in critical thinking between the writing exercises administered

after Phase 1 and those administered after Phase 2.
Pally (2001) examined English learners’ acquisition of analytical and critical
thinking skills in academic writing in sustained CBI settings in two U.S. univer-
sities. Differing from theme-based CBI, which enlists multiple (and not necessar-
ily related) themes during the span of a course, sustained CBI involves “study[ing]
one discipline for a half or full semester, progressing through various aspects of a
larger topic such that later concepts and information rely on earlier ones—just as
students in content classes do” (p. 281). Using data from 13 cases collected over
two years’ time, Pally claimed that sustained CBI facilitated students’ abilities
in skill areas such as presenting ideas of one’s own, questioning and challenging
sources, and synthesizing sources. This is most influentially demonstrated in her
comparison of papers from a lower-level learner and a higher-level learner; the
lower-level learner’s paper demonstrated stronger argumentation skills than the
higher-level learner’s, and it is argued that this is due to sustained CBI, which
the lower-level learner experienced but the higher-level student did not. In other
skills discussed in the study, such as challenging and synthesizing sources, the
connection between sustained CBI and skill development is less clear. Based on
the findings, Pally’s main assertion is that sustained CBI—delving deeply into
a discipline over a sustained period of time—provides a context in which to
develop complex academic skills like the ones analyzed in her paper.
Taken together, these studies indicate a positive relationship between CBI
and critical thinking skills development, corroborating in an empirical fashion
claims made above by prominent CBI scholars.
CBI, Critical Thinking, and Social Justice

An additional reason for implementing thinking-rich CBI stems from the critical
pedagogy literature. In simple terms, the provision of critical thinking practice
facilitated by CBI benefits socially conscious students for whom critical think-
ing skills are an important tool. Kumashiro (2002) points to the necessity of
cultivating critical thinking skills so that students can “formulate effective plans
of action” (p. 46). Along these lines, hooks (1994) characterizes critical thinking
skills as integral for education as the practice of freedom, which incites students
and teachers alike to challenge tacit (and sometimes not so tacit) power structures
in classrooms and in society. Highlighting critical thinking as “the primary ele-
ment allowing the possibility of change” (p. 202), hooks eloquently states:
Passionately insisting that no matter what one’s class, race, gender, or social
standing, I shared my beliefs that without the capacity to think critically
about our selves and our lives, none of us would be able to move for-
ward to change, to grow. In our society, which is so fundamentally anti-
intellectual, critical thinking is not encouraged. Engaged pedagogy has
110 Jason Martel
been essential to my development as an intellectual, as a teacher/professor

because the heart of this approach to learning is critical thinking. Condi-
tions of radical openness exist in any learning situation where students and
teachers celebrate their abilities to think critically, to engage in pedagogi-
cal praxis.
(p. 202)
Reagan and Osborn (2002) have extended scholarship on critical pedagogy

into the foreign language sphere. Of note, they explain the concept of problem
posing, which “involves constructing units around questions, issues, concerns,
and puzzles related to language” (p. 73). By infusing problem posing into their
curricula, foreign language teachers can help students practice critical think-
ing skills while “examin[ing] language, language use, and language attitudes
(both their own and others’) more critically” (p. 73). As an example, Reagan and
Osborn propose a unit involving critical digestions of advertisements, like the
Taco Bell chihuahua and his Spanish accent (see also Osborn, 2006). Cammarata
(2006) has also made the case for infusing critical thinking in foreign language
education within the context of curriculum planning and teaching, casting it as
a vital aspect of democratic participation. He argues:
[I]t is the foremost responsibility of any educational program in place in a

democratic state to help individual citizens develop critical thinking skills
so that they can maintain a certain level of awareness necessary for them to
operationalize their democratic ideals.
(pp. 23–24)
In sum, a strong intellectual and empirical case has been made for the use of
CBI as a vehicle for infusing critical thinking into foreign language curricula.
This case extends beyond positive outcomes evidence to an appeal to foreign
language teachers to design educational experiences that help their students to
become more critical and capable participants in the unjust society that sur-
rounds them.
Tapping the Culture, Connections, and Communities

Standards for Thought-Provoking CBI
Where the previous two sections established a case for the use of thinking-rich
CBI in traditional foreign language education, the present section focuses on
using the Standards as a catalyst for selecting engaging content that stimulates
students’ depth of thinking. My principal objective here is to bring awareness
to exciting work that is being done by foreign language teachers and teacher
educators in the United States that pushes the discipline to a thinking-rich space
in which content and language are seamlessly integrated. For three of the Five
Cs—culture, connections, and communities—I will (1) outline a brief position

regarding the use of the standard for thoughtful CBI and (2) discuss a project that
has integrated the standard in a critical thinking-forward fashion. Afterward, I
will provide a list of additional resources that readers can consult for exploration
beyond the projects profiled here.
The Culture Standards

The Culture Standards ask foreign language educators to move from static/
stereotypical conceptualizations of culture to dynamic/situated ones by drawing
connections between cultural practices, products, and perspectives (the Three Ps
framework). It does not seem farfetched to say, however, that most foreign lan-
guage culture instruction is stuck in a rut, dominated by products and practices.
Indeed, Tedick and Walker (1994) identified a surfacy and neutral (i.e., noncon-
troversial) approach to teaching culture as a problem that plagues the second
language teaching profession, and I would hold that this problem persists today,
despite the Standards’ call for more complex cultural explorations (see data con-
cerning teachers’ understanding of the Culture Standards in Phillips and Abbott
[2011]). A thoughtful approach to CBI, as argued for in this chapter, honors the
complexity inherent in the Three Ps framework and guides the selection of criti-
cal thinking-oriented culture-as-content in foreign language classrooms.
An excellent example of thoughtful culture-as-content comes from Barnes-
Karol and Broner (2010), who detail their work with the third level Spanish
curriculum at St. Olaf College. Motivated by a call from the MLA report Foreign
Languages and Higher Education: New Structures for a Changed World (MLA Ad Hoc
Committee on Foreign Languages, 2007), they developed an approach using
images as texts geared toward cultivating students’ cultural knowledge, critical
thinking skills, and academic language proficiency. They provide an extended
example of their approach, entitled “The Culture of Food in the Spanish-
Speaking World,” noting that textbooks’
food units often stop at the description of products and practices (vocabu-
lary, how to order a meal in a restaurant, how to use eating utensils, cul-
ture specific eating rituals such as el tapeo in Spain, and so forth); such units
never get to the level of perspectives.
(p. 430)
The extended example includes a thorough description of pre-, during-, and

post-phase activities and asks students to consider a variety of thoughtful ques-
tions, such as “Is it even possible to talk about only one set of eating habits in the
Spanish-speaking world?” (p. 433). It is worth noting that delving into cultural
perspectives via questions like this affords potential for engaging students in
critical thinking.
112 Jason Martel
The Connections Standards

The Connections Standard asks foreign language educators to use the target lan-
guage not only to support and expand upon learning in other academic subjects,
but also to gain access to unique information encoded in the target language.
Met’s work (1991, 1998) has been particularly helpful in providing examples for
doing so, especially at the elementary level. It is commonly understood, however,
that making connections becomes more difficult with older and more cogni-
tively mature students (i.e., middle school and older) who have low/beginning
language proficiency. Furthermore, the mere inclusion of content into a foreign
language class does not ensure critical thinking, or even content learning, as has
been empirically demonstrated in Pessoa, Hendry, Donato, Tucker, and Lee’s
(2007) influential study. A thoughtful approach to CBI, therefore, accepts head-
on the challenge inherent in making critical thinking-oriented and cognitively
appropriate curricular connections to other subjects in foreign language, what-
ever the language proficiency level of the learner.
Gerwin and Osborn (2002) offer an interesting example of curricular
connection-making at the high school level. Combining “history as mystery”
(Gerwin & Zevin, 2011) and interdisciplinary theme-based approaches, they
describe a unit entitled “Multiple Voices: Challenging the Monovocal Narrative.”
The history as mystery approach invites students to realize that history is not a
collection of static facts, but rather a network of claims based on various stake-
holders’ perspectives. In other words, history that is taught involves selection, and
that selection “is a tremendous act of interpretation” (p. 78). The Gulf of Tonkin
event during the Vietnam War is used as the central case for the unit. This event
is chosen due to its controversial nature and due to the fact that many textbooks
treat it in a peripheral and sanitized way (cf. Tedick & Walker, 1994). In their
history classes, students consider a variety of evidence related to the event, such
as ship logs and interrogation reports. In their foreign language classes, the idea
that history is a “puzzle” (Gerwin & Osborn, 2002, p. 86) is reinforced by read-
ing accounts of the event in foreign language media and by authoring narratives
of events from different actors’ perspectives. By studying examples from different
perspectives across history and foreign language classes, students are provided
with the opportunity to compare, contrast, debate, and construct—all of which
represent higher-order thinking skills according to Bloom and Krathwohl’s (1956)
framework.
The Communities Standards

The Communities Standards ask teachers to cultivate students’ use of the tar-
get language outside the boundaries of the classroom in addition to stimulating
their lifelong use of the language. According to Troyan (2012), these standards
have been operationalized and measured by research in the domains of service
learning, study abroad, and computer-mediated communication. A thoughtful

approach to CBI would use these domains as vehicles for putting students in
touch with content—that is, information, processes, debates, experiences, and so
on—that develops their critical thinking skills. For example, to what extent is
critical thinking incorporated into learners’ interactions with texts during study
abroad experiences? Or, how, in service learning projects, can students be pushed
to think critically about power imbalances that exist in society?
Unfortunately, none of the studies I reviewed from the foreign language
service learning, study abroad, or computer-mediated communication litera-
ture foregrounds critical thinking in the same manner as the projects described
above. Several of them highlight critical thinking development in passing,
however, principally in goal statements (e.g., Bloom, 2008; Wehling, 2008)
and sometimes brief ly in outcomes (e.g., Lee, 2011). In the case of service
learning, this may be due to the fact that critical thinking gains represent a
well-established theme in the general education service learning literature
(N. Avineri, personal communication, March 30, 2014). In the future, it would
behoove scholars to draw clearer connections between service learning, study
abroad, and computer-mediated communication experiences and students’ crit-
ical thinking skills development.
Additional Resources/Example Projects

In the preceding sections, I have profiled scholarly works that put critical think-
ing at the fore in foreign language curriculum development. I chose these exam-
ples from a larger set of publications on the topic, which I have included in list
form in Appendix 5A. Note that some of the entries in this list span multiple
standards; Bateman’s (2002, 2004) studies, for example, satisfy both the Culture
and Communities Standards.
Organizing Content-Rich Curricula

With so many choices for thought-provoking content at hand, one is left with the
task of developing coherent, classroom-ready curricular units. In an effort to facili-
tate this task, I offer a recommendation and a resource: using thematic units as a
primary curricular organizing principle and taking advantage of the tools in Wig-
gins and McTighe’s (2005) Understanding by Design (UbD) framework, respectively.
Thematic Units
Thematic units are not new to foreign language teaching. In fact, the major-
ity of foreign language textbooks are organized around canonical themes such
as clothing, health, travel, et cetera. These themes arguably came about as a
response to communicative language teaching, with the goal of adding context
114 Jason Martel
to support meaningful language use (Martel, 2013b). What is tricky, however,

is that the grammatical syllabus remains unchanged in textbooks, and the PPP
(Present–Practice–Produce) model is preserved, despite the addition of thematic
content and lip service to the use dimension of language (Larsen-Freeman,
2003). In other words, grammar continues to dominate as the central curricular
organizing principle, despite the use of themes (Ellis & Shintani, 2014; Martel,
2013b). The content of such units, which stands in second place, includes the
thinking-light context, generally in the form of vocabulary lists and accompany-
ing cultural tidbits, which are usually static and stereotypical in nature. Truth be
told, these themes are not really themes; they are topics. Curtain and Dahlberg
(2010) make the distinction between the two like so:
A theme is a richer basis for a unit, one that has greater potential for mean-
ing and purpose. A topic usually involves just a loose collection of ideas,
but a theme suggests a “big idea” and more focus for the unit. [. . .] We
might think of the theme as a way of “putting clothes on” the topic, to
make it more appealing and colorful, and to give it more personality—and
a much stronger affective impact.
(pp. 163–164)
Along these lines, the “themes” that appear in popular textbooks do not have
the depth of thinking we would like to characterize the foreign language cur-
riculum and thus stand to be enriched.
In order to enhance the thought value of foreign language curricula, we need
to abandon thin topics for rich themes that are supported by and elaborated with
thoughtful content. For example, a student of mine developed a unit for a high
school–level Japanese class based on electricity conservation, asking why it is
important to save electricity and how to go about doing so. Ideas she explored
in the unit included the limited nature of natural resources and the relationship
between conservation and people’s daily lives. Language foci involved making
suggestions using “let’s” and expressing opinions using “I agree with” and “I
disagree with.” This unit was decidedly more captivating than a unit on the
environment that one would normally see in a traditional textbook.
Curtain and Dahlberg (2010) enumerate several advantages to thematic plan-
ning. According to these scholars, a thematic approach enhances the comprehen-
sibility of input through the creation of meaningful context; shifts focus from
language as object to language for real-life communication; facilitates standards-
based and task-based instruction, while deemphasizing decontextualized, con-
trolled practice; and invites “complex thinking and more sophisticated use of
language” (pp. 150–152). What resonates in these assertions is the vital role of
thought-provoking content, not only for providing an authentic context for lan-
guage use, but also for creating learning experiences in which students practice
and refine their critical thinking skills.
Although thematic unit planning is sometimes described in foreign language

teacher preparation manuals as the province of elementary-level foreign language
programs (e.g., Shrum & Glisan, 2005), I would argue that these advantages,
which center on the thoughtfulness of content and the authenticity of language
use, apply equally as well to secondary and college-level students.
Using Understanding by Design

Based on the principles of backward design, UbD is a powerful curriculum devel-
opment framework used in many teacher preparation programs across the United
States, in foreign language and other subjects alike. Drawing upon constructiv-
ist learning theory, UbD unites theory and practice seamlessly, in a way that
very few texts in education do. In their text, the authors offer curriculum design
tools/strategies aimed at creating learning experiences in which students actively
earn understandings of concepts and demonstrate their ability to transfer their
understandings to novel contexts/situations. One well-known tool used in the
framework consists of “essential questions,” which invite students to consider sub-
ject matter from multiple, often conflicting viewpoints and do not have simple,
declarative answers (e.g., “How would life be different if we couldn’t measure
time?” vs. “How many minutes are there in an hour?” [McTighe & Wiggins,
2004, p. 88]).5 It stands to be noted that questions of this sort open the door for
meaningful language practice that assists in learners’ proficiency development.
In order to enhance the thought value of foreign language curricula, we need
to develop thematic units that inspire true understanding—and not superficial
knowledge—of nuanced foreign language-based content. This can happen using
the myriad tools outlined in UbD. It will most likely also have to happen in
a baby-steps fashion, by “exploding” current textbook topics into meaningful
themes using UbD tools (Martel, 2013b). The Japanese unit described earlier
serves as a good example of this process.
Unfortunately, current textbooks generally offer a fixed view of subject mat-
ter, as if what is written in them represents the one and only “truth.” Accord-
ing to Wiggins and McTighe (2005), “[textbooks’] dry simplification typically
hides the questions, the issues, the history of the ideas, and the inquiries that
ultimately led to what we now know—the very process needed to come to an
understanding!” (p. 232). Instead, we need engaging foreign language units that
encourage students to uncover nuanced understandings of content using the tar-
get language, rather than ones that position learners as passive recipients of static
knowledge (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005).
Conclusion
In this chapter, I have argued that traditional foreign language as a core academic
subject needs to revitalize its content, with an eye toward critical thinking. As
116 Jason Martel
is, the subject is currently shooting itself in the foot—that is, delegitimizing
itself—by refusing to substantially move away from anemic learning experi-
ences. Reform will indeed be hard, but it is necessary. If change does not occur,
it will not be surprising to see foreign language slip off the radar in American
students’ core education.
Resources, like the ones highlighted in this chapter, abound for educators
who want to integrate thoughtful content into their teaching and curriculum
development. These resources will only go so far, however. What we truly
need are courageous foreign language educators who are willing to take a stand
against conservatism. It is my sincere hope that a critical mass will do just so,
reimagining what it means to teach and learn a foreign language in the United
States.
Acknowledgments
I would like to graciously thank Ann Glazer for her help with locating resources,
Nicole Pettitt for her thoughtful feedback on an earlier draft of this chapter, and
Laurent Cammarata for his continued and genuine interest in my work.
Notes
1. As well as, I would argue, the secondary-age foreign language learner.
2. It is vital to note here that discussions of content in CBI ought not take place inde-
pendently of discussions of language. In other words, the texts that impart content in
CBI classrooms (e.g., articles, movies, textbooks, teacher talk) directly influence the
grammatical forms, vocabulary, etc. that teachers need to explicitly teach (see Lyster
[2007] for more about the content and language interface, as well as the work of the
other scholars cited earlier who have shaped my thinking about CBI). Despite this
relationship, I choose in this chapter to focus solely on the former, not only due to
space limitations, but also in order to make my comments about critical thinking and
content choice as salient as possible.
3. Here, Burke is referring to the committee that authored the Report of the Committee of
Ten on Secondary School Studies (National Educational Association, 1894).
4. It is important to note that Jackson et al. (1996) claim that Stage 5 “may be rare at the
secondary level” (p. 21).
5. Due to space limitations, I am unable to provide a thorough explanation of UbD, but
I encourage readers to pick it up and savor it from cover to cover. I also recommend
reading the accompanying workbook (McTighe & Wiggins, 2004), which provides
helpful graphic organizers and facilitates grasping the text itself.
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APPENDIX 5A
Studies/Projects by Standard
Culture Standard Connections Standard Communities Standard

Abrate (1999) Bragger and Rice (1999) Allen and Dupuy (2012)
Alstaedeter and Jones Hardwick and Davis (2009) Bloom (2008)
(2009) Kubota (2012) Caldwell (2007)
Bateman (2002, 2004) Osborn (2000) Chaston (1999)
Byram (2011) Osborn (2003) Darhower (2006)
Calvin (2005) Osborn (2008) Grabois (2007)
Cheatham (2007) Ryan-Scheutz and Grim (2010)
de Ramírez and Stryker Colangelo (2004) Heusinkveld (2006)
(2006) Seewald (2008) Lally (2001)
Duvick (2008) Verkler (2003) Lee (2011)
Goulah (2007) Lorenz and Verdaguer (1997)
Hager (2005) Morris (2001)
Kubota (2003) Pak (2013)
Musto (2011) Polansky (2004)
O’Brien and Levy (2008) Rosengrant (1997)
Peters (2003) Schueller (2007)
Reeser (2003) Wehling (2008)
Schultz (2002) Weldon and Trautmann
Tang (2006) (2003)
6
FOREIGN LANGUAGE EDUCATION
AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF
INQUIRY-DRIVEN LANGUAGE
PROGRAMS
Key Challenges and Curricular
Planning Strategies
Laurent Cammarata
The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of
young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterward; and curiosity itself can
be vivid and wholesome only in proportion as the mind is contented and happy.
(France, 1890, p. 178)
Introduction
As argued forcefully in the introductory chapter of this book, the field of foreign
language (FL) education can and therefore should reconsider and broaden its pri-
mary goals so as to better motivate language learners and so that it may partici-
pate fully in learners’ overall intellectual development (see Cammarata, Tedick, &
Osborn, chapter 1, this volume). For this to have a chance to become reality
though, future curricular reforms will need to concentrate on fostering the devel-
opment of FL programs that can concurrently stimulate learners’ curiosity1 and
ability to think critically within the context of learning an additional language. To
be effective, such programs will not only need to target appropriate instructional mis-
sions that go beyond the mere teaching of language skills and to be strategic when
it comes to the content utilized to contextualize language instruction, they will
also need to place learners into appropriate learning environments that are condu-
cive to intellectually stimulating learning journeys. In other words, to reach their
goals these programs will need to figure out effective ways of helping learners
engage willingly with content in meaningful and cognitively challenging ways;
they will need to nurture learners’ desire to want to know more, ask questions,
explore, and inquire within and beyond the FL classroom walls.
124 Laurent Cammarata
This chapter elaborates on this idea and advocates for the implementation
of an inquiry-driven content-based instruction approach by (1) providing a
rationale for the use of inquiry when designing curricula for the FL classroom,
(2) discussing specific challenges related to the design and implementation of
such curricula, and (3) introducing a curricular planning strategy designed to
help teachers plan for the concurrent targeting of three core instructional goals,
namely, the teaching of content, advanced literacy skills, and academic language.
Toward the Creation of Intellectually Stimulating FL

Programs: Adopting an Inquiry-Driven Language
Teaching Approach
Inquiry as the Core

The label content-based instruction (CBI) or content-based language teaching (CBLT)
is somewhat problematic when considering a move toward more cognitively
challenging curricula in FL education because the integration of meaningful
content into the FL curriculum is not enough, in itself, to ensure that the learn-
ing experience will be meaningful, cognitively engaging, and motivating to
learners. Indeed, any interesting theme and accompanying topics can be neu-
tralized if the tasks we ask students to complete in order to manipulate this
content are not compelling. For this reason, I argue in this chapter that, more
than content, it is inquiry that should be considered the primary focus of any FL
program whose goal is the concurrent development of cognitive and linguistic
abilities.
I argue that inquiry-driven approaches to language teaching are well adapted
to provide learners with more authentic language learning experience than that
proposed by more traditional frameworks because inquiry—the act of question-
ing and the relentless search for answers to important questions that require
deeper forms of thinking—is a core feature of human lifelong learning experi-
ence. Within an inquiry-based framework, the study of language is embed-
ded within long-term, sustained, and rigorous studies of content that afford the
potential to deepen learners’ understanding of important concepts, be they sci-
entific, cultural, or other, of themselves as members of their local or national
communities, and of their roles and responsibilities as global citizens, only to
name a few. Such explorations place learners in contexts where content and
task are not simply an excuse to increase a learner’s overall linguistic repertoire.
In other words, within an inquiry-driven approach to language teaching and
learning, the acquisition of new knowledge as well as the completion of specifi-
cally targeted tasks designed to deepen students’ understanding of non-linguistic
content are essential to the success of the language learning mission. The fol-
lowing sections will make a case for the adoption of an inquiry-driven type of
CBI approach.
Developing Inquiry-Driven FL Programs 125
Inquiry-Based Approach to Teaching and Learning:

A Brief Overview
Inquiry can be understood as “an official effort to collect and examine infor-
mation about something” or “the act of asking questions in order to gather or
collect information” (“Inquiry,” n.d.). The inquiry-based approach to teaching
and learning is based on constructivist theories of learning whose origin can
be traced back to the educational philosophy of Rousseau and Dewey and is
grounded in the research of Bruner, Piaget, and Vygotsky, among others. It has
given rise to varied pedagogical models over the years, for example, problem-
based or project-based learning, adventure learning, expeditionary learning, and
others. Although these models offer variations in the way inquiry work is opera-
tionalized within the classroom environment, they remain guided by the same
core principles for developing constructivist learning environments that have
been well documented in the literature (e.g., Olsen, 1999) and that emphasize
“the learner’s contribution to meaning and learning through both individual and
social activity” (Bruning, Schraw, & Ronning, 1999, p. 215).
The inquiry-based approach to teaching and learning has been implemented
with success in varied disciplines and most particularly in science education in
North America (Edelson, Gordin, & Pea, 1999). Inquiry-driven curricular mod-
els such as the Understanding by Design (UbD) framework proposed by Wiggins
and McTighe (2005) or the Expeditionary Learning (EL) model whose primary
mission is to stimulate depth of thinking through authentic learning and whole
school reform (McDonald, Klein, & Riordan, 2009; Troyan, Chapters 7 and 10,
this volume) have also led to varied school-wide implementation across North
America and Europe.
How Compatible Is the Inquiry-Based Approach with Current

Views on Language and Language Teaching?
The inquiry-based approach to teaching and learning, which considers learners as
explorers (Lindfors, 1982) and focuses on the process of learning, aligns well with
the modern sociocultural theoretical (SCT) view of language and language teach-
ing. SCT underscores the relationship between language and thought and, in that
way, participates in clarifying the intricate linkages unifying language form and
meaning (for a lengthy discussion on the topic, see Donato, chapter 2, this volume).
According to SCT, the primary function of language is not just to commu-
nicate information (as it is often portrayed within conventional programs); SCT
maintains that language should not be considered simply as a muscle needing
to be trained so that it can do some heavy communicative weight lifting. Not-
withstanding the fact that language is a tool used to communicate, it is also, and
importantly, “a device to think and feel with, as well as a device with which to
signal and negotiate social identity” (Gee, 1990, p. 78).
Taking sides with this theoretical position, as I and other authors in this vol-
ume do, necessarily implies that we cannot view language “as a skill, a tool
that is itself devoid of any intellectual value” (Kramsch, 1993, p. 3) any lon-
ger. Rather, we must acknowledge that the nature of language imposes that
we focus instruction on familiarizing learners with varied types of discourse
that may ultimately enable them to utilize language in cognitively authentic
ways—for example, express their thoughts, perform various functions essential
to their everyday existence such as engaging in discovery activities to explore,
and deepen their understanding of their surrounding world as well as their place
and role within it—and become better meaning makers (Meyer, 2015).
In short, espousing such a theoretical view has an impact on the way we
conceive language teaching—within this paradigm, integration of language and
content in instruction is not simply considered desirable; it is viewed as essential,
indeed inevitable. The central tenets of SCT are based on this very idea that
the acquisition of content knowledge and learners’ cognitive growth are both
dependent on learners’ parallel linguistic development. Such a view thus dictates
the elaboration of intellectually stimulating curricula for the FL classroom where
both cognitive and linguistic growth can be concurrently targeted. The adop-
tion of an inquiry-based approach to drive FL curriculum planning and teaching
provides an ideal educational ground to nurture both linguistic and cognitive
growth because it ensures that language learning is contingent on cognitively
authentic exploratory journeys, in other words, on intellectually demanding and
motivating tasks that naturally call for depth of thinking.
What Does It Look Like in Practice?

Examples of the meaningful integration of language and content learning that
naturally stem from the implementation of inquiry-driven CBI programs can
be found in curricular plans designed to help learners understand some impor-
tant concepts linked to the use of language as a sociocultural and political tool.
Although aimed at English as a second language contexts, the classroom activity
described by Schleppegrell and de Oliveira (2006) based on their historical literacy
approach provides a concrete example of how a focus on language use in the tex-
tual reconstructing of historical events can help students develop an awareness
of the intersects among history, culture, language, and power. The activity they
describe asked students to analyze the biases and prejudices of both the Ameri-
cans and Japanese through the exploration of specific linguistic patterns found in
two important speeches by the American president Truman and Premier Minis-
ter Suzuki during World War II. During this activity students identified loaded
and negatively charged terms used by both parties (e.g., brute, arrogant, idiocy)
to characterize each other in ways that reflected their biases and prejudices. The
teacher explained that, during the process, students “were able to take apart
those and figure out what Truman was trying to say, what the Japanese were
trying to say, and understand the bias of both sides during WWII, the racism of
both sides during WWII” (p. 262). This example demonstrates how a focus on
inquiry, in this particular case the exploration of language use in meaningful
historical documents, can lead to cognitively stimulating critical explorations and
how, when the sociohistorical/cultural/political nature of language is treated as a
theme, it can trigger deep reflections regarding the role of language in the shap-
ing of reality and beliefs. Other examples of inquiry-driven programs specifically
designed for the FL classroom can be found in the last section of this chapter
as well as in other chapters in this volume (see, for instance, the description of
Expeditionary Learning curricula in Troyan, Chapter 10, and Hagstrom, Chapter
12, in this volume).
How Can the Inquiry-Based Approach Support

Reforms in the Field?
Because they place learners at the center of their learning experience, which
is key to ensuring that they will remain highly engaged throughout the entire
learning process, inquiry-based programs can have a positive impact on learn-
ers’ motivation to participate actively throughout the entire learning journey. As
Edelson, Gordin, and Pea (1999) note,
Inquiry activities can lead learners to confront the boundaries of their

knowledge or recognize gaps in that knowledge. The limits of one’s knowl-
edge are often revealed by the failure of an expectation about a particu-
lar situation (Schank, 1999) leading to curiosity. The curiosity elicited by
such problematic situations creates a focused motivation to learn (Berlyne,
1966).
(p. 394)
Programs based on the inquiry-based approach also promote sustained intellec-

tual engagement (deep thinking/understanding) over lengthy periods of time. In
this regard, they are well adapted when it comes to stimulating the development
of higher-order thinking skills in the classroom, which are essential to academic
success. Considering both its potential positive impact on learner motivation and
its capacity to stimulate deep thinking in the FL classroom leads me to argue that
the inquiry-based curricular approach is well adapted to respond to the needs for
reform in the field of FL education today, as articulated in varied chapters in this
volume and elsewhere (see Cammarata et al., chapter 1, this volume; Martel, this
volume; Osborn, 2005; Reagan & Osborn, 2002).
Although the inquiry-based approach to learning and teaching has proven to
be highly effective in varied educational contexts inclusive of the K–12 setting,2
programs based on this model remain complex to design and implement, and
few examples of the way it might be operationalized in the FL classroom exist.
It is, therefore, important for anyone desiring to experiment with this approach
in the FL classroom to understand the specific challenges that accompany the
adoption of the approach, a topic explored in the next section.
Inquiry-Driven Language Teaching: What Key Challenges

Are Associated with the Approach?
Inquiry-driven programs, which contrast drastically with conventional skill-
driven FL programs commonly found in secondary and post-secondary settings,
are challenging to design because they make specific demands that impact cur-
riculum planning and teaching in significant ways. These demands must be well
understood by FL teachers desiring to experiment with planning curricula based
on the inquiry model. For instance, instructional units based on an inquiry-
driven framework such as EL (for illustrations see Troyan, Chapter 10, as well
as Hagstrom, Chapter 12, this volume) tend to require learners to be exposed
to and use a more advanced and academically formal linguistic repertoire. Such
units also require learners to deploy and utilize a wide array of advanced aca-
demic literacy skills, those needed to question, critique, argue, debate, synthesize
information, evaluate, and so on (be it orally or in writing). Such skills related
to content and disciplinary literacy (Alvermann, Phelps, & Gillis, 2010) will
need to be strategically targeted within the curricular planning process to help
support language learners’ efforts to engage in cognitively challenging tasks in a
language they do not yet fully control.
As a result, language teachers desiring to develop cognitively stimulat-
ing FL programs capable of motivating learners to engage with the learning
experience within the classroom walls and beyond will need to think like a
content, language, and literacy teacher all at the same time. The complexity
of the mission for FL teachers, then, is to figure out effective ways to plan
for the concurrent teaching of these three central instructional components:
(1) content that is meaningful to learners, capable of sparking students’ inter-
est and connecting with their lived world here and now (a topic explored
in depth in the introductory chapter as well as in many others in this vol-
ume); (2) academic language, the words and grammar linked to the content
being explored as well as the language linked to the specific genres and texts
being exploited in class and reproduced (i.e., the language of reading, writ-
ing, and speaking); and (3) advanced literacy skills, those that are connected
to higher-order thinking skills (Bloom et al., 1956) that must be deployed by
students whenever they have to engage in deeper forms of thinking. The last
two dimensions are the focus of the discussion henceforth, which endeavors
to clarify the nature of the work that the successful implementation of an
inquiry-driven CBI approach entails.
Inquiry-Driven CBI and the Reconceptualization of the

Language Teaching Mission
The “language teacher hat” is what FL language teachers working in conven-
tional textbook-based curriculum commonly understand to be the key compo-
nent of their instructional uniform.3 In other words, language teaching within
traditional K–16 programs is understood primarily as the teaching of form (e.g.,
lexicon, grammar) for the sake of helping learners develop communicative com-
petence in a target language. This view is based on a traditional understanding
of the nature and function of language, which must be reconsidered and broad-
ened for it to be compatible with the principles of an inquiry-based approach to
language teaching.
As previously discussed, inquiry-driven approaches to language instruction
propose a learning experience much more reflective of the nature and role of
language as it is understood today, yet they make additional demands in terms
of language instruction that must be well understood and carefully considered
when planning. Teachers will, among other things, need to broaden their teach-
ing scope to include an increased focus on academic language linked to the use
of more complex themes and topics than those commonly found in textbook-
driven programs as well as the use of more complex tasks requiring critical or
deeper forms of thinking within the context of learning a FL (see illustrations in
Section 4 of this volume). Such a formal focus on academic language acquisition
is rarely considered relevant within conventional programs where the communi-
cation goal is almighty and where content learning is not a priority.
Inquiry-Oriented Language Teaching: A Focus on

Academic Language
A focus on academic language is pertinent when considering the development
of inquiry-based CBI programs because it is tightly linked to the development
of higher-order thinking skills, a goal that the curricular reform advocated in
this chapter holds paramount. The importance of academic language can be
easily understood when we consider its nature and role. The complex nature
of academic language is described by Short, Vogt, and Echevarría (2011a) who
define it as being composed of the following essential components: academic
vocabulary, grammar, syntax, language for reading, language for writing, oral
academic discourse, prosody, self-talk, thinking, and knowing. They go on to
argue that there is an intricate relationship unifying academic language, literacy,
and thinking skills (Short et al., 2011b). Zwiers (2008, cited in Short et al., 2011a)
further defines academic language as “the set of words, grammar, and organiza-
tional strategies used to describe complex ideas, higher order thinking processes,
and abstract concepts” (p. 20). This definition clarifies the relationship between
academic language and thinking processes and underscores the link between the
development of an academic language repertoire and one’s ability to engage in

more complex thinking.
Academic Language and Depth of Thinking

Zwiers’s definition is in harmony with Cummins’s (1984) work, which clearly
indicates that there is a direct connection between one’s level of academic flu-
ency, what he characterizes as cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP),
and one’s ability to engage in complex thinking tasks. CALP represents the more
advanced linguistic and literacy skills learners need to acquire if they are to
thrive academically, socially, and professionally in twenty-first century societ-
ies where access to recorded knowledge and the ability to tap resources in all
forms—be it written, oral, or visual—have become a condition for survival.
According to Cummins (1984), there is a clear correlation between cognitive
and language processes: lower-level thinking skills (i.e., knowledge, comprehen-
sion, application) are associated with the surface manifestation of proficiency
(i.e., pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar), whereas higher-order thinking skills
(i.e., analysis, synthesis, evaluation) are associated with deeper or more com-
plex levels of language proficiency (i.e., semantic and functional meaning).
Cummins’s work is particularly relevant to our conversation because it clari-
fies the linkages unifying thinking, form, and meaning. More importantly, it
underscores the necessity for language educators desiring to experiment with an
inquiry-driven CBI approach wherein cognitive engagement is a primary goal
to help learners develop their academic language repertoires. The development
of learners’ academic repertoire is central if they are to delve into deeper levels
of cognitive and language proficiency while they are exploring intellectually
stimulating content (e.g., themes exploring ethical issues, existential questions)
in a meaningful way (e.g., tasks that have an authentic goal).
Because there is a strong correlation between learners’ ability to perform com-
plex cognitive tasks, the size of their academic language repertoire, and their level
of academic literacy skills, literacy growth represents an important instructional
variable to consider for FL teachers desiring to develop and implement cognitively
stimulating programs. The development of advanced literacy skills within the
context of FL instruction is especially important if the ultimate goal is to help the
field play a more important role within the broader educational lives of learners.
This important topic is explored in more depth in the following section.
A Focus on Advanced Literacy Growth in the

Inquiry-Driven FL Classroom
As was the case for academic language, when it comes to academic literacy, FL
teachers rarely if ever consider this instructional dimension to be an important
component to focus on during the curriculum development process. This is not
surprising as the topic is typically not covered in K–12 FL teacher education

programs nor is it in most common professional development opportunities. It is
true that, within traditional communicative and usually skills-focused language
instruction, helping learners develop advanced literacy skills might represent an
optional or even irrelevant instructional objective. It is, nevertheless, an essential
one if we are to reconceptualize FL teaching around an inquiry framework so
that it may, at last, support learners’ development of advanced thinking skills
and the academic language repertoire that comes with it. As I argue here, the
focus on literacy skills that is optional or ignored altogether in most conven-
tional programs becomes a requirement when implementing an inquiry-driven
CBI program or any other type of curriculum whose goal is to transform the FL
classroom into a site where essential thinking skills can be developed and core
intellectual traits can be nurtured. Because this topic is rarely addressed within
the context of FL education, a more extended discussion regarding the need for
an overt focus on advanced literacy instruction within the context of foreign
language teaching is warranted.
Academic Literacy: A Definition

Traditional definitions such as the one proposed by Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate
Dictionary describe literacy as the quality or state of being literate, that is, being able
to read and write. Such a definition, however, does not appropriately reflect the
modern understanding of what it means to be literate especially from an academic
perspective. According to Short and Fitzsimmons (2007), developing academic lit-
eracy is a complex endeavor that involves reading, writing, listening, and speak-
ing for multiple school-related purposes using a variety of texts and demanding a
variety of products. They go on to describe the main characteristics of academic
literacy among which the following three are important for us to consider: (1) Aca-
demic literacy and literate thinking include reading, writing, and oral discourse
for school, which underscores the fact that literate thinking also occurs when indi-
viduals are communicating orally while exchanging information with others or
with themselves; (2) academic literacy is context-bound and varies from subject to
subject, which means that the theme and accompanying topics we select will have
an impact on the type of academic language students will need to possess and the
type of literacy skills they will need to deploy to manipulate the content studied;
and (3) academic literacy requires knowledge of multiple genres of text.
The pedagogical implications for FL curriculum planning and teaching
within an inquiry-driven CBI paradigm are manifold (for an extended discus-
sion see Ryshina-Pankova, chapter 3, this volume). Most importantly, this para-
digm underscores the need for FL teachers to be cognizant of the complexity the
academic reading, writing, and communicative activities they propose within
the context of teaching language through meaningful inquiry (e.g., rigorous,
sustained, well-informed explorations) might represent to learners.
Asking learners to engage in cognitively complex tasks implies that we pro-

vide learners with adequate preparation for the task. To be effective, such prepa-
ration must go well beyond the usual focus on linguistic control and make room
for the strategic practice of advanced literacy skills in the FL classroom because
the practice of such skills represent effective instructional scaffolds. The follow-
ing section elaborates on these specific literacy needs while contextualizing them
within the inquiry-oriented CBI curricular work advocated for in this chapter.
Advanced Literacy Growth for Cognitive Depth

As was argued thus far, teaching FL with an inquiry-driven framework, which
implies using content that can arouse learners’ curiosity, meaningful tasks, and
authentic texts, not only involves a preparation at the conceptual and linguistic
level, but must also include a focus on literacy instruction. Advanced literary
instruction is needed if we are to ensure that learners are able to successfully
engage in increasingly more cognitively complex tasks in the FL classroom,
such as those the inquiry-oriented CBI curricular model fostered in this chapter
require.
When it comes to the reading abilities required to perform well in a learning
context where inquiry has been set as a core curricular engine, at the very least
learners need to be able to extract specific information from varied texts (scan-
ning) as well as to grasp the overall meaning of varied texts in a very quick and
efficient manner (skimming). Learners also need to develop the ability to syn-
thesize, condense, summarize information from varied venues, simplify complex
notions to share with others, and even present orally or in writing in a way that
is academically appropriate/acceptable. These are advanced literacy skills all must
develop and master if they are to work at the level of cognitive depth targeted by
curricula developed within a content as well as inquiry-based paradigm.
When it comes to oral and written literacy needs involved in particular cog-
nitively engaging language learning activities, they are no less important for FL
teachers to consider. Asking learners to craft a short argumentative essay, for
instance, a type of text commonly found in secondary and post-secondary pro-
grams, which will be discussed in more detail in the last section of this chap-
ter, implies that leaners possess the necessary language to complete the task (i.e.,
content-specific vocabulary, words and grammar of argumentation such as means
of expressing opinion and causation) as well as understand how effective argu-
mentative essays are constructed. In other words, they need to become familiar
with the specific purpose, structure, and associated language of the type of texts
being targeted (see Fortune & Tedick, 2003; Gibbons, 2009; Schleppegrell, 2004).
Given the preceding discussion, it should now be clear that, within more
cognitively challenging FL programs, language learners’ capacity to perform
will greatly benefit from having developed their ability to wield advanced lit-
eracy skills as much as from their language control. In this sense, the practice
of advanced literacy skills within the inquiry-driven FL classroom context can

help alleviate some of the difficulties learners will face when asked to complete
cognitively complex academic tasks while not possessing the adequate level of
language proficiency. It goes without saying that the development of such skills
will not materialize out of thin air or be the product of chance; it will require
a sustained pedagogical effort from FL teachers as well as the use of effective
curriculum planning strategies, a few of which are described in the following
section.
The Writing of Well-Crafted Curricula for the

Inquiry-Driven CBI Classroom
It is now considered a truism that “[a]ll good teachers must be good planners”
(Met, 1994, p. 160). But while expertise in curriculum planning is acknowledged
today as a key ingredient in successful teaching in general, it is even more essen-
tial when it comes to adopting an inquiry-oriented CBI teaching stance.
As was previously touched upon, framing curricula around the exploration of
meaningful content within well-conceptualized inquiry learning environments
(e.g., see the inquiry cycle model showcased in Osborn, 2005 and 2006 or the
Expeditionary Learning model illustrated in Troyan, Chapter 10, and Hagstrom,
Chapter 12, this volume), is an experience very different from what FL teachers
are commonly used to when planning units and lessons for the FL classroom.
Adopting such a stance implies important modifications to the way we plan,
implement, and assess instruction. Most particularly, it requires planning on
multiple planes so that leaners may develop concurrently linguistic skills, think-
ing skills, and advanced literacy skills supportive of the cognitive development
language teachers will seek to stimulate.
Notwithstanding the potential negative side effects that may stem from the use
of such a strategy, which Donato (chapter 2, this volume) eloquently describes, I
argue that, when appropriately introduced, the writing of well-crafted content,
language, and academic literacy skills objectives is an effective way to help teach-
ers desiring to experiment with cognitively engaging CBI curriculum prepare
for the task. The following will provide a rationale for engaging in such work
and walk readers through a series of steps that have been helpful to many talented
language teachers I have had the chance to work with throughout the years.
Crafting Sound Objectives for Inquiry-Driven CBI

Programs: A Rationale
Identifying and categorizing clear educational outcomes (i.e., overarching aim
or vision for the program, unit goals, lesson objectives) is key when it comes to
curriculum planning. As Chiarelott (2006) explains, it is based on the assump-
tion that “you can’t plan a trip if you do not know where you’re going” (p. 58).
The writing of clear lesson objectives is particularly useful to FL teachers desiring

to experiment with inquiry-driven CBI because it can allow them to assess the
gap between the intended learning outcomes and the actual learning outcomes.
That is, it is an effective means by which language teachers can ensure that
the instructional module they have designed provides the necessary support for
learners to concurrently learn new content knowledge, increase their academic
language repertoire, and hone academic literacy skills essential for deep thinking
and academic performance.
Although this is a an instructionally sound principle to follow regardless of
the curricular approach utilized, being able to systematically trace the effective-
ness of the instructional plan when it comes to targeting the development of
content knowledge, language, and literacy skills becomes essential to CBI cur-
ricular planning. This is even truer when the content and tasks selected as the
focus of language instruction are complex, as is the case with inquiry-driven
CBI curricular units exploring themes such as those related to ethics and justice
in general.
A Scaffold for Crafting Well-Written Content Objectives

Because with CBI, content learning is considered an instructional mission of pri-
mary importance, the curriculum planning process ideally should begin by clar-
ifying the type of content knowledge we want students to gain as the outcome of
the learning journey. Thus the selection of an overarching theme, big idea, or an
essential question (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005) followed by the identification of
usable authentic texts should precede considerations about the specific language
that will need to be taught within this context as well as other language-related
programmatic concerns. The clarification of what students will learn specifically
during the course of the inquiry-driven CBI unit is also of utmost importance
because the clearer the content learning objective is, the easier it will be to iden-
tify key linguistic and literacy challenges students will face. Such information is
needed for FL teachers to be able to provide the strategic instructional scaffolding
students will need to perform well during their learning journey. To that end,
the KCA formula (Appendix 6A), which stands for Knowledge targeted, Cognitive
complexity, and Activities, was created to guide teachers through the process and
help them clarify their thoughts regarding the content side of the instructional
objectives. This is called a formula because all three components must be added
together to create a well-written content learning objective. The idea of a for-
mula for writing objectives comes from Fortune (n.d.), who developed a formula
for writing language objectives,4 a variation of which is introduced later in the
chapter.
The first category of the formula (Knowledge targeted) asks teachers to reflect
on the academic or cultural content they wish their students to be exposed to
during a given lesson. The question that teachers should ask themselves at this
stage is: What concepts, academic or other, will students learn about during the
lesson? What specific knowledge will they explore? What is it exactly we want
them to understand when it comes to the question or topic under study? The
second category of the formula (Cognitive complexity) asks teachers to decide
on a specific level of cognitive engagement that will be required of learners as
they engage in varied activities. Although it has been criticized and is not with-
out flaws, the use of the now well-known Bloom’s Taxonomy (1956) offers a
detailed model for categorizing outcomes in the cognitive domain and, by that
way, provides a great scaffold for teachers wanting to create clear and effective
objectives for their lessons. Knowing what cognitive level will be targeted is
important because it can help teachers decide what activities are most suitable
for students at varied stages of the learning process considering many variables
such as conceptual complexity (e.g., abstract concepts) as well as students’ age,
maturity level, and background knowledge. It can also help ensure that the unit
follows a logical and steady progression toward the targeting of higher-order
thinking skills so that the learning experience may remain cognitively engaging
all throughout (an important goal for inquiry-driven CBI). The third and last
category of the formula (Activities) asks teachers to describe what students will
do in order to learn the content identified in the first category of the formula.
This step is also important because the nature of the activity itself has implica-
tions in terms of the literacy and language demands it entails and thus requires
strategic planning to support learners’ efforts.
In order to provide a concrete illustration of the use of the KCA formula to
craft clear content objectives for an inquiry-driven CBI curriculum, let’s con-
sider a unit on air pollution created by Heidi Fiedler, a French K–12 teacher
and former student of mine. The unit was created for a French II class and for
students of low-intermediate proficiency (for an overview of the unit and its
context, see Appendix 6B). During the first lesson of the unit, Heidi wanted her
students to become familiar with air indexes, tools commonly used to measure
air quality, so that her class could begin talking about environmental issues,
define air pollution, and learn about key pollutants that most indexes use as vari-
ables when analyzing air quality. Using the KCA formula helped her frame her
content objective by clearly identifying what knowledge she wanted her students
to be exposed to during the session and how this knowledge was going to be
manipulated. The following provides an illustration of one of the many content
objectives included in Heidi’s lesson created using the information identified in
the KCA formula:
• Students will be able to identify (K) key pollutants related to air pollution (C)
by interpreting data from three online air quality indexes and completing a
graphic organizer requiring them to compare and contrast information (A).
In writing content objectives, teachers must ensure that all three components of
the formula are included, but the order in which they appear in the objective is
not important.
A Scaffold to Guide the Identification of Key Literacy

Skills to Be Targeted
Once clear content objectives have been crafted, implications regarding literacy
demands can and, I argue, should be explored. Each activity we plan when develop-
ing inquiry-driven CBI curricula has the potential to require the use of advanced
academic literacy skills. To illustrate this point, let’s go back to our previous exam-
ple where students are asked to read air quality indexes, a very specific type of
authentic text learners might not be familiar with at all. Interpreting data from
texts we have never encountered may require particular reading skills and particu-
lar background knowledge students may or may not have. The lack of knowledge
of what the particular text being studied is meant for and how it is structured can
present language learners with complex reading challenges that will add to the
conceptual and linguistic challenges the task might already impose.
In the particular case of the Parisian air index, to be able to comprehend this
authentic text readers will first need to be clear about what all the components
(e.g., numbered scale, colors, map, labels or map legends) stand for. They will
also need to understand how all the components interact with each other in
order to make sense of the information provided. These are specific reading
skills that should be introduced and practiced in order to ensure that learners
will make the most of the texts that they are asked to mine. These skills are
transferable to other texts that may use a similar structure or present information
visually (e.g., maps, diagrams) and thus the academic benefits for learners extend
well beyond the classroom walls. In other words, FL teachers can play a more
important role within the broader educational lives of learners by helping them
hone literacy skills that can augment their capacity to perform academically in
all their subjects. But this will only happen if it is by design.
In order to guide teachers in the process of crafting sound academic liter-
acy skills objectives for their inquiry-driven CBI curriculum, the LTO formula
(Appendix 6A), which stands for Literacy skills, Texts, and Outcome, was created.
Following this scaffold, FL teachers are invited to think about the different lit-
eracy skills (L) learners will need to use as they complete the activities. Such
activities will naturally involve the use of authentic texts (T) to support the learn-
ing of content (e.g., newspaper articles, videos, interviews from members of the
community belonging to the target culture) and will mostly involve skills linked
to the receptive modes of communication (listening and reading), although the
productive modes (writing and speaking) could also be targeted during this pro-
cess. Depending on the context and learners’ needs, varied academic literacy
skills could be practiced such as the use of scanning and skimming reading
strategies to quickly grasp texts, using one’s familiarity with specific genres or
type of texts (e.g., diagrams such as air quality indexes) to quickly identify main
ideas or a particular feature of the text that must be dealt with, use of reading
comprehension strategies such as making inferences, using cues such as the main
titles or else to predict what the text will discuss, only to name a few.
Additional needed literacy skills will be directly connected to the outcome (O)
of the learning experience, or the product that learners will be asked to create.
This product, which serves as evidence of learners’ understanding of the content
under study and which often takes the form of a culminating written and/or oral
task used as summative unit assessment, involves the creation of texts and thus
the use of productive skills (i.e., writing and speaking). The nature of the task,
the specific type of text learners will be asked to produce, will make specific
demands in terms of literacy skills.
In the particular case of the unit on air pollution we’ve been using as an
illustration thus far, the learning culminates in a writing task that asks stu-
dents to provide evidences of their understanding of complex environmental
issues and their roles and responsibilities as users and future consumers. The
assignment is a short argumentative essay in which they need to critique varied
means of transportations for their negative environmental footprint and pro-
vide a convincing argument for a particular alternative (e.g., a specific type of
vehicle). Being able to craft a good critique and argument means being capable
of providing a thoughtful, well-articulated opinion. In this particular case it
involves, among other things, being able to (1) determine a set of criteria from
which the environmental friendliness of a car or other means of transportation
can be judged (e.g., use of air indexes, ecoscores); (2) identify facts, examples,
and evidence to strengthen one’s reasoning and judgment; and (3) state one’s
opinion and support it with examples and evidence to convince the audience
that the judgment is the fruit of a rigorous ref lection. Thus, FL teachers who
want to help students complete such a task in the target language must recog-
nize that, for learners to be able to perform well on the task, they will need
not only to have developed content knowledge specific to the topic, but also to
possess the literacy skills required to craft a good evaluation or critique. In other
words, helping students perform here means, to a great extent, helping them
develop the academic literacy skills needed to reproduce the specific targeted
texts (in our example an argument and critique). This implies that students
understand what essential components must be present and how these elements
must be organized for the text to be effective. Such work can be asked even of
lower proficient learners provided that appropriate scaffolds are in place. In the
air pollution unit, Heidi created a graphic organizer that guided students in
the process of crafting their argument—the graphic organizer required them
to identify key components for their argument in a sequential manner thus
modeling an ideal structure for a good argument. A literacy objective created

for this unit using the LTO formula was as follows:
• Students will demonstrate targeted mastery in reading and writing by iden-

tifying and describing the role of the key components of an air quality index
(L) included in each of the three identified online air quality indexes (T) so
as to later be able to give a personal and well-informed opinion regarding
the impact of car emission on air pollution (O).
Identifying key elements linked to literacy needs is also important because, as is

the case with targeted content to be studied, they have an impact on the type of
language learners will need to learn and practice.
A Scaffold to Help Teachers Tease Out Key Language Implications

Stemming from Content and Literacy Objectives
The importance of meticulous planning when it comes to designing and imple-
menting CBI curricula comes from the need and accompanying challenge for
teachers and curriculum planners to find ways “in which language experiences
can be sequenced in order that the development of language learning can be
coordinated with the development of content learning” (Mohan, 1986, p. 117).
The writing of specific language objectives plays a key role in this process, as it can
ensure that both discourse development and content development support each
other. In fact, the writing of clear language objectives is, I argue, an essential com-
ponent of any curriculum whose goal is to try to make language learning more
meaningful by weaving in authentic texts and tasks.
Having clarified our content aims and identified important literacy skills needed
to complete the tasks we have planned for our students places us in a strategic posi-
tion to clearly anticipate all major linguistic demands that may stem from them.
As mentioned previously, Fortune (n.d.) developed a formula that can be used as a
scaffold by teachers to craft well-focused language objectives. I have expanded this
formula to match the specific planning needs of teachers desiring to experiment
with an inquiry-oriented approach to FL instruction. Two planning scaffolds related
to language are proposed here (Appendix 6A) to help guide FL teachers in antici-
pating key linguistic challenges as they relate to both the content study dimension
and the task dimension, which is likely to require the use of advanced literacy skills.
With the content-related language objective formula (FGV), which stands for
Function, Grammar, and Vocabulary teachers are invited to begin their analysis
by considering the goal(s) embedded within the communicative act (i.e., the
functions). Teachers are then asked to reflect on the grammar students need
to carry out particular activities (grammatical structures required to perform)
and lexical items related to the content being studied (words associated with the
topic) as well as the particular context within which communication will occur
(e.g., the linguistic backdrop such as words, phrases, and expressions that belong
to a specific meaning-making event). In the air pollution unit, and given the
activity in which students were asked to utilize information found in air quality
indexes to describe the state of air quality in Atlanta and Paris on a given day, the
following objectives resulted from such analysis: Students will . . .
• describe information found in air quality indexes (F) by using the present
tense 3rd person singular and descriptive adjectives, for example, bon(ne)
(good), mauvais(e) (bad), moyen(ne) (average), (G) with words/phrases/frames
such as Aujourd’hui la qualité de l’air est . . . (Today air quality is . . .) (V)
• describe the cause of the pollution recorded by a given index (F) by using the
compound preposition à cause de + noun (because of ) (G) with words/phrases
such as pollution à’ozone/aux particules (ozone or particle pollution), and so on (V),
for example, Aujourd’hui la qualité de l’air à Paris est mauvaise à cause de la pollution
à l’ozone (Today the air quality in Paris is bad because of the ozone pollution)
• compare and contrast air quality information about Paris and Atlanta (F) by
using the conjunctions et (and) and mais (but) along with comparatives such
as meilleure que (better than), moins bonne que (less good than), and pire que
(worst than) (G), with words/phrases such as La qualité de l’air à (nom de
la ville A) est meilleure/moins bonne que/pire qu’à (nom de la ville B) (The
air quality of city A is better/less good/worse than the one in city B) (V)
When it comes to the literacy-related language objective scaffold, FL teachers

are asked to consider language implications as they relate to the materials being
utilized (words and grammar of the texts) as well as language demands that stem
from the productive phase of the lesson (written or oral production) where stu-
dents are asked to create a specific text on their own. The writing of language
objectives using this particular scaffold can follow the FGV formula used earlier,
but does not have to be as precise. The following is a concrete example related to
the air pollution unit assessment:
• Students will use conjunctions showing cause and effect, such as parce que
(because), puisque (since), par conséquent (as a result), donc (therefore) (G), to
provide a convincing argument when developing their final project (F).
Although they might at times lead to some redundancy, these two formulas taken
together will allow FL teachers to fully appraise the linguistic complexity associ-
ated with the study of the selected content and thus help them craft the necessary
scaffolds to support students’ learning all throughout their learning journey.
Pulling It All Together: A Framework to Ensure That the Three

Interconnected Dimensions Are Not Treated in Isolation
The proposed scaffolds designed to assist teachers in the elaboration of sound
instructional objectives linked to the development of content knowledge, language,
and academic literacy skills should not be used in isolation; rather the interplay
among all these dimensions should be considered of primary importance and
should drive the planning process when experimenting with an inquiry-driven
approach to language instruction. Understanding how the three dimensions (i.e.,
content, language, and literacy) intersect and form a unified whole like a pyra-
mid, which would not be able to exist without one of its three sides, is essential
if FL teachers are to successfully attend to all learners’ needs during the course of
developing and implementing an inquiry-driven CBI program.
Referring back again to the air pollution unit assessment can provide a con-
crete illustration of the existing connections among the three dimensions. In
order to perform well during the task, learners will need to not only understand
key concepts (e.g., responsibility, environmental protection, pollution) and their
associated language (e.g., names of key pollutants and type of pollution such as
particle or ozone pollution; type of health risks and effects such as asthma), but
also understand the engineering or mechanics of an effective argument, a type of
activity and associated texts that require the use of specific literacy skills. Indeed,
crafting a good critique or written argumentation presupposes that one knows
how to critique or argue and this within a specifically given academic context.
Thus, learners will need to know, among other things, what a good argument
looks like and what type of literacy and language skills are needed when craft-
ing a good argument. This implies that learners can identify essentials facts from
experts’ voices and that they are able to provide supporting evidence (involves
reading/listening skills as well as specific language used to support one’s own
opinion). They also need to know the rhetoric of how to disagree with others in
a respectful manner (which involves, e.g., both advanced academic skills and the
use of specific language to express polite disagreement, indirect speech to report
what other persons have said). And they need to be able to synthetize informa-
tion (which involves varied receptive and productive language and literacy skills
as well as the capacity to use the passive voice, synonyms to paraphrase, referents
to condense information, etc.).
The air pollution unit used as an illustration throughout this section clearly
shows how each dimension matters when it comes to successfully completing
a learning journey designed around the pursuit of a cognitively complex and
engaging exploration. Relationships between dimensions included in the content-
language-literacy framework have been identified with the use of arrows to
indicate major connections between components (see Appendix 6A). Although
this visual representation of how the content, language, and literacy dimensions
interconnect does not pretend to be encompassing when it comes to reveal-
ing all challenges related to the design and implementation of inquiry-driven
CBI curricula in the FL classroom, it provides a visual aid that may be used as
a quick reminder that (1) content and language integration, as it is conceived
within an inquiry-driven educational framework, cannot be fully realized
without concurrently helping learners develop essential academic literacy skills;

and (2) the linguistic demands associated with such curricula are manifold and
will emerge not only from the content under study, but also from the discipline
it relates to, and the complex tasks embedded within the curriculum.
Conclusion
As was argued throughout this chapter, the adoption of an inquiry-driven CBI
approach requires FL teachers to move away from traditional models of instruc-
tion. They must be willing to revisit and broaden their instructional agenda to
include a focus on meaningful content (i.e., capable of arousing learners’ curios-
ity and desire to explore further) and tasks (i.e., cognitively engaging to learners)
as well as on the development of academic language proficiency and advanced
literacy skills. Creating curricula that successfully target these three dimen-
sions all at once is an important but difficult adventure. The success of such an
experiment depends much on teachers’ understanding of the work at stake, their
sustained and strategic pedagogical efforts, as well as their use of well-adapted
curriculum planning strategies.
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to Diane Tedick and Jason Martel for the insightful comments and
feedback they provided on an earlier draft of this manuscript.
Notes
1. The concepts of curiosity and inquiry are intimately intertwined. In fact, curiosity, a
strong desire to want to know more, is often described as the engine of inquiry and
has long been identified as a central component of motivation.
2. Casco Bay High School for Expeditionary Learning (CBHS) school in Maine has been
successfully implementing an inquiry-based approach as evidenced by the awards and
accolades it has received in the media over the years: CBHS was identified as one of
“35 High Schools Worth Visiting” by Education Week in 2013; it was named one
of Maine’s top high schools by U.S. News and World Report in 2012. It has also been
showcased in the Schools That Work flagship series of Edutopia magazine (http://
www.edutopia.org/schools-that-work), which highlights K–12 and district practices
that improve the way students learn.
3. When describing current issues linked to traditional language teaching practices in
this chapter, I am referring to the work of the majority of conventional FL teachers,
those who follow a textbook-based curriculum. This is not to say that all FL teaching
practices are the same: Some (albeit few) language teachers are doing the type of work
advocated here (indeed some of their stellar work is showcased in this volume).
4. The original formula is available on the Content Based Language with Technol-
ogy (CoBaLTT) website: http://www.carla.umn.edu/cobaltt/modules/curriculum/
formula.html
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APPENDIX 6A
A Framework for Content-Language-Literacy Integration to Guide
Curriculum Planning Decisions
APPENDIX 6B
An Inquiry-Based CBI Unit on Air Pollution
AUTHOR: LANGUAGE: TARGETED INSTRUCTIONAL CONTEXT:

Heidi Fiedler French French II
PROFICIENCY LEVEL (ACTFL PROGRAM MODEL: Traditional FL
guidelines): Intermediate-Low instruction in a suburban Atlanta school
district. The school uses the “Bon Voyage!”
French textbook series. The school offers
French I through IV, as well as AP French.
UNIT TITLE: “Air pollution: Do we drive too much? ”

THEME: Environmental issues caused by air pollution from vehicle emissions
ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS EXPLORED: Why should we be concerned about
air pollution and its effects? What is the impact of cars on air quality and air
pollution? How can you make more environmentally friendly or responsible
choices to improve air quality? What alternatives to driving exist at home and
in other cities?
UNIT OVERVIEW: My overarching goal is to incorporate environmental con-
sciousness into the French curriculum. The purpose of this unit is to study one
cause of air pollution, that of vehicle emissions, as well as the harmful effects of
air pollution on humans and the environment. The goal is to encourage students
to reflect on ways that they can reduce their impact on further air pollution
in Atlanta, using their knowledge of cars’ ecoscores and alternative modes of
transportation. I selected this theme because the topic of cars is very relevant for
fourteen to sixteen year olds who are of an age where they will be buying their
first cars soon. Most of the students live in an affluent area and have a large say
in the cars that their parents purchase for them. By learning about the impact of
vehicle emissions on air quality, the students can become more environmentally
responsible consumers.
UNIT TIMEFRAME: 4 lessons: Five 50-minute periods; Summative Assess-
ment: Four 50-minute periods
Topical Sequence
• Lesson#1—Topic: What is an air quality index and what does it tell us?
Definition of air pollution and its presence in big cities like Atlanta and Paris.
Authentic texts used for this lesson:
° T#1: website with Atlanta’s air quality index: http://www.cleanaircampaign.

org/Your-Air-Quality-Transportation/Today-s-Air-Quality
° T#2: website for air quality index of Paris: http://www.airparif.asso.fr/
indices/resultats-jour-citeair#jour
° T#3: website for the air quality index of southern France: http://www.
atmopaca.org/
• Lesson#2—Topic: Are cars really to blame? Role of vehicle emissions in air
pollution
• Lesson#3—Topic: So what? What are the effects of air pollution on humans
and the environment?
• Lesson#4—Topic: Do we really have a choice? Alternatives to cars (2 sessions)
• Unit assessment: individual written assignment—short argumentative essay
critiquing varied means of transportations for their negative environmental
footprint and providing a convincing argument for a particular alternative
(e.g., a specific type of vehicle or else).
7
ASSESSING WHAT MATTERS
WITHIN CONTENT-BASED FOREIGN
LANGUAGE TEACHING THROUGH
INTEGRATED PERFORMANCE
ASSESSMENT
Francis J. Troyan
Introduction
The assessment literature in content-based instruction (CBI) has almost exclu-
sively focused on the development of learners’ language skills rather than on the
development of content knowledge. Despite calls for the systematic monitoring
of the development of both content and language skills (e.g., Gottlieb, 1999;
Mohan, 1986; Morgan, 2006; Short, 1999; Stoller, 2004), little progress has been
made in the field in terms of assessing the development of content knowledge
as a construct separate from language skills. Moreover, the advocacy for content
and language assessments has come primarily from the field of English as a sec-
ond language (ESL), where the priority for the learner is to develop the content
knowledge articulated by external high-stakes testing, that is, No Child Left
Behind (NCLB) in the United States. High-stakes and classroom-based assess-
ment models in ESL seek to develop students’ academic English so that students
can better access core content knowledge (See, for example, Llosa (2011) for a
discussion).
In foreign language (FL) education contexts, few frameworks for classroom-
based assessment of content have been developed and investigated for CBI. In a
recent review of research by Tedick and Cammarata (2012) that surveyed the
last decade of research on CBI program implementation in K–12 contexts, the
assessment of content is not mentioned. A few comprehensive reform efforts in
post-secondary foreign language programs have depicted the systematic assess-
ment of both language and content (e.g., Byrnes, 2002; Byrnes, Maxim, & Nor-
ris, 2010); however, similar efforts at the K–12 level are scant to nonexistent.
Therefore, in an effort to advance the dialogue in CBI assessment in K–12 foreign
language programs, the central goal of this chapter is to provide an illustration of
a classroom-based performance assessment specifically designed to address both
148 Francis J. Troyan
language and content. This CBI-compatible assessment model that will be show-
cased is based on an existing performance-based language assessment called the
Integrated Performance Assessment (IPA), which was adapted to ensure that both
the language and content dimensions would be targeted appropriately. The need
to rework the IPA model, which originally included rubrics that focused only on
language—an issue when it comes to CBI—was previously identified by Tedick
and Cammarata (2006). I argue that the integration of content in the IPA can be
effectively achieved by combining Mohans’s (1986) Knowledge Framework (KF)
and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004), a the-
ory of language use in context that is a powerful tool for unpacking the potential
of language to represent content knowledge (e.g., Fang & Schleppegrell, 2008).
In this chapter, I will describe the origin and nature of the IPA model and under-
score its potential for CBI. I will then provide a rationale for using the KF model
to create optimal assessment tools for CBI. I will conclude by providing concrete
examples of the use of the IPA-KF assessment model and discuss its potential in
the context of CBI implementation.
The Integrated Performance Assessment: What It

Is and What It Does
The “Intertwined” Nature of Language and Its

Impact on Assessment
Working from the assumption that language is inherently intertwined with con-
tent and that language is the vehicle through which knowledge is developed and
expressed (e.g., Donato, chapter 2, this volume; Halliday, 1975; Vygotsky, 1978),
the discussion in this section aims to provide the theoretical and empirical back-
ground to support the design of an assessment of content that considers the ways
in which content is represented linguistically.
It is clear that an assessment model explicitly accounting for both content
and language is long overdue in the field. In fact, in light of what we know
about assessment—that is, “What gets measured gets done” (McTighe & Wig-
gins, 2013)—without assessments that clearly delineate between content and
language, it may be shortsighted to expect that instruction geared toward the
integration of content and language in instruction would effectively target both
dimensions at once. To be clear, assessing both language and content presents
significant challenges because, as Mohan (1986) pointed out almost thirty years
ago, “language is intertwined with content” (p. 122), which renders the task of
assessing both dimensions very complex.
Thus, any assessment model that seeks to acknowledge the “intertwined”
nature of language and content must be based on a conceptual framework that
allows the language teacher to deconstruct the content that is to be taught so that
content-related instructional goals as well as the linguistic implications stemming
Assessing What Matters 149
from them are clearly understood and, therefore, assessed appropriately. Such
articulation of content goals has been modeled at the level of the lesson plan
in tools developed by the Content Based Language Teaching with Technology
(CoBaLTT) Project1 at the Center for Applied Research in Language Acquisition
(CARLA) (Cammarata & Tedick, 2007); yet, when it comes to the development
of assessment tools appropriate for CBI, few specific models have been proposed
to date. Assessment for CBI requires a framework to guide the deconstruction
of content knowledge and the development of assessment rubrics that articulate
a range of performance in terms of application of content understanding. I con-
tend that the IPA framework can provide such a model if and only if it is adapted
to account for and deconstruct content in meaningful and systematic ways, such
as the KF can facilitate.
The IPA Model: The First Step toward the Answer

The Integrated Performance Assessment is a performance-based assessment
model that was developed by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign
Languages with the goal of creating a performance assessment aligned with the
Communication goal area of the National Standards. The standards of this goal
area include
Standard 1.1 Students engage in conversations, provide and obtain informa-

tion, express feelings and emotions, and exchange opinions
Standard 1.2 Students understand and interpret written and spoken language
on a variety of topics
Standard 1.3 Students present information, concepts, and ideas to an audi-
ence of listeners or readers on a variety of topics (NSFLEP,
2006, p. 39).
The IPA consists of three tasks—one in each of the three modes of communica-
tion: interpretive (Standard 1.2), interpersonal (Standard 1.1), and presentational
(Standard 1.3). The three communicative tasks are intended to engage students
in “authentic communication” through which they demonstrate what they can
do with language in each mode based on the performance descriptors on the IPA
rubrics. This focus on authentic language use in the IPA is particularly relevant to
CBI, an approach based on sociocultural perspectives of language use for meaning-
making purposes (see Cammarata, 2009; Donato, chapter 2, this volume). For
the interpersonal and presentational modes of communication, the performance
rubrics articulate four levels of performance: Novice, Intermediate, Intermediate-
High, and Advanced. By contrast, a single rubric describes performance in the
interpretive mode of communication. In this way, interpretation is viewed as a
continuum of performance rather than a skill that develops in a linear fashion
(Adair-Hauck, Glisan, & Troyan, 2013). The three tasks of the IPA are linked by a
common theme (e.g., immigration, divorce, healthy eating), which runs through-
out the assessment. Given the integrated nature of the assessment, each task leads
to the next with the culmination of the assessment in a synthesizing task that asks
students to combine information from the interpretive and interpersonal tasks in
the presentational mode of communication (Adair-Hauck et al., 2013).
The original IPA prototype was developed and field tested from 1998 to 2000
through a grant from the U.S. Department of Education (Adair-Hauck, Glisan,
Koda, Swender, & Sandrock, 2006). Since the development of the prototype,
research at various levels of instruction (e.g., Adair-Hauck et al., 2006; Davin,
Troyan, Donato, & Hellman, 2011; Glisan, Uribe & Adair-Hauck, 2007) has
demonstrated the potential of the IPA as a feasible model for classroom-based
assessment of student development of language performance as described in the
Communication goal area of the National Standards.
A Model That Needs to Be Modified for CBI

Regardless of the fact that the IPA model has been touted as a feasible and poten-
tially effective model for the assessment of student performance in the three
modes of communication, some issues must be addressed before it can be fully
supportive of a well-integrated approach where both meaning and form are the
instructional targets of instruction. The model as currently conceptualized is
limited in terms of assessing the standards beyond the Communication goal,
dimensions that have remained unaddressed thus far in assessment related to the
National Standards (Troyan, 2012). Likewise, CBI scholars have called for mod-
ifications to the IPA to enable the explicit assessment of content within the IPA
framework. For instance, Tedick and Cammarata (2006) argued that the initial
positioning of the IPA as a flexible assessment to be “plugged into” any cur-
riculum (Glisan, Adair-Hauck, Koda, Sandrock, & Swender, 2003) limited its
efficacy for CBI instructional contexts because, in CBI, both content and lan-
guage must be at the center of instructional design. In a recent update to the IPA
manual (Adair-Hauck et al., 2013), a clear focus on the integration of the IPA
into a backward design approach to instructional planning (Wiggins & McTighe,
2005) has increased the compatibility of IPA for use in CBI contexts. Backward
design involves the identification of standards, essential questions (McTighe &
Wiggins, 2013; Wiggins & McTighe, 2005), and overarching objectives for an
instructional sequence (i.e., a unit, a year, an entire curriculum) as the initial
stage of planning. This clearly articulated integration of backward design and
the IPA addressed one of the key concerns of Tedick and Cammarata (2006),
namely, the ability to position content at the core of planning for assessment
and instruction. The remaining critical issue, which has yet to be addressed and
therefore guides the discussion in remainder of this chapter, is How is content to
be assessed within the IPA framework? This issue is explored in terms of Mohan’s
(1986) KF. Using KF, the assessment of content will be exemplified in an IPA
designed for and implemented in a high school French classroom in which
students were engaged in long-term inquiry within the local Franco-American
community.
Why Knowledge Framework and IPA Together?
Knowledge Framework: What Is It and Why Does It Matter?

As was previously discussed, currently, the IPA model is not yet adapted for
the assessment of content. Thus, to situate content assessment at the core of the
model and, thereby, integrate language and content from the outset of assess-
ment design, I rely on Mohan’s (1986) Knowledge Framework. KF is an effec-
tive means for organizing content and positioning it as distinct from language
performance because it identifies both “language and thinking skills across the
curriculum” (p. 43). KF is constructed around classroom activity, which has a
distinct definition because, as Mohan (1986) posits,
the term “activity” has been given many meanings in education, and gen-
erally has come to mean something we get students to do. In this discussion
the term “activity” has a less vague meaning. . . . [W]e define it not just
as action, but as a combination of action and theoretical understanding.
(p. 42)
While KF has been applied primarily in ESL contexts (e.g., Mohan & Slater,
2005, 2006; Huang & Morgan, 2003) a few studies in foreign language educa-
tion sought to integrate language and content using KF. For instance, Mohan
and Huang (e.g., Mohan & Huang, 2002; Huang & Mohan, 2009) depicted the
integration of language and content in an elementary Chinese program. They
observed that KF effectively support language and content integration while
helping learners broaden their understanding of form and meaning in the target
language of instruction. These studies demonstrate the potential of KF for the
formative assessment of what Halliday (1985) referred to as “meaning in the sense
of content” (p. 101)—that is, KF allows for assessment of the linguistic represen-
tation of content. However, this research does not specify how the KF could be
applied in the design of performance assessment criteria by disentangling lan-
guage and content in a way so as to complement the existing language-focused
rubrics of the ACTFL IPA rubrics with rubrics focused on the development of
content understanding. It is my assertion that KF can facilitate the articulation
of expectations for content understanding that are separate from language out-
comes within the IPA framework through the identification of the practical
(action) knowledge and theoretical knowledge represented in the KF.
How Can the KF Be Used to Support a Dual Language

and Content Commitment within the IPA?
KF can be used by the teacher to deconstruct the aspects of an activity into its
constituent cells of knowledge. As Appendix 7A depicts, the KF is divided into
two columns, which represent practical knowledge and theoretical knowledge.
As Mohan (1986) described, theoretical knowledge represents understanding
or background knowledge that students develop through expository approaches
to education, such as lectures, textbook readings, and discussions. By contrast,
practical knowledge encompasses those understandings that are best developed
through experiential education, such as laboratory work, field trips, and hands-on
learning. With practical knowledge, students enact their understandings, whereas
theoretical knowledge allows them to understand their actions in an activity.
Mohan provides questions to guide the analysis within each knowledge cell. On
the practical/action situation side of the framework, questions that are posed
include Who/what is involved? What is the order of the actions? and What choices are
available? On the theoretical/background knowledge side, questions to consider
include What concepts apply? What are the principles involved? and What are the stan-
dards and values involved in a situation? With these questions as a guide, the KF can
be applied in the analysis of content and creation of a content rubric in the IPA.
Considering the clearly expressed need for modifications to address content
understanding in IPA design, the following section will present an IPA that was
designed for use within a foreign language unit designed to be a “learning expe-
dition” in a French-speaking community (see Troyan, Chapter 10, this volume).
In this inquiry-oriented unit of instruction addressed, content understanding is
conceptualized through KF (Mohan, 1986), which enabled the development of
an IPA-KF that assessed both content and language.
Applying Knowledge Framework to IPA Planning for CBI:

A Concrete Illustration
To illustrate the IPA-KF design, the KF was applied to an IPA from a high school
French class. This particular French class was in a K–12 environment allow-
ing for CBI. In other words, the entire program was designed to balance con-
tent and language in instruction (see Troyan, Chapter 10, this volume, for a full
description). Using KF, the performance categories for content in a culminating
activity in a community-based unit of inquiry will be described. In this unit of
inquiry, students investigated the experiences of local Franco-Americans, whose
history of immigration, persecution, and linguistic and cultural revitalization is
an integral component of the regional culture. After conducting interviews with
Franco-American informants over a period of several months, students synthe-
sized the individual experiences of their particular informant in a culminating
final product—a documentary panel that depicted the life and experiences of the
Franco-American that each student interviewed. The planning process for the
inquiry unit, Le Maine Francophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui (Francophone Maine: Yes-
terday and Today), began with the identification of the desired outcomes in terms
of student performance in the culminating event at the end of the unit of instruc-
tion. During the process, the teacher, acting as the instructional designer (Wiggins &
McTighe, 2005), identified the performances and products through which students
were to demonstrate what they could do in terms of language and content. To fur-
ther contextualize this work within a content-based unit of instruction, this section
provides an overview of the use of the IPA and its role in a CBI unit of instruction
exploring the theme of Le Maine Francophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui. Following the
IPA overview, the application of KF and functional language analysis in the decon-
struction of content and the creation of a content rubric are described.
Instructional Context: Le Maine Francophone

To illustrate the sequence of tasks in the assessment, an IPA from Le Maine Fran-
cophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui is presented and will serve as the focus of discussion
in the remainder of this chapter. In any IPA, an overview of the entire assessment
“scenario” and a descriptor of each task are provided to the student in an effort to
contextualize the assessment within a particular communicative situation.
This task overview (Figure 7.1), when presented to students at the beginning
of a unit of instruction, explicitly articulates to the students the instructional
goals of the unit as they relate the communicative context in which the tasks
are situated. As Figure 7.1 depicts, this IPA and, therefore, the unit of instruction
focused on understanding the Franco-American experience in the region where
the high school students lived. The Franco-American culture in the region con-
sisted of rich individual stories that comprised a collective community narrative.
For the purposes of this discussion, “Franco-American” represents the cultural
group whose members are the descendants of franco-québecois who immigrated to
parts of the northeastern United States in late 1800s and early 1900s.2 At the time
of this inquiry, the Franco-American community was in the midst of reclaiming
IPA Overview
At the end of the semester, you will participate in a documentary exhibit called Le Maine
Francophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui. You, along with all of your peers, will create a
documentary panel for the exhibit about the Franco-American experience. In preparation
for the exhibit and for the creation of your panel, you will research the Franco-American
experience through readings, documentary film, and an invited expert panel of
Franco-Americans. To complement the research that you conduct, you will interview a
Franco-American to gather firsthand information. Your documentary panel will present
the important themes in the Franco-American history through the experience of your
interviewee.
FIGURE 7.1 Overview of the assessment tasks.

its linguistic and cultural identity. The key themes explored in the CBI curricu-
lar unit designed to raise students’ awareness of the Franco-American experience
included
1. waves of immigration from Québec to the northeastern United States;

2. discrimination by the dominant white Protestant culture because of linguis-
tic and religious heritage;
3. revitalization of the French language by second- and third-generation Franco-
Americans.
This third theme, related to the reacquisition of the language, was a primary
motivation for this community-based inquiry.
The IPA-KF in Action: An Example from Practice

Within the learning context at this high school (See Troyan, Chapter 10, this
volume for a full description), the IPA was positioned as the culminating assess-
ment activity within the semester-long unit of inquiry called Le Maine Fran-
cophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui. According to the principles of backward design
(Wiggins & McTighe, 2005), the learning activities throughout the semester
reflected the types of tasks that students would encounter in the IPA. For exam-
ple, students conducted interviews of their Franco-American subjects at four
other points throughout the semester prior to completing the IPA. These learn-
ing activities included opportunities for feedback on performance both in terms
of their language proficiency and their developing understanding of the con-
tent as they prepared for the culminating presentation of the Franco-American
experience.
The Interpretive Task

According to the guidelines for IPA design (Adair-Hauck et al., 2013), the selec-
tion of the text that students will either listen to or read in the interpretive
task should be guided by (1) learner-based factors (e.g., linguistic level and
age) and (2) text-based factors (e.g., context and the task related to the text)
(Adair-Hauck et al., 2013). Certainly all of the learner- and text-based fac-
tors are important to consider when selecting a text. However, in designing
the IPA-KF, the text-based factors related to content are the most critical ones
to consider because, in this particular context, it is essential that the content
of the text is aligned with overall content being explored in the unit of study
(Tedick & Cammarata, 2006).
The interpretive task in the IPA for CBI in Le Maine Francophone was designed
to assess students’ learning and contribute to their research in preparation for the
culminating presentation. In this task, students watched a two-minute excerpt
of a video on the Franco-American experience in a local town. The following

prompt was provided to them before they viewed the video:
To understand the Franco-American experience, you need to do some

reading and viewing of documentary footage. You will watch an excerpt
of the Canadian Broadcasting Company’s show Zone Libre on “Immigra-
tion à Waterville.”
http://ici.radio-canada.ca/actualite/zonelibre/01-09/franco.html
Read the guide and complete the accompanying “Comprehension Guide.”
A comprehension task was created based on the guidelines in the IPA manual
(Adair-Hauck et al., 2013). This task required that students glean information
regarding key words, the main idea, supporting details, and cultural perspectives.
Once students completed the interpretive task, they received feedback on their
interpretation of the text through a group feedback discussion of the details and
key information contained in the text. The students subsequently incorporated the
information gathered from the interpretive task in their final presentational task.
The Interpersonal Task

The interpersonal task for this IPA was the fifth of five interviews with the same
Franco-Americans that the students interviewed over the course of the unit. The
task was contextualized through the following prompt:
You will travel to Lewiston, Maine, for fieldwork that will build on your
work in the classroom. On five occasions, you will meet with a Franco-
American at La Rencontre, the monthly lunch at the Franco-American
Heritage Center. In your interviews, you will seek answers to our essential
questions by investigating:
Why did your subject’s family immigrate to Maine? What types of discrimi-
nation does your subject’s family recall? How did this discrimination affect
the Franco-American? How is he/she reacquiring the French language?
The Presentational Task

For the presentational task, students were asked to prepare a final documentary
panel. For the task, they responded to the following prompt:
Based on the research (reading, viewing of films, and interviews) that

you have conducted over the past few months, you will create and pres-
ent a documentary panel that tells the story of the local Franco-American
history through the experience of the individual whom you have
interviewed.
To create the documentary panel in the presentational task, the students had to
synthesize their learning about the Franco-American experience to represent
the experience of one Franco-American subject. The collection of documentary
panels became part of a community exhibit in which the collective experience
of the community was represented through the various documentary panels that
depicted the experiences of the individual Franco-Americans. Given the three
tasks of this IPA and the existing language-focused rubric, specifications for con-
tent and the accompanying content rubrics were designed using the KF and SFL.
Creating an Assessment Rubric for Content Using

the Knowledge Framework
As described earlier, the IPA engages students in a series of three performance
tasks across the three modes of communication, which are articulated in the
Communication goal area of the National Standards (NSFLEP, 2006). Recall that
the IPA model provides a set of rubrics that describe performance in the language
across four levels—Novice, Intermediate, Intermediate-High, and Advanced.
Although these performance criteria and rubrics for language performance are
based on clearly articulated expectations for performance in terms of language,
the rubrics make little reference to content. Thus, the goal of the IPA-KF is to
make the IPA model more compatible with the CBI dual commitment to lan-
guage and content instruction. The following section depicts the analysis of the
content and development of the performance criteria for content using KF.
In the design of the IPA-KF tasks, KF facilitated the deconstruction of the key
aspects of content understanding that students were expected to develop during
the unit of instruction as demonstrated in the culminating product that they
were prompted to create. The categories from the KF guided the development
of a content rubric (Appendix 7B) to accompany the language-specific rubrics
originally included in the IPA. Unlike the existing rubrics for language per-
formance provided in the IPA, which describe language ability in interpretive,
interpersonal, and presentational tasks assessment, respectively, a single rubric
was designed using KF to assess students’ understanding of the content in the
culminating presentational mode task of the IPA. The assessment of content
understanding in the presentational task of the IPA positions the task as an accu-
mulative synthesis of the information gathered during the other two tasks and
across the unit of instruction. In this way, the integration of KF in the design
of the content rubric maximizes the flexibility of content integration in the
IPA-KF.
Deconstruction of the Content

The deconstruction of content understanding in the culminating presenta-
tional task from Le Maine Francophone is depicted in Appendix 7A to illustrate
the application of the KF in the design of a rubric for assessing content under-
standing in the IPA. The two sides of the KF represent information that the
students obtained from the interactions with the Franco-Americans during the
interviews (action situation) and the research and learning activities conducted
outside of the interviews (background knowledge). Beginning with the action/
practical-oriented side of the KF, the practical content in this unit encompassed
(1) the identification of the Franco-American whom the student interviewed
throughout the unit, (2) the organization of details of the Franco-American’s
lived experience and family history, and (3) specific details that the student chose
to highlight the “essence” of the Franco-American. These understandings were
developed through action-oriented learning activities such as face-to-face inter-
actions with a Franco-American and subsequent description of the individual’s
experience.
By contrast, the background information was primarily gathered through
readings and research conducted within the context of the classroom. Although
some of this learning of theoretical knowledge was developed through experien-
tial activities (e.g., presentations by visiting experts in Franco-American history),
students acted primarily as information gatherers. The theoretical understanding
about the history of Franco-Americans in the region, for example, was used to
contextualize the experience of the individual interviewee in place and time
among the wider Franco-American experience. Theoretical knowledge was used
by students to (1) classify the Franco-American Experience as typical or atypical,
(2) understand the ways in which the experience of the interviewee was unique
while simultaneously representative of the overall Franco-American experi-
ence, and (3) evaluate the nature of the interviewee’s individual experience as a
Franco-American.
The components of theoretical knowledge and practical knowledge were com-
bined to create the criteria for the content rubric (Appendix 7B). Compatible
cells in the KF were combined to create three categories for content understand-
ing within the IPA. For example the first cells in each column Description and
Classification of Concepts were combined because a description of the Franco-
American (practical knowledge) is necessary before his or her experience can
be classified (theoretical knowledge) as typical or atypical within the overall
Franco-American experience. The interaction between Sequence and Principles
calls for the student to organize the details of the Franco-American’s narrative
in a way that aligns them with the overall themes in Franco-American history.
Although it is an individual narrative, each narrative represents a part of the
overall story of immigration, discrimination, and reclamation of identity that
comprises the Franco-American narrative. Finally, the choices that the students
made in describing the essence of the Franco-American contribute to their over-
all evaluation of the Franco-American experience. It is critical to note here that
Choice and Evaluation required the student to engage the Franco-American in
dialogue regarding the documentary product depicting the Franco-American
interviewee’s experience and position within the Franco-American experience

while the student was creating the product. In this way, the final product that the
student created belonged not only to the student, but also to individual Franco-
American and the Franco-American community that the project was intended
to serve.
Together, the components of the KF allowed for a meaningful articula-
tion of the content understanding involved in the culminating presentational
task in Le Maine Francophone in terms of (1) Description and Classification,
(2) Sequence and Principles, and (3) Choice and Evaluation of the Franco-
American experience. In this way, the KF allowed the teacher to describe both
the practical and theoretical knowledge required for content understanding.
While KF has provided a means by which to identify key aspects of con-
tent, the ways in which the content is represented linguistically have not been
addressed. As Mohan and Huang and others (see also Donato, chapter 2, this
volume) have suggested, the functions of language in representing content
must also be explored and made explicit to students in CBI. Therefore, the
following section explores key linguistic representations of content through a
focus on functional linguistic analysis.
Unpacking the Linguistic Representation of Content

through Functional Language Analysis
Thus far, this chapter has depicted an expanded IPA-KF that accounts for the
assessment of content understanding in addition to language performance that
responds appropriately to the needs of CBI programs for assessment tools and
strategies that target the development of both language and content knowledge.
However, this framework has not yet accounted for the development of linguistic
representation of the content understanding articulated in the KF. To address this
particular need, functional linguistic analysis was enlisted as a tool to unpack the
ways in which language was expected to be used within the text created for the
culminating presentational task of the IPA-KF. Specifically, Systemic Functional
Linguistics was used during planning to depict the key linguistic features related
to each part of the KF used to deconstruct the text—a documentary panel about
a Franco-American—that the students were asked to create for the culmination
of the IPA-KF and the unit of inquiry. This deconstruction of the linguistic fea-
tures of the text during planning enabled the teacher to systematically focus on
those features of text during instruction. Such in-depth analysis of the functional
linguistic features of the text reveals the ways in which meaning is made in the
content-rich authentic text (Troyan, 2014a). Thus, the following discussion will
illustrate the use of SFL to unpack the linguistic representation of content in the
documentary panel involved in the presentational mode task and illustrate how a
focus on functional linguistics can complement KF in IPA-KF design that inte-
grates content and language.
Systemic Functional Linguistics

SFL, a theory of language use in context, is compatible with the positioning of
authentic language use described in the National Standards (NSFLEP, 2006) and in
the curricular materials and assessments of the profession because it is a language
system that describes the meaning-making resources (Halliday & Matthiessen,
2004) in authentic texts and contexts. SFL identifies three types of meaning called
metafunctions: (1) experiential, a resource for the construction of knowledge
within a field and the participation in its activities; (2) interpersonal, a resource
for actualizing tenor, and (3) textual, a resource for the weaving together of the
ideational and interpersonal metafunctions based on the needs of a particular mode
(Martin, 2009; Ryshina-Pankova, chapter 3, this volume; Schleppegrell, 2004). SFL
views the clause as the core element of any text and the site where the metafunc-
tions construct meaning. According to SFL, all three types of meaning are at work
in all texts, whether spoken or written. Experiential meaning is created through
processes (realized as verbs), participants (realized as nouns), and circumstances
(realized as prepositional phrases and adverbs). Interpersonal meaning is driven
by the mood system and modality that depict, for example, certainty, doubt, and
conditions (e.g., will go, might go, would go) and express judgments (a good meal
versus an exquisite meal). Textual meaning involves the ways in which clauses are
organized and linked together through chains of new and understood information
through Theme and Rheme relationships. For instance: Jack drove the car to the store.
It broke down on the way. The car—which is part of the Rheme, the final element,
of the first sentence—is taken up again in the Theme, the beginning, of the second
sentence to link the two as a chain of related events. Certain texts organize Theme
and Rheme in different patterns depending on the purpose of the text. In sum, the
use of experiential, interpersonal, and textual components of a text can help reveal
to students the ways in which language makes meaning in those texts and, in this
way, understand more clearly how content is represented linguistically.
In addition to revealing to students the ways in which language makes mean-
ing in texts and equips them with critical information about the probable orga-
nization patterns and the linguistic choices available to them in a particular
genre (Eggins, 2004), analysis of the metafunctions allows for the articulation
of assessment criteria targeted at developing and understanding of the linguis-
tic representation of content within a particular text type. Scholars have used
functional linguistic analysis to describe the “language of schooling” and the
linguistic demands that content area texts make on language learners in English
as a second language instructional settings (e.g., Schleppegrell, 2004). In for-
eign language education, recent curricular design efforts have integrated a focus
on functional language at the university level (e.g., Byrnes, Maxim, & Nor-
ris, 2010), as well as in K–12 programs linked to the National Standards (e.g.,
Troyan, 2014a). Informed by this scholarship, the following example is offered to
illustrate the integration of functional linguistic analysis into the framework for
content understanding presented earlier. The result of the analysis allows for the
development of a rubric that identifies both content understanding and content-
based literacy criteria.
Linguistic Analysis of the Text

To illustrate the use of the functional linguistic features of the rubric, the cul-
minating text created by a student in the French class engaged in the inquiry
related to Le Maine Francophone was analyzed and the feedback offered to the
student based on the rubric (Appendix 7B) are described. The student text (see
Appendix 7C) describes the experience of Sophie, a Franco-American inter-
viewed by the student. From the perspective of the experiential metafunction,
the field knowledge was realized through “doing” and “being” processes that
represent the experience of the participants in the first and second paragraphs.
Specifically, Sophie, the immigrants, her parents, her community, her music, her
friends, and her family were the participants “doing,” “having,” and “being.”
Through the use of the possessive relational process “to have,” connections with
music and family celebrations were positioned as possessions of Sophie and the
community, which functioned as a unifying cultural phenomenon. In the third
paragraph, the writer departed from the previous integration of Sohpie’s expe-
rience and the overall historical Franco-American experience. This departure
was evident in the shift in participants, which are the Franco-American history,
discrimination, the Ku Klux Klan, and demonstrations in this paragraph. The
writer made another abrupt shift in the fourth paragraph, where the dominant
participants were the Franco-American Heritage Center and the culture of Qué-
bec. This shifting of participants throughout the paragraphs contributed to an
uneven narrative of the Franco-American. Moreover, Sophie was again absent in
the fourth paragraph. Through an analysis of the participants in paragraphs 3 and
4, it was clear that the writer needed to enhance these paragraphs by integrat-
ing Sophie as a participant. By doing so, congruent with the overall purpose of
the documentary panel, the writer could have linked the overall experience of
the community to Sophie as an individual member of the community who was
impacted by those experiences. In the text’s current form, minimal content,
in the form of the processes and participants, was present to meet the standard
depicted on the rubric for (1) content—outlining basic information about the
Franco-American and his or her life; and (2) experiential resources—using par-
ticipants and processes to depict discrete experiences of the Franco-American
and the overall community. However, the feedback advised the student to attend
to how Sophie, in particular, was positioned as a participant throughout the text
to better integrate her into the overall experience.
Analysis of the textual metafunction revealed that the first paragraph was
the strongest from the standpoint of cohesion. The writer made helpful Theme-
Rheme connections, such as “At that time,” in the third sentence, which refers
back to “in the 1920s” in the second sentence. “It was a time” also refers back
to the time period previously described. Through this use of thematic refer-
ence, which Thompson (2004) defined as grammatical resources that allow the
speaker or writer to repeat information given in a previous part of the text, the
writer created cohesion between clauses and, thereby, the content presented in
those clauses. Although it was scant in the entire text, reference was achieved in
the example documentary panel text—through expressions such as those high-
lighted in the thematic position and through pronouns such as “her father.” In
other paragraphs, however, this feature of the first paragraph was not present.
As a result, the subsequent paragraphs read more like a listing of facts rather
than a cohesive narrative. Again the text minimally meets the standard depicted
on the rubric for (1) content—presenting the Franco-American subject in a
sequence that provided structure, logic, and meaning to the story; and (2) tex-
tual resources—using emergent Theme-Rheme connections and/or chains of
reference that contributed to the development of the narrative. Feedback to the
student highlighted the textual resources that have been developed in the first
paragraph, how these organizational features created meaningful chains of ref-
erence, and the ways in which the writer could have enhanced the other para-
graphs by weaving a more coherent narrative that could have integrated Sophie
and the community by reintroducing her in some way.
Finally, from the perspective of the interpersonal metafunction, the student
was guided to enhance this text in multiple ways. In this draft, one of the key
features of interpersonal meaning that needed to be developed was the use of
appraisal, the linguistic resource through which speakers and writers reveal how
they “feel about things and people (in a word, what our attitudes are)” about a
given topic (Martin & Rose, 2008, p. 26). As a linguistic resource, appraisal can
express affect, judgment of character, and appreciation. The only appraisal in the
student’s text were adjectives that modify nouns to express appreciation, such
as in the following examples: “small villages,” “rich childhood,” and “strong
connection.” The student was guided to expand appraisal as a linguistic resource
in this text by including expressions of (1) affect, for example, She couldn’t
explain the pain of the dehumanizing experience of discrimination and (2) judgment
of character, for example, innocent victims of the degrading actions of the Ku Klux
Klan. The goal in focusing the student’s attention on the interpersonal meaning
was therefore to enable the weaving of a dynamic appraisal of the participants,
experiences, and historical events across the narrative through affect, judgment,
and appreciation.
Through this illustration of the integration of SFL in the IPA-KF, content
knowledge and its linguistic representations have been described and decon-
structed in a rubric for content understanding in the culminating IPA presen-
tational writing task for which students were required to create a documentary
panel about a Franco-American’s lived experience. The content rubric enabled
the IPA-KF to move beyond the proficiency-oriented rubrics that previously
informed the model. In this way, targeted feedback could be provided to students
regarding the content that needed to be addressed and the appropriate ways to
represent and organize it in the documentary panel that the IPA-KF task required
them to create. In this way, this IPA-KF provides an example for supporting the
learners’ content and language development by ensuring that they practice and
demonstrate both content understanding and the appropriate linguistic represen-
tation of content in the products and performances involved with the IPA-KF in
CBI contexts.
Conclusion: Toward Unified Performance Assessment

of Language and Content
The assessment of language, content understanding, and the linguistic represen-
tations of content is a complex, multifaceted undertaking that requires comple-
mentary approaches to assessment design that consider not only the development
of global language proficiency, but also content-specific understanding (Mohan,
1986) and text-specific linguistic features that are also part of content literacy
(e.g., Fang & Schleppegrell, 2008). This chapter has presented a model for inte-
grating a focus on content understanding and the linguistic representation of
content through the IPA-KF. Moreover, the example from a high school French
classroom demonstrated the potential of the IPA-KF to reveal to students their
performance in terms of language, content understanding, and the linguistic rep-
resentation of that content. Given the increasing attention paid to text-specific
literacies, foreign language teachers need to be trained in critical aspects of func-
tional linguistics to raise their awareness of the ways in which language functions
(e.g., Tedick & Cammarata, 2012; Troyan, 2012, 2014b) to prepare them to make
explicit to students not only content per se, but also the discourses of content area
texts that they encounter in CBI contexts. The IPA-KF model provides a frame
within which to address these issues in assessment and instruction that integrates
content and language in meaningful ways.
Notes
1. For more information, see the CoBaLTT website: http://www.carla.umn.edu/cobaltt/
index.html
2. Space does not permit an extended discussion of the Franco-American histories in this
region. For an extended discussion, see Quintal (1996).
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APPENDIX 7A
Creating a Documentary Panel about
a Franco-American Using Mohan’s
Knowledge Framework
ACTIVITY
Specific, General,
Practical Theoretical
(Action Situation) (Background Knowledge)
Identify the Franco- Classify the Franco-

Description American Described American’s experience Clarification
as typical or atypical
Organization of Understand the ways in
Details which the community’s
experience is
Sequence Principles
represented in the
individual Franco-
American’s experience
Choose Details that Evaluate the nature of
Highlight the the interviewee’s
Choice Evaluation
“Essence” of the individual experience
Individual as a Franco-American
From Mohan (1986). Reproduced and adapted with permission of the Author.
APPENDIX 7B
Content Rubric for Le Maine Francophone
Knowledge Structure Exceed Expectations Meets Expectations Does Not Meet

(Criteria) Expectations
Linguistic Resources
Description and The description of the Franco-American The description of the Franco-American Minimal description is
Classification contextualizes the subject in place and time outlines the basic information about the provided; An incomplete
Identification of the and within the Franco-American Experience. subject and his/her life. The description illustration of the subject is
Franco-American subject; The Franco-American’s experience is describes the overall Franco-American provided.
Classify the Franco- situated within the overall experience of experience. The product synthesizes
American’s experience as the community. The product represents a information from another phase of the
typical or atypical synthesis of information derived from the IPA and two or more other sources.
other two phases of the IPA and from two or
more other data sources throughout the unit
of study.
Experiential Resources A variety of participants and processes integrates Participants and processes function to depict Little variation in the use of
the histories of the subject and the community. discrete experiences of the Franco-American processes and participants; May not
and the overall community. be aligned with the purpose of the
genre.
Sequence and The narrative of the Franco-American subject The narrative of the Franco-American The narrative of the Franco-
Principles is presented in a sequence that provides subject is presented in a sequence that American subject is presented
Organization of the structure, logic, and meaning to the story. provides structure, logic, and meaning primarily as a list of facts.
details of the Franco- The story links to the three overarching to the story. The story links to two of The story links to one of the
American subject’s tenets of the Franco-American experience the overarching tenets of the Franco- overarching tenets of the
narrative; Understand (i.e., immigration experience, discrimination, American experience (i.e., immigration Franco-American experience
the ways in which the reacquisition of French), integrates them, and experience, discrimination, reacquisition (i.e., immigration experience,
experience is generalized generalizes them to the overall Francophone of French). discrimination, reacquisition of
across Franco-Americans experience. French).
Textual Resources Theme-Rheme connections and chains of reference Emergent Theme-Rheme connections and/ New information is frequently
are consistent throughout and create a highly or chains of reference contribute to the presented in the thematic position.
coherent and cohesive narrative that connects the development of the narrative. Limited use of pronouns to refer
subject’s life to the life of the community. to previously mentioned nominal
groups.
Choice and Evaluation The details in the description are uniquely The details in the description of the The details provided in the
Choice of Details presented to illustrate the core character Franco-American contribute to a description are superficial.
highlights “the Essence” of the Franco-American. The product rich description of the Essence of the The Essence of the Franco-
of the Franco-American demonstrates the ways in which the Franco- subject; The product suggests how the American is minimally
subject; Evaluates American experience is simultaneously a experience relates to overall human developed.
the nature of the singular experience of the individual and experience (i.e., How we want to treat
interviewee’s individual a reflection of the human experience. The one another).
experience as a Franco- product skillfully weaves the experience of the
American; What are individual with the journey of the community
the lessons, values, or into a solid whole and provides a commentary
cultural themes that can on the human condition.
be extracted from the
experience?
Interpersonal Resources Dynamic appraisal of the participants, experiences, Variation in appraisal (e.g., through Appraisal follows a consistent
and historical events convey a range of affect, adjectives and adverbs) creates a dynamic pattern (e.g., often contained
judgment, and appreciation that is woven across the image of the subject. within noun groups via adjectives),
narrative. creating a basic image of the subject.
APPENDIX 7C
Sophie*
Stage 1: Identification and Situation in Historical Context

Sophie est un exemple excellent de la culture franco-américaine. Ses parents sont
venus au Maine pendant les années 1920 de deux petits villages québécois. A
cette époque, l’industrie agricole échouait. Les fermes ne produisaient pas assez
de nourriture pour nourrir tout le monde. C’était le temps pour une nouvelle
direction dans la vie. Donc beacucoup de personnes sont venus au Maine pour
travailler dans les moulins et les usines, y compris les parents de Sophie. Son père
habitait dans « le Petit Canada » où il élevait des animaux. Sa mère habitait dans
le Centre Ville de Lewiston où elle travaillait dans une usine de chaussures. Il y
avait des moment difficiles, mais Sophie avait une enfance riche.
Sophie is an excellent example of the Franco-American culture. Her parents came to
Maine during the 1920s from two small villages in Québec. At that time, agriculture was
failing. Farms were not producing enough food to feed everyone. It was time for a new
direction in life. Therefore a lot of people came to Maine to work in the mills and factories,
including Sophie’s parents. Her father lived in “Little Canada” where he raised animals.
Her mother lived in downtown Lewiston where she worked in a shoe factory. There were
difficult times, but Sophie had a rich childhood.
Stage 2: Role of the Franco-American Community

in the Subject’s Life
Pendant son enfance, Sophie avait une connexion forte avec la communauté
franco-américaine. La musique jouait un grand rôle dans cette connexion. Sou-
vent les amis et la famille de Sophie organisaient des fêtes avec les chansons
et les danses canadiennes. Les fêtes comme celles-ci unissaient la communauté
franco-américaine.
During her childhood, Sophie had a strong connection with Franco-American community.
Music played an important role in this connection. Often Sophie’s friends and family had
celebrations with Canadian song and dance. Celebrations such as these united the Franco-
American community.
Stage 3: Impact of the Franco-American Struggle

on the Subject
Bien que il y eût de bons temps, le passé des Franco-Américains n’était pas
toujours agréable. La discrimination contre eux étaient très forte. Le Ku Klux
Klan avait des préjugés contre le catholicisme, les immigrés, et la culture franco-
américaine au Maine. Aussi, ils avaient les manifestations, et ils brûlaient des
croix pour protester la présence des Franco-Américains. La communauté à Lew-
iston avait des préjugés aussi. Le mot « Canuk » était utilisé pour insulter les
canadiens. La discrimination faisait la vie encore plus difficile pour Sophie.
Even though there were good times, the Franco-American history was not always pleasant.
Discrimination against them was very strong. The Ku Klux Klan had prejudices against
Catholicism, immigrants, and the Franco-American culture in Maine. In addition, they
had demonstrations and they burned crosses to protest the presence of Franco-Americans.
The community in Lewiston also had prejudices. The word “Canuk” was used to insult
the Canadians. Discrimination made life even harder for Sophie.
Stage 4: Role of the Franco-American Culture in Life Today

Aujourd’hui, la culture franco-américaine revient fortement à Lewiston. Le Cen-
tre d’Héritage Franco-Américain garde la culture at la transmet aux nouvelles
générations. On parle du mot « Survivance » qui représente l’espérance qu’on
gardera la culture pour beaucoup d’années. La culture québecoise au Maine ne
disparaîtra pas.
Today, Franco-American culture is coming back strong in Lewiston. The Franco-American
Heritage Center maintains the culture and transmits it to new generations. They use the
word “Survivance,” which represent the hope that they will maintain the culture for many
years. The culture of Québec in Maine will not disappear.
Note
 The original student text was not altered in any way from its original form and, there-
fore, contains errors that represent the student’s developing language use.
PART 3
Critical Pedagogy and

the Foreign Language
Classroom
8
LANGUAGE TEACHERS IN FOREIGN
TERRITORY
A Call for a Critical Pedagogy-Infused
Curriculum1
Timothy Reagan
Introduction
There is a growing body of literature about critical pedagogy and applied critical
linguistics in the foreign language education context.2 Although much of this
work has as its focus broad ideological issues and concerns, a number of scholars
in recent years have also begun to call for language practitioners to experi-
ment with new, critical approaches to curricula, teaching methodologies, and
assessment strategies. As John Edwards notes, “[T]here has, for instance, been
a number of recent works arguing for greater and more precise attention to the
teaching of foreign languages, and almost all these works stress the importance
of the ideological framework within which this occurs. Unlike earlier and more
linguistically focused treatments, these latter ones encourage a broader sociolin-
guistic and sociocultural contextualization” (2010, p. 3). In this chapter, my goal
is threefold: first, to lay out a case for why foreign language educators should
be concerned with critical pedagogy; second, to discuss how critical pedagogy
might be incorporated into foreign language teaching; and third, describe what
such efforts might look like in classroom practice.
Critical Pedagogy in Foreign Language Education

Critical approaches to the teaching of foreign languages remain uncommon, and
are very much “foreign territory” for most foreign language educators. After all,
even if the classroom teacher is convinced of the wisdom and legitimacy of help-
ing students become more socially and ideologically aware of the world in which
they live, and of the functions of language and language use in maintaining
and reproducing power relations in society, it is quite another matter to figure
out how to accomplish this while still meeting the expectations of increasing
174 Timothy Reagan
proficiency in the target language. As one classroom English teacher observed in

her evaluation of a student teacher, “I am all in favor of taking a critical approach
in the classroom, but some days you just have to teach apostrophes.” This is,
I believe, a very real dilemma for foreign language educators: We do need to
teach specific skills and knowledge related to the target language, but it is also
clear, I would argue, that we also need to embed such teaching in more critical
approaches than has traditionally been done.
Foreign language educators do not need any convincing that they need to
teach students language skills—typically conceptualized as listening, speaking,
reading and writing. They understand and accept the need for students to learn
both vocabularly and the linguistic components of the target language, as well as
to gain at least some familiarity with the cultures in which the target language
is used. The idea that we also should be preparing students to reflect on issues of
social justice, the role of language in social and class reproduction, and concerns
about linguistic imperialism, on the other hand, is a less commonly held one for
many foreign language educators. And yet, a focus on the growth of proficiency
in the target language is not in any way incompatible with the broader objectives
of introducing critical pedagogy in the foreign language classroom. Critical ped-
agogy, by its very nature, cannot take the place of existing linguistically based
standards—but it can serve as something of a “fly in the ointment” to provide a
counter-narrative to the existing ideology implicit in the existing standards. This
is no small matter, given the ubiquity of the standards movement, and it provides
classroom teachers with more flexibility to cope with the discourse on standards
than they now have.
What Is “Critical Pedagogy” and Why Does It Matter?

Critical pedagogy is difficult to define, in part because it does not, in the words
of Peter McLaren, “constitute a homogenous set of ideas” (2003, pp. 185–186).
Rather, critical pedagogy is defined and manifested in a wide variety of ways
by many different scholars and educators who, while sharing certain common
assumptions and objectives, differ in many other important ways.3 At its heart,
critical pedagogy seeks “to empower the powerless and transform existing social
inequalities and injustices” (McLaren, 2003, p. 186). It is, as Joan Wink suggests,
“a process that enables teachers and learners to join together in asking funda-
mental questions about knowledge, justice, and equity in their own classroom,
school, family, and community” (2000, p. 71). As Ira Shor explains in his book
Empowering education, critical pedagogy involves
[h]abits of thought, reading, writing, and speaking which go beneath surface

meaning, first impressions, dominant myths, official pronouncements, tradi-
tional clichés, received wisdom, and mere opinions, to understand the deep
meaning, root causes, social context, ideology, and personal consequences
Language Teachers in Foreign Territory 175
of any action, event, object, process, organization, experience, text, subject

matter, policy, mass media, or discourse.
(1992, p. 129)
In terms of the implications of critical pedagogy for foreign language education,

what this suggests is that by broadening the goals and objectives of foreign lan-
guage education, the field can become both more relevant and play a bigger role
in the lives of our students. Indeed, foreign language education is particularly
well placed to accomplish this, since it has the potential to encourage students
to think deeply about such matters as their place and role in their own society.
Foreign Language Teaching as Political Activity

An important facet of the process of empowerment is the recognition that dis-
course is negotiated between and among students and teachers. Classroom dis-
course is inevitably political and ideological in nature, and can serve to either
empower or disempower students. To argue that our discourse, and indeed, what
takes place in the foreign language classroom more generally, is political and ide-
ological is not necessarily a criticism. As Suresh Canagarajah argues with respect
to the teaching of English as a foreign language:
If language learning is ideological . . . the solution is not to run away from

politics, but to negotiate with the agencies of power for personal and col-
lective empowerment. If [language teaching] is implicated in larger social
processes and cultural practices, the corrective is not to eliminate that
connection in favor of autonomy or ‘purity’, but to seek a holistic peda-
gogy that will enable learners to engage with those domains for a richer
educational experience.
(1999, p. 197)
To a significant degree, the political and ideological nature of teaching and

learning is both ubiquitous and universal; it takes place to some extent in all
classrooms, at all grade levels, and in all subject matters. However, the foreign
language classroom is unique in certain ways as it relates to power and power
relations, because it allows “an approach to language education in which learners
and teachers aim to achieve some critical distance from language use in a range
of spoken and written texts” (Wallace, 1997, p. 241).
The Transformative Power of Critical Pedagogy in

Foreign Language Education
This brings us to the matter of the transformative potential of critical peda-
gogy in the foreign language classroom. We are all familiar with the traditional
176 Timothy Reagan
components of the curriculum of the foreign language classroom, as well as with

the various teaching methodologies in the field, and the types of assessment that
can be employed. A commitment to critical pedagogy does not in any way elim-
inate these options, but it does require us to be thoughtful and reflective about
them, and also to consider alternatives that we may not have employed in the
past. Some of these alternatives involve rethinking our own role as the classroom
authority. As Barbara Craig comments,
Traditionally, the [foreign language] teacher’s role has been seen as that of
an authoritative expert. This view is based on the conception of knowl-
edge as a quantifiable intellectual commodity. The teacher, as an expert
in a field of inquiry or as an expert speaker of a language, has more of this
knowledge than his or her students have. Because this knowledge has a
separate existence outside of its knowers, it can be given, or taught, to the
learners by the teacher-expert.
(1995, p. 41)
This is a challenge for all teachers, but it is especially so for the foreign lan-
guage teacher since we have controlled not only the subject matter, but also the
medium of classroom communication. In other words, our dominance over our stu-
dents is significantly greater than that of teachers of other subjects, and we need
to be aware of this and to take it into account. In addition, an awareness of issues
of power in the foreign language classroom will not only contribute to students’
reflective and critical thinking abilities, but may also benefit their academic
abilities and language proficiency in the target language.
Textbooks and Curricular Nullification

In the context of foreign language teaching, there has historically been an unfor-
tunate tendency to confuse and conflate the curriculum with the textbook. This
problem is not unique to foreign language teaching, but it seems to be more
common in foreign language classes than in many other areas. There are a num-
ber of possible explanations for this tendency: institutional requirements that
one follow the textbook, the ease of simply following the predetermined course
structure provided by a textbook, teacher insecurity about his or her own foreign
language skills, and understandable (though perhaps somewhat inappropriate)
assumptions about the knowledge, skills and competence of the creators and
authors of foreign language textbooks. Taken together, all of these factors lead to
what can be termed the “hegemony of the textbook,” which refers to an unwill-
ingness to question or challenge the textbook.
Although it is clearly desirable for teachers to go beyond the textbook with
respect to the curriculum, there is a process by which the critical pedagogue can
challenge the hegemony of the textbook in a far more profound way than simply
providing students with various kinds of supplementary materials. This process

is called “curricular nullification,” and it is analogous to the phenomenon of
“jury nullification” in the United States, in which a jury chooses to ignore legal
mandates in coming to a finding that they believe to be more just and appropri-
ate (see Osborn, 2000, pp. 98–99). Curricular nullification refers to the teacher’s
ability to reject the set curriculum (whether this means the textbook or more
formal and established institutional curricula), either to exclude certain features
or units, or to include features or units that were absent in the original textbook
or curriculum (that is, both additive and subtractive curricular nullification) (see
Osborn, 2000, 2006).
Additive curricular nullification in the foreign language classroom already
takes place quite often, especially as foreign language teachers add curricular
content concerned with issues of culture. Such issues are typically the only non-
linguistic and extra-linguistic ones that foreign language educators see as a core
part of their teaching obligations, and active efforts are commonly made to inte-
grate culture into the foreign language curriculum and classroom.
In his book Teaching World Languages for Social Justice, Terry A. Osborn identi-
fies a number of social, political, economic, cultural and historical themes that
go well beyond those typically considered appropriate by foreign language edu-
cators that can be utilized in the context of the foreign language classroom to
promote critical perspectives on issues of language and society (2006, p. 61).
Among the themes that he identifies are
• personal and group identity;

• issues of conflict, struggle and discrimination;
• socioeconomic class;
• ideology;
• hidden curricula;
• popular media (entertainment);
• other media ( journalism, etc.);
• register and political/power relations;
• cultural hybridity;
• hegemony (linguistic, cultural, economic, political, etc.);
• issues of law and language;
• linguistic rights; and
• linguicism,4 resistance and marginalization.
It is precisely these kinds of themes that can contribute to the effective imple-
mentation of critical pedagogy in the foreign language classroom, and that pro-
vide guidance with respect to the kinds of curricular changes and modifications
that might be required.
Additive curriculum nullification can also include discussions or even entire
curricular units on such topics as language variation and language diversity, the
178 Timothy Reagan
linguistic hegemony of English and its impact on the particular language being
studied, linguistic rights as human rights, assumptions about linguistic purity,
“proper” language use and language status, among others. For instance, addi-
tive curricular nullification might take place in a French course through the
discussion of the differences between Parisian French and the French spoken in
Montréal; in Spanish courses, going beyond the typical discussions of peninsular
and Latin American Spanish to include other varieties, and especially local and
nonstandard varieties of the language, would constitute such additive curricular
nullification. There are also examples of phonological, lexical and grammatical
variations that can be introduced in the foreign language class to encourage dis-
cussions on many of these topics.
Thus far, the examples of additive curricular nullification that have been offered
here deal primarily with matters of sociolinguistics, issues of power and ideology
and so on, but there are also examples of additive curricular nullification that
are related to phonology, the lexicon and the syntax of the target language. In
Spanish classes, for instance, we almost universally teach students when and how
to use tú, usted, and ustedes. Vosotros and vosotras are commonly but by no means
universally taught, and so their inclusion or exclusion may be considered to be
either an instance of negative curriculum nullification or positive curricular nul-
lification. What is generally not taught, especially in beginning Spanish classes,
is the voseo form, in spite of its widespread use in a number of Latin American
countries, and most notably in Argentina. The voseo form could very conceivably
be added to the introduction of personal pronouns; it complicates an already dif-
ficult concept for native speakers of English, but it also demonstrates the richness
and diversity of Spanish. Similarly, when we teach Spanish vocabulary, we often
do so with a focus on “Standard Spanish” (or, more accurately, on a particular
variety or set of varieties of “Standard Spanish”). This is appropriate and valu-
able, but if one is teaching students in parts of the United States to speak Spanish,
and is concerned with helping them to interact with the local Latino community,
then such words as el broda (the brother), la norsa (the nurse), la troca (the truck),
espelear (to spell), huachar (to watch), and so on are likely, in some contexts, to
prove at least as useful as their Standard Spanish equivalents.5
Subtractive curricular nullification, on the other hand, basically occurs when
mandated parts of the established curriculum are minimized or eliminated alto-
gether by the teacher. Subtractive curricular nullification is less common in the
foreign language context than in many other disciplines, since our curricula are
generally articulated over a number of years, which means that removing mate-
rial from the curriculum may present problems for both teachers and students in
later years of language study. Nevertheless, subtractive curricular nullification
does occur; I have already mentioned the case of the elimination of vosotros/
vosotras in some Spanish courses and programs. Another example of curricular
nullification that took place in French classrooms was the replacement of la fin de
semaine with le week-end, a recognition that the lexical use in France had changed.
The curriculum is not the only focus of critical pedagogy, of course. A com-
mitment to critical pedagogy on the part of the foreign language teacher also
requires serious changes in our planning, teaching methods and assessment,
and in the ways in which we engage in classroom management. Many of the
more appropriate changes in terms of these various aspects of foreign language
teaching will involve making the foreign language classroom considerably more
student-centered in nature—not simply for pedagogical reasons (though such
reasons are extremely powerful), but also as a way to create a more democratic,
and empowering, learning environment. The rhetoric of student-centered
instruction is hardly novel, of course—John Dewey advocated it at the start of
the twentieth century (see Dewey, 1997, 2008). The practice of creating student-
centered instructional programs, however, has very often fallen short of this
rhetoric. In such areas, we need to be more honest and reflective about what we
actually do in the classroom, and about the gap between our articulated beliefs
and our daily classroom practice.
In terms of planning for instruction, there is a wide array of different formats
and models in existence for lesson, unit and course planning, and most expe-
rienced teachers have developed their own approaches to some degree. How-
ever, in order to really engage in critical pedagogical practice, it is necessary for
the foreign language teacher to reflect about what he or she actually wants to
accomplish in the classroom, not only in terms of the formal curriculum and
explicit language teaching, but also with respect to engaging students in critical
reflection. Critical pedagogy ultimately requires the teacher to be able to target
multiple goals and objectives simultaneously—that is, if we really want to opera-
tionalize a critical pedagogy-oriented approach to foreign language teaching,
then we must be very strategic when planning. The issue here is that if we are to
integrate meaningful content into the foreign language curriculum, then it will
naturally impose the teaching of particular academic language linked to the texts
and tasks with which we will want students to be engaged. This means, also, that
we will need to focus on the practice of literacy skills (e.g., those needed to tap
or critically analyze a text). Targeting these multiple objectives at once simply
cannot be done in traditional planning; it requires the use of planning protocols
that make room for such vision and practice.
Finally, the implementation of critical pedagogy in the foreign language class-
room requires a rethinking of evaluation and assessment. There are obviously
many ways in which we can assess student learning, but most are, to at least
some extent, problematic. Some of the things to keep in mind are that whatever
techniques we use to assess student learning should reflect the kinds of activities
that we routinely use in the classroom; otherwise, what we are really assessing is
how well students adjust to a kind of assessment that is different from the ways
in which they have been taught. Our assessment activities should reflect not
only what we actually do in the classroom, but also our articulated objectives. In
terms of the assessment of students’ acquisition of the target language, evaluation
180 Timothy Reagan
should be both formative and summative in nature. Formative assessment should

involve daily activities and informal observation by the teacher. Summative
assessment, which is traditionally thought of as some sort of written quiz or test,
can instead involve various sorts of oral, communicative activities (which can be
between the teacher and the individual student, between the teacher and groups
of students or amongst students themselves). All of this would also be true in
traditional approaches to evaluation in foreign language education, of course,
but good assessment practice in the critical classroom might well go beyond such
evaluative methods. For instance, one extremely useful approach to evaluation is
to actually ask students to assess themselves. Although we might expect this to
result in every student receiving an A, in actual practice this is rarely the case; in
my experience, students are likely to grade themselves far more critically than I
would. Such an approach to assessment, in addition, is far more in keeping with
the use of an approach grounded in critical pedagogy.
In short, our evaluation tools should be designed to assess what they are meant
to assess; too often, the tools we design only assess the very basis as students’
ability to recall or reproduce pre-digested facts and so on. If we say that what we
want is to assess students’ performance and ability to navigate, then assessment
must align with the curriculum. If what we are after here is the implementation
of a critical pedagogy-oriented curriculum focusing on themes such as those
identified by Osborn, then our objectives must be broadened to include more
than the traditional mission of language learning—we are adding instructional
missions such as the increase of students’ awareness to critical issues. Contrary
to common mythology, the evolution and development of students’ key under-
standings (such as their increased sensibility of their place and role within their
local community and beyond) can in fact be evaluated—specific tasks can be
designed to assess such progress. This naturally means that out assessment tools
must include dimensions that reflect these added instructional objectives, because
if they do not, they will not be considered important by learners who have been
conditioned to think that points on the test equal “learning” (meaning that what
is not on the rubric is not important to learn).
Examples of Critical Pedagogy in the Foreign

Language Classroom
I now want to turn to several examples in which various aspects of the application
of critical pedagogy can be seen in foreign language classrooms. The cases pre-
sented here are drawn from a second-year Spanish classroom and an introductory
Russian classroom. The students in the Spanish classroom have studied Spanish
altogether for approximately thirteen months; in the Russian classroom, the stu-
dents have been in the course for approximately seven weeks. I especially want to
point out that these examples are in fact actual examples of classroom discourse;
more to the point, neither is an example of particularly good foreign language
instruction. I have chosen them for that precise reason: They demonstrate that
all foreign language teachers, including those who are struggling and, therefore,
would not be considered exemplary, can effectively make use of critical pedagogy
in their classroom, and thus improve the overall educational experience for the
students. Finally, I should note that neither teacher is a native speaker of the target
language, and that this is reflected in their own language use.
Grammar and Politics in the Second-Year Spanish Classroom

In the following case, the teacher has presented students in her second-year Span-
ish class with a text dealing with a potentially controversial political issue rel-
evant to the study of the Spanish-speaking world. Notice the role of the teacher
in guiding and questioning students, both about the linguistic features of the
passage and about the political issues presented.
El otro 9/11
Cuando los Americanos piensan en el 9/11 (11 de Septiembre del 2001),
generalmente piensan en el ataque a las torres gemelas o World Trade Center.
En el pasado, ya había existido otro importante 9/11 el cual ocurrió el 11 de
Septiembre de 1973. Sucedió en Chile, cuando el Dr. Salvador Allende fue
electo presidente en elecciones democráticas en 1970. El comenzó muchas
reformas sociales y económicas. El 11 de Septiembre de 1973 el presidente
Allende y su gobierno fueron expulsados por un complot militar apoyado
por la CIA de los Estados Unidos. Desde 1973 al 1990, el líder chileno fue
Augusto Pinochet, quien encabezó una brutal dictadura en la cual 28,000
personas fueron torturadas y por lo menos 3,2000 asesinadas, además de un
gran número de personas desaparecidas.
The Other 9/11

When Americans think about the date 9/11 (September 11, 2001), we usu-
ally think about the attack on the World Trade Center. There was already
another important 9/11, though—September 11, 1973. In Chile, Dr. Sal-
vador Allende was elected president in a democratic election in 1970. He
began many social and economic reforms. On September 11, 1973, President
Allende and his government were overthrown by a military coup supported
by the United States CIA. From 1973 to 1990, Chile’s leader was Augusto
Pinochet, who headed a very brutal dictatorship in which 28,000 people
were tortured and at least 3,200 murders and “disappearances” took place.
182 Timothy Reagan
Class Discussion
TEACHER: Esta lectura se llama “El otro 9/11.” ¿Por qué? Gustavo? [This
reading is called “The other 9/11.” Why? Gustavo?]
GUSTAVO: Chile . . . Presidente Allende, ¿sí? [Chile . . . President Allende,
yes?]
TEACHER: Sí, pero . . . ¿Qué pasa con el presidente Allende? ¿Clase?
[Yes, but . . . What happened with President Allende? Class?]
JUANITA: Era . . . pues, su gobierno . . . was overthrown . . . por un golpe
militar. [He was . . . well, his government was overthrown by a mili-
tary coup.]
TEACHER: Su gobierno fue derrocado, sí. ¿Cuándo? [His government was over-
thrown, yes. When?]
ROBERTO: ¡Ah! 11 Septembre . . . umm . . . 1973. [Ah! September 11 . . .
1973.]
SUSANNA: Y . . . Pinochet se convirtió en el nuevo líder de Chile. Y él
estaba muy mal, ¿de veras? [And . . . Pinochet became the new
leader of Chile. And he was very bad, right?]
TEACHER: Pues, muchas personas en Chile lo creen. Pero, ¿por qué? [ Well,
many people in Chile believe that. But, why?]
SUSANNA: Dice que torturó y mató a muchas personas . . . [It says that he
tortured and killed many people . . . ]
ROBERTO: Y presidente Allende estaba asesinado. [And President Allende
was (sic) assassinated.]
TEACHER: Sí, presidente Allende fue asesindo. En realidad, el presidente
Allende se suicidó durante el golpe. [Yes, President Allende was
assassinated. In fact, President Allende committed suicide during the
coup.]
What about grammar . . . can you find some examples of
noun/adjective agreement in the reading?
JUANITA: Sí. Las elecciones democráticas—femenino. [Yes. The democratic
elections—feminine.]
PEDRO: Y muchas reformas sociales y económicas—femenino . . . [And
many social and economic reforms—feminine . . . ]
ROBERTO: Un complot militar, y los Estados Unidos, too—masculino. [A
military plot, and the United States, too—masculine.]
TEACHER: Muy bien, clase. Y, ¿qué saben uds. sobre el verbo “piensan”?
[Very good, class. And what do you know about the verb “piensan”?]
JUANITA: Well, it comes from “pensar,” so it’s an -ar verb . . .
MARIA: Yeah, but it’s one of those stem-changing verbs, because of the ie.
JUANITA: And it’s present tense, and goes with los Americanos [the
Americans]. That’s . . . umm . . . third person plural, ¿sí? [Yes?]
TEACHER: Perfecto. Ahora, ¿hay algo aquí interesante? [Perfect. Now, is
there something else that’s interesting?]
JUANITA: Does it say that the United States . . . the CIA . . . supported the
coup? That can’t be true . . .
TEACHER: ¡Vamos a ver! Su tarea consiste en averiguar todo lo posible
acerca del golpe de 1973 en Chile. Vamos a ver si la lectura es
correcta, y lo que realmente sucedió. [Let’s see! Your homework
is to find out everything possible about the 1973 coup in Chile. Let’s
see if the reading is right, and what really happened.]
As one can see in the class discussion, the text provided by the teacher pro-
vides numerous obvious and direct opportunities for discussions about politics
and ideology in Latin America, and the role of the United States in recent Latin
American history, as well as for review of a number of Spanish grammatical
features (gender, noun-adjective agreement, -ar verbs, etc.). One interesting
observation that I would offer here is that in this particular case, the teacher and
students seem comfortable using Spanish to discuss the passages, and the teacher
is comfortable in correcting students’ Spanish usage, but both tend to revert to
English for discussion of grammatical points. Although there are some public
school settings where such a text would potentially be problematic, it can be
presented quite legitimately as providing a starting point for critical discussions.
Aspect and Revolution in the Russian Classroom

Russian verbs occur in pairs: imperfective and perfective (Hansen, 1999). This
distinction is fundamental to the Russian verbal system, and is reflected in the
infinitival form of the verb as well as in all other variations. This distinction,
which is technically referred to as aspect (вид) (see Cubberley, 2002, pp. 151–157;
Durst-Andersen, 1992; Galnaityte, 1980; Perez Bouza, 1996), is related to the
division that was present in Old Church Slavonic (see, e.g., Bermel, 1995; Iva-
nova, 2008; Lunt, 2001), remains common to other Slavic languages (see Com-
rie & Corbett, 2002) and refers to the extent to which an action is perceived to
be completed. In terms of tense (время), Russian verbs are inflected by person
and number for three tenses: the present tense, the past tense and the future
tense. Imperfective verbs utilize all three tenses, while perfective verbs use only
the past and future tenses. Thus, past tense imperfective verbs are those that refer
to actions that remain uncompleted at the time of locution, while perfective
verbs are those that have been completed. In the future tense, imperfective verbs
are used to indicate uncertainty about whether the action will take place, while
perfective verbs are employed to suggest certainty. In contemporary Russian, all
verbs in the present tense are, by definition, imperfective (Wade, 2000, p. 268).
In teaching Russian as a foreign language, aspect commonly presents peda-
gogical challenges, regardless of whether one attempts to use a direct or indirect
approach to the teaching of the grammatical underpinnings of the concept. As
Paul Cubberley (2002) observes, “The concept of aspect has proved a major
184 Timothy Reagan
problem in pedagogy, which the forms involved have pushed both teachers and
students to perceive the whole topic as fraught with danger and often just too
difficult” (p. 150; see also Abdelrahim-Soboleva, 1998; Stoll, 2001).6 The norm is
typically to begin with the imperfective aspect, and only gradually introduce the
perfective aspect. There is also a strong tendency among Russian teachers to pres-
ent aspect in a direct and explicit manner. Common verb pairs that are taught
in beginning Russian classes are likely to include such verb pairs as писать/
написать (to write), звонить/позвонить (to call), обедать/пообедать (to
have lunch), слушать/послушать (to listen), смотреть/посмотреть (to watch,
look at), читать/прочитать (to read), делать/сделать (to do), говорить/
приговорить or сказать (to speak, say, tell), отвечать/ответить (to answer)
and помогать/помочь (to help).
Although different from English, this distinction is really not all that com-
plex. Consider, for instance, the following sentences:
Вы читал эту книгу?

“Have you read this book?”
Да, читал.
“Yes, I have read [it].”
Я читал эту книгу два дня.
“I was reading this book for two days.”
Возьмите журнал, я прочитал его.
“Take the magazine, I have read it.”
These sentences not only all make sense, but the use of grammatical aspect in
fact makes them (arguably) clearer than they might be in English (see Borras &
Christian, 1971, pp. 117–165; Paducheva, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992).
In teaching aspect in the beginning Russian classroom, all of the general principles
of constructivism can be put into practice. Thus, students could be provided with
authentic materials in Russian and guided to appropriate understandings of these
materials, and then asked about the meanings of the different verbs, both with regard
to tense (which they should already understand) and aspect (which is the grammati-
cal objective of the unit). At the same time, issues at the heart of critical pedagogy
can also be integrated into such a lesson; in the following passage, for instance, issues
of crime, poverty and politics in nineteenth century Russia are discussed:
Преступление и наказание
На прошлой неделе я читал книгу Федора Достоевского Преступление
и наказание которую моя сестра прочитала в прошлом году. Эта книга
рассказывает о человеке по фамилии Раскольников который совершил
убийство чтобы доказать доказать право “сильной личности” преступать

законы нравственности. Книга рассказывает о жизни и психологии людей
в России 19 века.
Crime and Punishment

Last week, I was reading a book by Fyodor Dostoyevski, Crime and Punish-
ment, that my sister read last year in school. It is about a man called Raskol-
nikov, who committed a murder to prove the right of a strong personality
to violate moral laws. I think that we can learn a lot about the life and
people’s psychology in 19th century Russia from this book.
Class Discussion
TEACHER: Саша, когда человек читал Преступлéние и наказáние?
[Sasha, when did the boy read Crime and Punishment?] Did he
finish reading it?
SASHA: На прошлой неделе [Last week]. Umm . . . Я не знает
[I don’t knows (sic)].
TEACHER: Ты не знаеш. Я . . . [You don’t know . . . I . . . ]
SASHA: Я не знаю [I don’t know.]
TEACHER: Да, я не знаю. Ну, [Yes, I don’t know. Well,] can someone help
Sasha? Any idea about how we could figure that out? Аlexander?
ALEXANDER: Я думаю что он . . . [I think that he . . . ] finished reading
the книгу [book].
TEACHER: Да, он закончил читать книгу. Ну, почему Александр?
[Yes, he finished reading the book. Well, why, Alexander?] What
clues are there?
ALEXANDER: It’s in the past tense, so he must have finished it.
TEACHER: Is it always true that if we use the past tense, it means that we
finished whatever we’re talking about? Анна? [Anna?]
ANNA: Noo . . . in English you can say something like, “I was going
to the store,” but maybe you didn’t get there for some reason.
TEACHER: Хорошо . . . [Good . . . ] И как насчет сестры мальчика?
Когда она прочитла книгу? [And what about the boy’s sister?
When did she read the book?]
SASHA: Да, я знаю это [Yes, I know that]. Она читала книгу в
прошлом году [She read the book last year].
TEACHER: Почему она прочитла книгу? [Why did she read the book?]
SASHA: В школе [In school]—I’ll bet it was an assigned reading!
(Laughs)
TEACHER: OK, да, может быть [Yes, maybe] (laughs). И она . . . Она
дочитать книгу? [And she . . . did she finish reading it?]
186 Timothy Reagan
ALEXANDER: Да, потому што . . . [Yes, because . . . ] it was a school

assignment.
TEACHER: Is there a difference in the Russian verb that might help us
know that for sure?
ANNA: Oh, да [yes]—even though both verbs mean “read,” they’re
different.
TEACHER: Да, правильно. [Yes, correct.] All verbs in Russian come in
pairs, and one verb is called the imperfective and the other
is the perfective. In this text, читал is the imperfective verb,
and прочитала is the perfective. What’s the difference in
what they mean?
ALEXANDER: I see, yeah. The imperfective means something that’s maybe
not done, and the perfective means it is done. Oh, and читал
is masculine and прочитала is feminine, because of who the
subject is.
TEACHER: Очень хорошо! [Very good! ] That’s exactly right. Что автор
в виду, когда он говорит, что мы можем узнать много о
России в 19 веке из Преступлéние и наказáние? [What do
you think the author is talking about when he says that we can learn
a lot about 19th century Russia from Crime and Punishment?]
ANNA: Это была очень . . . poor . . . страна, не так ли? [It was a
very . . . ‘poor’ . . . country, right?]
TEACHER: Да, Россия была очень бедная страна. [Yes, Russia was a
very poor country.]
ALEXANDER: И там было много преступлений . . . [And there was a lot
of crime . . . ]
SASHA: Но . . . Я думал, что Россия очень богатая страна. Это
было много дворцов, и все было покрыто золотом . . .
[But—I thought that it was a really rich country—it had lots of
palaces, and everything was covered with gold . . . ]
ALEXANDER: Могло ли это быть как? [Could it have been both?] Some
really rich people, and a whole lot of poor people?
TEACHER: Это очень хорошее представление, Александр. [That’s
a very good insight, Аlexander.] Do you know what happened
because of that huge divide between the rich and the poor
in Russia?
SASHA: Yeah, there was a revolution and the Communists came in,
and they killed the царь [tsar] and his family.
TEACHER: Да, in Russian it’s called the Великая Октябрьская
социалистическая революция [Yes, the Great October
Socialist Revolution], and it led to the founding of the Союз
Советских Социалистических Республик [the Union of
Soviet Socialist Republics]—the Soviet Union, which we will
be studying throughout the course. Now, let’s look at some

of the other verbs in this text . . .
This is essentially a constructivist approach to the initial teaching of aspect in

Russian, which allows students to figure out the basic idea on their own, with
only limited guidance from the teacher.7 Ultimately, for example, it is Anna who
identifies the fact that there are two different meanings for the verbs читл and
прочитл; it is only after she has done so that the teacher provides an explanation
of aspect to the class. If we look at the content of the lesson, though, we can see
some other things taking place that could also infuse a critical pedagogy-based
foreign language lesson. The text selected for the lesson raises the issue of the
huge social class inequity in Russia during tsarist times, as well as offers an open-
ing for a latter discussion of the Russian Revolution of 1917. Other ways in which
the content of the class might be altered to become more critical would include
(1) asking students to write short essays (or even simply paragraphs) about vari-
ous parts of the former U.S.S.R., (2) describing both historical and contemporary
developments (which would necessitate the use of both the imperfective and per-
fective aspects), (3) researching and presenting to the class a brief oral commen-
tary about what a particular historical figure (e.g., in politics, Peter the Great,
Nicholas II, Lenin, Stalin and Vladimir Putin; in literature, Tolstoy, Dostoyevski,
Pushkin, etc.) did during his or her life (which again would involve both the
imperfective and perfective aspects, as well as raising fairly obvious issues about
the nature of Russian society at various points in her history) and (4) reading
a newspaper article about recent political events in Russia and identifying and
explaining the uses of each aspect in the article. All of these examples involve
increasing the students’ understanding of and ability to make use of the imper-
fective and perfective aspects of the Russian verb (i.e., a focus on form), but they
also do so in contexts in which it is necessary to reflect on more critical social
and political issues (i.e., a focus on meaning).
Conclusion
The simultaneous focus on form and meaning, demonstrated in both of the
examples presented in this chapter, is a characteristic of critical pedagogy in for-
eign language education that is largely absent in other approaches to the teach-
ing of foreign languages. The ability to infuse form and meaning in a manner
that allows for the targeting of both dimensions at once is unique to critical
pedagogical approaches; the more common approaches to curriculum develop-
ment and classroom instruction in the field are not adapted to make content
“count” within the context of language instruction. For instance the commu-
nicative approach, theme-based approach or task-based approach to language
teaching, the most frequently found approaches in foreign language education
programs today, are primarily concerned with issues of language development.
188 Timothy Reagan
Even theme-based instruction, which is an approach often equated with content-

based instruction, is a communicative approach in disguise; language instruction
is contextualized using interesting content but the assessment tools are usually
only designed to assess target gains in linguistic knowledge.
The overarching theme of this book is that if we are to target multiple goals
at once we must then adopt approaches to curriculum and teaching that are
designed specifically for this purpose (teaching language through content). In
other words, if we are to simultaneously help learners increase their linguistic
repertoire (a language teaching goal), become aware of their surrounding world
and their place and responsibility within it so that they may combat common
injustices and make the world a better place for all (a critical pedagogy goal),
and increase their capacity to think deeply and ask questions about meaning (an
advanced literacy goal), then we must reconsider our approaches to planning
and teaching because conventional approaches have proven very inefficient at
making possible the simultaneous teaching of content, language and academic
literacy.
A major challenge to critical approaches toward education in general, and
toward foreign language teaching in particular, has been the difficulty of relat-
ing theoretical work to the “real world” of pedagogical practice. It is one thing
to advocate helping students to become more socially and ideologically aware of
the world in which they live and of the functions of language and language use
in maintaining and reproducing power relations in society; it is quite another to
figure out how to accomplish this while still meeting both the expectations of
increasing language proficiency and addressing the national and international
goals such as the ACTFL Standards (1996, 2006) and the Common European Frame-
work (Verhelst, Van Avermaet, Takala, Figueras, & North, 2009). In this chapter,
I have tried to demonstrate that critical pedagogy can indeed be manifested in
classroom practice in the foreign language setting, showing how typical instruc-
tion in the foreign language classroom can be made more critical, especially
through content instruction.
Notes
1. I am grateful for a number of discussions with Terry A. Osborn, which have had a
significant impact on my thinking on this matter, and for the strong support that I
have received from Laurent Cammarata in the writing of this chapter.
2. The term “foreign” as it is used in the U.S. context is itself problematic since it sug-
gests that “foreign languages” are in some sense alien to the country (which they are
not), and reinforces false assumptions about “Otherness.” Recent efforts to change
nomenclature, utilizing the phrase “world languages” in place of “foreign languages,”
to some extent addresses such concerns, but only at the level of what might be termed
articulated bias. Regardless of what they are called, in U.S. schools languages other
than English are in fact perceived, by both adults and students, as profoundly foreign.
This perception is in fact only strengthened, really, by encouraging the use of what
is seen as a politically correct label (i.e., “world languages”). The risk with such word
games, as Michael Apple has noted, is that “historically outmoded, and socially and
politically conservative (and often educationally disastrous) practices are not only con-
tinued, but are made to sound as if they were actually more enlightened and ethically
responsive ways of dealing with children” (1979, p. 144).
3. For an overview of the literature dealing with critical pedagogy, see Darder, Torres,
and Baltodano (2009), Kincheloe (2008), McLaren and Kincheloe (2007), Morrell
(2002), and Wink (2000, 2005).
4. The term “linguicism” was originally introduced by Tove Skutnabb-Kangas in the
1980s (see Skutnabb-Kangas, 2000). Basically, “linguicism” is the linguistic equivalent
of racism, sexism, ageism and so on; in other words, it refers to ideologies, attitudes,
beliefs and structures that are used to create and maintain social, political, education
and economic distinctions among individuals and groups based on issues of language.
5. See Stavans (2008) and Lipski (2007).
6. My focus here is on the student who is a native speaker of English. However, it
is increasingly common to find heritage speakers of Russian in Russian language,
and these students obviously present both the linguistic and pedagogical challenges
that are different from those presented by other students. See, for instance, Andrews
(2000), Brinton, Kagan, and Bauckus (2008), Isurin and Ivanova-Sullivan (2008),
Kagan (2005), and Kagan and Friedman (2003).
7. For discussions of constructivist learning theory in the foreign language education
context, see Reagan (1999), and Williams and Burden (1999).
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9
CRITICAL CONTENT-BASED
INSTRUCTION IN THE FOREIGN
LANGUAGE CLASSROOM
Critical Issues for Implementation
Ryuko Kubota
Introduction
Content-based instruction (CBI) has been implemented in such areas as foreign
language education, language for specific or academic purposes, immersion edu-
cation, and sheltered instruction for English language learners. Since CBI is based
on the principle that language is learned through learning meaningful content,
the types of content selected and the educational philosophy behind the selec-
tion are as important as the ways in which language proficiency is developed.
Although teachers may select topics and content of interest to learners, they may
also consider how the topic, content, and delivery of instruction can encourage
learners to think critically about the content and develop critical awareness of
language and texts.
In this regard, the content in CBI can be informed by critical pedagogy and
critical literacy. Critical literacy also assists learners to develop advanced literacy
tools. Although these educational philosophies provide learners with alternative
ways of understanding the world by challenging mainstream knowledge and
validating marginalized perspectives, they risk teachers’ imposition of progres-
sive ideas.
In this chapter, I will critically reflect on the content of CBI, which I imple-
mented in an advanced Japanese language course on “Memories of War” at
a Canadian university (Kubota, 2012, 2013). After providing a brief descrip-
tion of critical pedagogy and critical literacy, I will describe the key content
of the course and instructional aspects for promoting advanced literacy. This is
followed by my reflection on the politics of the content of CBI and potential
problems. This discussion is relevant to the issues raised in the scholarly litera-
ture on teaching about controversial topics. One contentious problem is teachers’
Critical CBI in the FL Classroom 193
imposition of perspectives. Although this problem can be solved by a poststruc-

turalist approach to examining all knowledge as legitimate for scrutiny, this
approach should also be critically appraised. I argue that implementation of CBI
needs to be grounded on critical reflexivity to always caution against hegemony
that critical approaches potentially create.
Critical Pedagogy and Critical Literacy

Critical pedagogy aims to raise learners’ critical awareness of the ways in which
social practices and their knowledge of the world are shaped by ideologies and
power relations (Freire, 1998; Kincheloe, 2005). By shedding light on the mar-
ginalized experiences and voices of culturally, socioeconomically, and linguis-
tically subjugated people and by questioning taken-for-granted hegemonic
practices and ideas, critical pedagogy scrutinizes unequal relations of power and
explores how the status quo can be transformed. Likewise, critical literacy raises
learners’ awareness of how various linguistic and discursive means in texts (e.g.,
choices of modality, lexical item, discourse marker, nominalization, passive or
active voice, genre) mediate the production of particular knowledge (Freire &
Macedo, 2013; Luke, 2000). It encourages the learners to employ critical aware-
ness to actively read and write for social change.
“Critical” in critical pedagogy and critical literacy is different from that in
critical thinking. While critical thinking aims to only arrive at objective and pre-
cise understanding of the content of learning by exploring assumptions and solv-
ing problems, critical pedagogy moves beyond this learning stage and envisions
social change by questioning assumptions and posing problems (Canagarajah,
2002). The neutral and cognitive approach in critical thinking is in marked con-
trast to the sociopolitical engagement of critical pedagogy and critical literacy.
Critical pedagogy and critical literacy, as transformative educational philoso-
phy, are relevant to all subject areas, including foreign and second language edu-
cation (e.g., Benesch, 2001; Crookes, 2010; Iwasaki & Kumagai, 2008; Kubota,
2003, 2008; Leeman, 2005; Morgan, 1998; Osborn, 2000, 2006; Reagan &
Osborn, 2002). They problematize dominant assumptions about language, cul-
ture, language users, and social issues by encouraging learners to reflect on such
questions as What forms of language and culture are deemed legitimate and
why? What assumptions exist behind everyday social practices with regard to
gender, race, ethnicity, religion, physical ableness, and sexuality? How do these
assumptions and social practices affect diverse groups of people? In what ways are
social beliefs and practices constructed historically, politically, and ideologically?
How can we transform the social structures and practices that privilege a certain
population while marginalizing others? As such, a form of CBI that incorporates
critical pedagogy and literacy can be called critical CBI (Kubota, 2012; Sato,
Hasegawa, Kumagai, & Kamiyoshi, 2013).
194 Ryuko Kubota
In critical CBI, it is essential to critically reflect on our own practice. In dis-

cussing critical applied linguistics, Pennycook (2001) advocates movable praxis,
which reflects a dynamic approach to research and teaching, rather than fixed
methods and techniques, as “a way of thinking and doing that is always ques-
tioning, always seeking new schemas of politicization” (p. 173). This chapter
adopts this philosophy and critically reflects on the content I introduced to my
class in order to examine the difficult challenges of critical CBI. Specifically, I
pose such questions as Should multiple perspectives be presented in discussing
critical issues that are often controversial? Does teaching about critical topics
and content selected by a teacher lead to transformation or imposition? How can
a teacher engage students in deeper learning without imposing his or her own
position? What are unresolved problems in critical CBI? In what follows, I will
describe the content of an advanced Japanese language course based on CBI and
some strategies for critical literacy.
Critical CBI: An Example

At a university in Canada, I recently developed a content-based advanced Japa-
nese course, “Memories of War.” The course focused on issues related to Japan’s
involvement in the Asia-Pacific War during World War II. The learning objec-
tives were to (1) understand key issues in selected historical and contemporary
events in Japan since the early twentieth century that are related to war and
peace; (2) explore both victim and victimizer roles and perspectives in historical
events; (3) identify and critique how the victim or victimizer roles and perspec-
tives are represented in various texts and audiovisual media; (4) read, watch,
and listen to Japanese materials on the course theme, comprehend the content,
analyze it, and articulate opinions using legitimate argumentation; (5) express
orally and in writing reactions to the course content using academic discourse
with fluency and intelligibility; and (6) critically analyze the perspectives of
a self-selected topic through library/internet research and present the findings
orally and in writing.
In developing the course, I drew on a CBI course entitled “War and the
Japanese” developed by Chikamatsu (2008, 2011) for a Japanese program in a
U.S. university. Chikamatsu focused on the Asia-Pacific War and used authen-
tic materials with an appropriate level of linguistic difficulty, including school
textbooks published in Japan and popular culture media, such as anime and
manga, to guide students to critically understand historical perspectives and to
develop the linguistic skills necessary to comprehend the content and express a
statement of peace. Students pursued these objectives through various activities
in Japanese, such as reading online customer reviews of a film, writing their own
review, conducting a questionnaire survey related to issues of war and peace,
analyzing responses, and writing a report including a proposal for peace. Stu-
dents also interacted with a guest speaker and participated in community events.
While Chikamatsu’s course was situated in the U.S. context and aimed to fos-
ter students’ critical understanding of multiple perspectives that appear in various
materials, the critical CBI course on “Memories of War” specifically focuses on
how higai and kagai, or victim and victimizer, perspectives are embodied and
intertwined in selected events related to the Asia-Pacific War (Kubota, 2012,
2013). This focus was motivated by the fact that Japan’s dominant postwar dis-
course on peace has tended to emphasize Japan’s position as a victim of atomic
bombing in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, rather than as the victimizer of violence,
murders, and oppression in the Asia and Pacific region.
For instance, a critical review of kokugo [Japanese language arts—literally
“national language”] textbooks for elementary and secondary education indicates
that many “peace materials”—mostly narrative and expository essays—highlight
the tragedy of Japanese civilian victims of hunger and atomic or fire bombing
during the war (Kubota, 2012). Fiction films on atomic bombing, such as Kuroi
ame [Black rain] (1989), parallel this tendency; while they powerfully depict the
tragedy and inhumanity of war, they lack attention to the brutal violence, rape,
torture, and murder committed by Imperial Japan during the war (Yoneyama,
1999). Favoring the victim perspective coexists with the denial of such atrocities.
Some Japanese public figures have openly claimed that the Nanking Massacre
of 1937 did not happen or that there was no coercion of young women into
sexual slavery by the Japanese Imperial Army (Narusawa, 2013). Such denial
discourses exist not only in Japan but elsewhere; for instance, the dominant dis-
course in the United States justifies the atomic bombing as a necessary means to
end the war and to save thousands or millions of American lives (Kuznick, 2007;
Stone & Kuznick, 2012), evading responsibility for the mass murder and long-
term suffering of civilians. By shedding light on not only the victim but also the
victimizer perspective, “Memories of War” intended to provide students with
an opportunity to explore alternative historical views of both the target culture
and the Self. Such understandings are enabled by becoming aware of how our
knowledge of historical and contemporary issue are produced and contested by
complex relations of power, rather than reflecting objective facts.
Based on the perspective delineated here, “Memories of War” presented
materials for raising awareness of and critiquing the prevalence of the victim
perspective on the topics that are described next. These topics were examined
through academic and nonacademic essays, journalistic writing (e.g., articles in
newspapers, magazines, and newsletters), fiction and nonfiction films, manga,
children’s books, and social studies textbooks to build background knowledge
and to compare different discourses. In the next five sections, I describe the con-
tents, perspectives, and critical literacy addressed in the class (see also Kubota,
2012, 2013). Although I cite some English texts for the audience of this chapter,
I used comparable texts in Japanese as reading materials for students, plus a few
materials in English. The content was addressed in various ways: Teacher- and
student-led large and small group discussions, small group activities including
196 Ryuko Kubota
out-of-class research and in-class presentations, watching film viewings, written

responses to reading assignments, short response papers on the course content,
jigsaw reading, guest lectures, and a final paper on an individually selected topic.
Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Fiction and nonfiction materials demonstrate multilayered and ambivalent feel-
ings about hibakusha or the victims of radiation; although their emotional and
physical suffering, including a sense of survivor’s guilt, are expressed in a com-
pelling manner, anger toward the victimizer is rarely expressed, perhaps reflect-
ing censorship under the U.S. occupation after the war. At the same time, these
works are typically silent about the brutalities that Imperial Japan committed
against non-Japanese civilians within and outside of Japan, as seen in the lack of
attention to Korean hibakusha, for example.
Another issue is a complex multilayered victim/victimizer relationship, as seen
in Japanese medical professionals’ complicity with the Atomic Bombs Casualty
Commission (ABCC), which the United States established to conduct research on
the health effects of radiation, without, however, providing medical treatment to
victims. Two different works in the same genre can be contrasted to understand
how different historical perspectives are presented. For example, the course used
two works of manga: Yûnagi no machi, sakura no kuni [Town of evening calm,
country of cherry blossoms] (Kono, 2004) and Hadashi no Gen [Barefoot Gen]
(Nakazawa, 1975/1980). While the former represents a typical victim narrative
about hibakusha and atomic bombing, the latter exposes multifaceted injustices
committed by Japan as a victimizer, including the colonization and exploitation
of Koreans and Japanese physicians’ complicity with ABCC, providing critical
perspectives. Discussing whether the victim or victimizer perspective is pre-
sented in the visual and text materials and what discursive and semiotic devices
mediate the perspective can encourage learners to develop critical interpretation
of the materials.
Canada’s Involvement in Atomic Bombing

Teaching in Canada required me to scrutinize the role that Canada played in the
atomic bombing. In short, Canada was deeply involved in the development of
atomic bombs as a major supplier of uranium to the Manhattan Project of the
United States in the 1940s (van Wyck, 2010). The complex victim/victimizer
relationship is lucidly demonstrated in both the suffering and dignity of the
Dene, a First Nations people of Déline located in Canada’s Northwest Territories,
who mainly worked as transporters of uranium ore. The exposure to radiation
gradually caused many deaths in the community after many years. Village of
Widows (1999), a documentary film directed by Peter Blow, depicts the suffering
inflicted by the Canadian government’s refusal to acknowledge and compensate
for the health and environmental effects of uranium mining in the past. Yet
the film also portrays the Dene’s own sense of responsibility; a delegation from
Déline visited Hiroshima to make amends for the atrocities caused by the ura-
nium that originally belonged to their sacred land. This demonstrates a possibil-
ity to acknowledge Self as both a victim and a victimizer, which is contrasted to
the challenge that many Japanese hibakusha and non-hibakusha feel when they are
confronted with Japan’s war responsibility. Such contrast in perspectives further
facilitates the understanding of ideological positions underlying other texts on
atomic bombing.
The Battle of Okinawa

Okinawa, which prospered as an independent kingdom in the past, has suffered
from the domination of Japan since the seventeenth century. The unequal rela-
tion of power between the center and the periphery has continued; since the
reversion of the islands to Japan in 1972, the Japanese government has imposed
on Okinawa to host a majority of the U.S. military bases stationed in Japan.
Yet, perhaps the most atrocious event in Okinawan history was the Battle of
Okinawa fought between the United States and Imperial Japan in 1945. It took
lives of almost one quarter of the Okinawan people. Many civilians were vic-
timized by the Imperial Army of Japan, which drove civilians from shelter for
their own safety and forced them to commit suicide or massacred them for fear
of espionage (McCormack & Norimatsu, 2012). What is often forgotten is the
fact that civilian victims also included Korean men and women who served as
laborers and sexual slaves. The Battle of Okinawa can be denounced as brutality
against humanity by viewing all victims—enemies, allies, and civilians—as suf-
ferers. This view is reflected in Mabuni no anmâ [A mother of Okinawa] (Akaza,
2005), a children’s book about a mother grieving for all victims while searching
for her son’s remains, and in the monument called Heiwa no ishiji [Cornerstone of
peace], where names of the war dead are inscribed. However, as Kitamura (2007)
argues, such an effort to honor all casualties erases the victim/victimizer rela-
tions of power and overlooks where oppression or resistance exists. The fact that
very few names of Korean women are inscribed at Heiwa no Ishiji indicates their
silent resistance. The critical view provided by Kitamura (2007) offers a different
reading of Mabuni no Anmâ.
The Nuclear Disaster in Fukushima

Although this topic is not related to war, the asymmetrical and multilayered rela-
tions of power parallel the wartime power structure that produced victims while
exculpating the authorities from their responsibility. The nuclear disaster at
Tokyo Electric Power Company’s (TEPCO) Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power
Plant shortly after the massive earthquake of 2011 displaced 140,000 Fukushima
198 Ryuko Kubota
residents. To date, the precise causes of the accident have not been found, nor
have any individuals taken responsibility for the accident. But why has the sole
victim of atomic bombs on earth come to develop nuclear energy?
The reason is intertwined with U.S. politics during the Cold War, in which
the “peaceful use of nuclear energy” was promoted as a strategy for gaining sup-
port from non-Communist allies, and with the Japanese government’s economic
and military interests (Kingston, 2013; Tanaka & Kuznick, 2011). International
and domestic politics have victimized residents in economically depressed rural
communities in Japan; economic incentives were given in exchange for build-
ing nuclear facilities to supply electricity to major cities afar. These communities
in turn have faced irrevocable risks of disaster. This framework of victimiza-
tion continues as seen in the limited ways in which the Japanese establishment,
including the government, lawmakers, and TEPCO, have responded to the needs
of the victims; protected the health of residents, especially children; and sup-
ported restoration workers in Fukushima. This parallels the ways Japanese war-
time and present governments treated the residents of Okinawa or the Canadian
government’s treatment of the Dene.
Reading texts related to these issues provided students with knowledge of the
historical and political background of nuclear energy, which enabled them to
understand the subtext of media coverage and to investigate related issues (e.g.,
“nuclear racism” as seen in uranium mining and the treatment of nuclear waste)
in small groups.
The Politics of History Textbooks in Japan

Politics influence education. History textbooks in Japan have especially been
politicized. Contentious issues in the last several decades have concerned Japan’s
victimizer role in Asia. One example is the issue of sexual slaves or ianfu [comfort
women] for Japanese soldiers during the war. According to Tanaka (2002), at
least 80,000 to 100,000 women mainly from Korea (80 percent) were mobilized.
In 1993, the Japanese government acknowledged the Imperial Army’s involve-
ment in the establishment and administration of ianfu facilities and the coerced
nature of recruiting, transporting, and confining the women. In the statement,
the government made a commitment to remember the facts through history
education. Accordingly by 1997, almost all junior and senior high school history
textbooks included a brief reference to ianfu (McCormack, 2000; Nozaki, 2005,
2008). However, its reference disappears in the 2001 version due to pressure from
a conservative group, which eventually published a history textbook based on
their revisionist view.
Comparing revisionist and non-revisionist history textbooks for junior high
school enables learners to clearly see how each position discursively presents dif-
ferent versions of a history. Students can identify discursive strategies in the texts,
such as the use of the passive voice or an abstract noun as the subject of a sentence
(e.g., war rather than Japan) to obscure who the victimizer is, the selection of par-
ticular topics, and the use of semiotic means (e.g., pictures, photos, headings) to
foreground certain historical events but not others. Such investigations raise their
awareness of how social and historical knowledge is discursively constructed.
The Politics of the Content and the Situatedness

of Instruction
As evident from the preceding descriptions, many topics are political and con-
troversial. The core of potential disagreement lies in Japan’s victimizer role in
the Asia-Pacific War. In short, revisionists—academics, politicians, journalists,
and the general public—want to reverse the discourse about wartime Japan as
an oppressor by emphasizing Japan’s image as a liberator of Asian peoples from
Western imperialism. Constructing such a positive image requires a denial of the
injustices committed by Imperial Japan, as some revisionists have recently done.
For instance, in addition to the issues of sexual slaves and the Nanking Massacre
of 1937, conservative citizens have demanded that school and public libraries
remove the aforementioned manga work Hadashi no Gen [Barefoot Gen] (Naka-
zawa, 1975/1980), which has long been used for peace education. Additionally,
some young Japanese people have been drawn to a xenophobic hate group and
engage in hate speech on the street and in the cyberspace (Morris-Suzuki, 2013).
Such trends underscore the highly political and ideological nature of the con-
tent addressed in “Memories of War.” The content was chosen to challenge the
dominant discourse that emphasizes Japan as a victim and to pay more atten-
tion to the complexity of victim/victimizer perspectives and Japan’s role as
a victimizer—a perspective that nationalists wish to erase. Thus, the content
clearly favors a certain political stance supported by progressive authors and
scholars. The inclination toward progressive perspectives in critical CBI reflects
a vision of critical pedagogy as discussed earlier.
However, the privileging of progressive content in critical pedagogy entails
the potential for imposition and indoctrination. Kincheloe (2005) argues that a
critical stance should not be imposed on students even in challenging the domi-
nant view about school knowledge as neutral and apolitical. Arguing against the
criticism posed by mainstream critics that critical pedagogy imposes a particular
position, Kincheloe argues that staying neutral and withholding a political stance
equally leads to indoctrination. While avoiding imposition or indoctrination is
essential in education, it is necessary to explore what such avoidance might look
like in practice and to critically reflect on how the content of “Memories of
War” might be complicit with imposition.
Another important issue to consider is the situatedness of teaching. No
instructional idea can or should be implemented in a one-size-fits-all fashion due
to contextual factors, including the characteristics of the learners, educational
objectives, and instructional contexts. With this in mind, teachers “engage in
200 Ryuko Kubota
constant moment-to-moment, day-to-day negotiations with students over innu-

merable issues and concerns” (Buzzelli & Johnston, 2002, p. 13). Such negotia-
tions should be made in teaching critical CBI courses or any other course.
For example, teaching “Memories of War” in the United States would be
different from teaching it in Canada, because of differing national discourses
stemming from political and historical narratives. The prevalent discourse that
justifies atomic bombs in the United States might create stronger resistance to
accepting a view that positions America as a victimizer. Conversely, the plight
of the Dene is a topic more relevant to Canada. The demographic characteris-
tics of the students also constitute a major factor. Teaching “Memories of War”
in a class that enrolls a majority of Asian students of Chinese and Korean ori-
gin would be different from teaching predominantly non-Asian students. In my
experience of teaching this course in the first year, the class enrolled predomi-
nantly non-Japanese Asian students who were nonnative speakers of Japanese;
the following year, the class enrolled predominantly native-Japanese-speaking
students—many of whom experienced primary and secondary education at
English-medium international schools in Japan and wished to develop academic
language skills in Japanese.
During this second year, I increasingly felt uncomfortable about the possibility
that I might be imposing a particular position filtered through the instructional top-
ics and materials. My feeling came from the fact that the students of Japanese back-
ground seemed to carry different cultural baggage, although they did not directly
voice their political stance, if they had one at all, in front of me or other Asian stu-
dents of non-Japanese background. In fact, their own stances on some of the issues
were often not expressed even though I tried to engage them in discussion activities.
I suspected that this had to do with teacher-student power dynamics.
There was another incident in a different context—teaching in Japan an inten-
sive course on the methods of teaching English as a second language (TESL)
(TESL methods course hereafter) to both Japanese and Chinese Canadian post-
graduate students. An overt conflict of opinions occurred in a classroom discus-
sion after students returned from a public lecture on the Nanking Massacre of
1937, which I encouraged them to attend since the topic seemed useful to discuss
CBI. In our class discussion, a denial opinion that the Massacre did not happen
was expressed by some Japanese students, which emotionally hurt their Chinese
Canadian peers (Kubota, 2014).
Looking back, my decision to teach “Memories of War” and to encourage
students to learn about the Nanking Massacre was driven by my professional
commitment to critical pedagogy. I believed that a victimizer perspective, which
is often absent in the dominant discourse, should be highlighted in order to
achieve a more ethical understanding of history, culture, and society. However,
the choice of topics and materials was determined entirely by my stance and
could be interpreted as imposition, just as school curricula that exclude mar-
ginalized knowledge are questioned by critical pedagogues as the imposition of
dominant ideas. Furthermore, when difficult moments arose in the discussion of

the Nanking Massacre, I was unprepared to handle the situation.
These experiences led me to reflect on the implementation of criticality
in teaching critical CBI. They also made me more aware of the controversial
nature of the topics and materials that I chose to discuss in my classrooms.
While critical pedagogy strongly discourages teachers from imposing certain
ideas (Benesch, 2001; Kincheloe, 2005) based on a Freirean philosophy of dia-
logic education (Freire, 1998), it does not provide specific pedagogical insights
when the dialogue turns into strong disagreement and emotional conflict (cf.,
Ellsworth, 1989). The possibility of implicit or explicit disagreement in the
classroom indicates that teachers who develop and implement critical CBI
should be aware that the topics, contents, and materials they choose are often
political and controversial—controversial in the sense that they raise unresolved
questions of public policy or other social, economic, historical, or political top-
ics that generate significant and often emotionally charged disagreement (Hess,
2002). In this regard, reviewing interdisciplinary discussions on teaching about
controversial issues in the classroom provides insight into what pedagogical
issues need to be taken into consideration and how teachers can approach criti-
cal CBI with critical reflection.
Teaching about Controversial Issues

Instructional approaches to controversial issues in the classroom is an inter-
disciplinary interest discussed in geography, science, social studies, and envi-
ronmental studies, and in primary, secondary, and higher education in general
(e.g., Ashton & Watson, 1998; Cotton, 2006; Dewhurst, 1992; Hess, 2002, 2009;
Hitchings, 2011; Kelly, 1986; Oulton, Day, Dillon & Grace, 2004; Oulton, Dil-
lon & Grace, 2004; Stenhouse, 1983). There are three main questions in this dis-
cussion: Should controversial issues be discussed in the classroom at all? Should
balanced views be presented? Should the teacher stay neutral among competing
views? While these questions are explored from instructional points of view,
another theoretically based perspective—a poststructuralist approach—provides
an additional dimension to the discussion. However, a poststructuralist approach
potentially endorses moral relativism, posing yet another challenge of how to
deal with unethical or outrageous opinions expressed in the classroom. In what
follows, I examine each question and link it to critical CBI.
Should Controversial Issues Be Discussed at All?

Scholars who discuss teaching about controversial issues recognize its value as it
facilitates achievement of the fundamental goal of education: to foster socially
informed and morally responsible citizens who can make their own decisions
through critical thinking (Hess, 2008; Kelly, 1986). From a critical CBI point
202 Ryuko Kubota
of view, controversial issues naturally constitute the instructional content. This

is because critical approaches to teaching aim to fill a gap in the traditional
curriculum, which tends to favor mainstream perspectives in terms of culture,
language, gender, ethnicity, history, and so forth, by questioning common
assumptions (Kincheloe, 2005; Kumashiro, 2004). For instance, highlighting
Japan’s victimizer role in atomic bombing—discrimination against Korean hiba-
kusha and exploitation of hibakusha by Japanese physicians—is likely viewed as
controversial from mainstream and revisionist points of view. In this sense, the
topics and perspectives I chose to address in “Memories of War” are indeed con-
troversial. From a critical perspective, instructional content allows teachers and
students to question the dominant view.
Should Balanced Views Be Presented?

From a liberal and constructivist perspective of student-centered pedagogy, stu-
dents should be exposed to multiple perspectives, rather than a one-sided view,
so that they can make their own informed decision of which position to choose
(cf. Oulton, Dillon, & Grace, 2004). However, this approach is likely to fall into
absolute relativism (Andreotti, 2011) and may not be compatible with critical
pedagogy, which tends to favor underrepresented views in traditional curricula
or mainstream discourses. For example, in the introduction to Rethinking Glo-
balization: Teaching for Justice in an Unjust World (Bigelow & Peterson, 2002)—a
progressive resource book for teachers—the editors pose and answer the ques-
tion “Is this book biased?” They condemn economic inequalities, environmental
disasters, and excessive privatization caused by globalization and define the term
“balanced” as “giving equal credence to claims that we know to be false and
that . . . enjoy wide dispersal in the dominant culture” (p. 5). Thus, the editors
eschew giving “ ‘equal time’ . . . to proponents of corporate-driven globaliza-
tion” and instead advocate for a “partisan” curriculum, which “invites diversity
of opinion but does not lose sight of the aim of the curriculum: to alert students
to global injustice, to seek explanations, and to encourage activism” (p. 5). Here,
balanced views are compromised for giving more credence to a critical view
supported by the editors.
Hess (2004) regards such a position as a “privilege” approach to controversial
issues, in the sense that a teacher acknowledges a particular issue as controversial,
but she or he believes that there is one preferred answer to the issue and that
students should adopt that position. With regard to “Memories of War” and
the TESL methods course, the instructional content and materials reflected this
“privilege” or “partisan” approach, in that I paid greater attention to a victimizer
perspective that was seen as deemphasized in the mainstream discourse. From a
centrist perspective, this approach could be challenged. Focusing on pragmatic
demands in academic writing, Santos (2001) argues that critical approaches to
teaching English for academic purposes could lead to proselytizing a progressive
ideology at the cost of the required academic training, which, she argues, is not
political or ideological.
While I disagree on the ideological neutrality of academic training, I believe
that critical approaches, including my own teaching of critical CBI, need to be
scrutinized not from a centrist but from a critical perspective. Although the
“privilege” or “partisan” approach can be justified as providing students with
alternative perspectives that are often sidelined, this approach can be problem-
atic. First, as Kelly (1986) argued, the “privilege” approach may fail to expose
students to the multiple perspectives available in public discourses (e.g., different
interpretations of Imperial Japan as a victimizer—both from the left and from
the right) and to help them understand conceptual complexities. Second, this
lack of exposure to multiple positions and the assumptions behind them bar
students from developing skills to competently argue against opposing views.
Third, offering only certain perspectives, no matter how well intentioned, dis-
regards the agency of students as rational individuals who can make their own
decisions. Overall, the “privilege” approach, as any other approach, may result
in indoctrination.
From this perspective, the “privilege” approach to “Memories of War” or the
TESL methods course, although it offered knowledge glossed over in dominant
discourses, did not create a learning space to examine and debate the complex-
ity of the politics behind the victim/victimizer perspectives. A more balanced
approach would include materials that represent diverse views as well as activities
to unpack knowledge via a poststructuralist approach, which I discuss later.
Should the Teacher Stay Neutral among Competing Views?

There is little consensus on this issue. Neutrality has some educational and prac-
tical advantages, such as promoting respect for learner agency, avoiding excess
influence of the teacher as an authority, encouraging open discussion on diver-
sity of opinions, creating a democratic forum for learning, evading potential
criticisms from administrators and parents, and sending a message to students
that there are no absolute truths on controversial issues (Stenhouse, 1983; see also
Ashton & Watson, 1998). However, maintaining a neutral position is also prob-
lematic in many ways. First, it fails to draw students’ attention to the outrageous-
ness of certain views (e.g., that the Holocaust or the Nanking Massacre did not
happen or racism should be justified). Second, it undermines the teacher’s role
and responsibility as a model for making informed judgments. Third, it can fall
into absolute moral relativism as discussed earlier (Ashton & Watson, 1998). Most
of all, “do not take a position” is as dogmatic as the “privilege” approach and
impossible to achieve in many circumstances. In fact, many authors in this dis-
cussion consider complete neutrality to be undesirable (Ashton & Watson, 1998;
Cotton, 2006; Dewhurst, 1992; Hitchings, 2011; Kelly, 1986; Oulton, Day, Dil-
lon, & Grace, 2004; Oulton, Dillon, & Grace, 2004). Nonetheless, the teacher’s
204 Ryuko Kubota
taking a position, either implicit or explicit, does not necessarily encourage stu-
dents with strong opinions to consider opposite perspectives (Cotton, 2006).
This implies the importance of deeper engagement in knowledge construction
for various positions in the controversy, which I discuss in the next section.
In critical CBI, a teacher’s selection of instructional topics and materials sig-
nals a certain position that the teacher supports, as in the case of “Memories
of War” and the TESL methods course. The selection of topics and materi-
als in a “privilege” approach to teaching is justified by the argument that the
mainstream instructional approach also imposes a dominant position, which can
be counterbalanced by critical perspectives (Benesch, 2001; Kincheloe, 2005).
Nonetheless, a teacher’s disclosure of her ideological position, coupled with an
inescapable power disparity between her and her students, is likely to lead to
imposition. Pessoa and Urzêda Freitas (2012) indeed observed a sense of imposi-
tion of progressive ideas on race, gender, sexuality, and other diversity taught
by a white male teacher in an English as a foreign language class in Brazil, even
though some students raised their critical awareness of these issues.
All in all, teacher neutrality has some educational merits for democratic and
constructivist learning, but it also poses realistic difficulties and pedagogical and
moral undesirability. In a critical pedagogical approach, together with its ten-
dency to favor a single-sided instructional focus, resistance to teacher neutrality
risks conceptual imposition.
Problems of Imposition
In critical CBI or critically teaching about controversial issues, a balanced and
neutral manner of presenting the content tends to be compromised. This was
the case in my teaching in “Memories of War” and the TESL methods course,
in which the victimizer perspectives on selected issues were highlighted. The
selection of instructional topics itself was based on a certain ideological posi-
tion. While such an approach does not completely shut down free exchanges of
opinion in the classroom as some students may disagree with a position presented
(e.g., Benesch, 2001), students would typically accept the content and arguments
presented by their teacher because of the institutional relation of power.
In fact, decentering the teacher’s power allows more open discussion. For
instance, Benesch (2012) took a stance of friendship with students, rather than
an overtly antiwar activist stance, in her college ESL reading class to explore
whether the college should be allowed to bar military recruiters from cam-
pus. Providing a balanced view, where students were invited to respond to the
pro and con essays published on campus, and engaging students in discussion
on a question generated by a student, rather than disclosing her own position,
Benesch (2012) observed a range of opinions expressed by students. In teaching
“Memories of War,” students’ more honest opinions seemed to emerge when I
completely relinquished control, sitting back in silence, and let students develop
their own discussion questions on their reading and engage in a discussion mod-
erated by a peer. However, this approach can be problematic as it prevents inter-
ventions by the teacher, who is the most intellectually experienced member of
the classroom (Ashton & Watson, 1998). Although a teacher of critical CBI, or
any other approach, will not remain neutral in selecting instructional topics and
materials, procedural neutrality (Stenhouse, 1983) is necessary at times to foster
students’ intellectual development through autonomous learning.
Decentering teacher authority would supposedly avoid teacher imposition.
But how much decentering is actually possible? Attempting to establish friend-
ship with students, as described by Benesch (2012), echoes feminist pedagogy,
which promotes “noncoercive, nonhierarchical, ‘open’ and ‘equitable’ relations
with students” (Luke, 1996, p. 292). However, no matter how much women
teachers seek egalitarian relationships, they cannot escape the institutional and
authoritative power that they exercise in making instructional decisions, judging
students’ academic performance, writing recommendations, and so on (Gore,
1993; Luke, 1996). Just as feminist pedagogy is contradictory (Luke, 1996), criti-
cal pedagogy’s attempt to decenter to avoid imposition is likewise deceptive.
Teacher authority obviously influences students’ academic performance.
Teachers are gratified when their students begin to adopt a more critical lens at
the end of the semester. However, what is often not known to teachers is whether
such students have genuinely raised their critical consciousness or are simply
displaying new knowledge, feeling compelled unconsciously or consciously to
adopt the ideas endorsed by their teacher. Thus, what students say or write may
simply reflect “a masquerade of ostensibly ‘authentic’ voice and knowledge”
(Luke, 1996, p. 297). Even students who have begun to think like their teacher
may not be able to articulate the conceptual foundation of criticality unless they
have unpacked the political and ideological underpinnings and ramifications of
divergent ideas—a point raised in the debate on presenting balanced views in
the classroom.
These observations suggest that critical teaching in second/foreign language
classrooms coincides with teacher’s power used on the pretext of emancipation,
empowerment, and social transformation, potentially leading to the indoctrina-
tion of learners into progressive ways of thinking. Along the same line, feminist
teachers such as Ellsworth (1989) and Gore (1993) have critiqued the problem
of the authoritative and repressive nature of critical pedagogy that can silence
certain groups of students. In a language classroom that enrolls students from
diverse cultural, racial, and religious backgrounds, the teacher’s belief often
clashes with the students’, requiring the teacher to tactically negotiate difference
(e.g., Appleby, 2009; Nelson, 2009).
Critical CBI indeed can create a contentious pedagogical space with a danger
of imposition, disagreement, and impasse. I say this critique not from an ideo-
logically centrist position (e.g., Santos, 2001) but as a critical practitioner who
is concerned about the ultimate outcomes of our approach—whether it fosters
206 Ryuko Kubota
future citizens who can think critically to seek social justice or who display a
superficial belief seduced by the teacher’s authority. Furthermore, imposition can
occur with fellow professionals—even those who embrace critical pedagogy—
when rationalist assumptions become an essentialist position (Ellsworth, 1989;
Gore, 1993; Luke, 1996) or a regime of truth (Foucault, 1980), exerting repressive
power to silence other views, including criticisms from within.
While the existing institutional arrangement inevitably creates imposition, a
poststructuralist approach can provide teachers with an alternative tool to engage
students in a deeper intellectual exploration by allowing a space for discussing
multiple perspectives. Although this approach still poses challenges as discussed
next, it is worth considering in teaching critical CBI.
Poststructuralist Approach to Critical CBI:

Possibilities and Challenges
Poststructuralism shares a postmodern skepticism against modernist essentialism
that views various categories in our culture as monolithic, static, and inorganic
and instead offers such concepts as performativity, hybridity, and diaspora (Mor-
gan, 2007). Influenced by Foucauldian philosophy, knowledge or a regime of
truth is viewed as constructed by discourses that are produced, altered, or erased
in manifold relations of power, rather than existing a priori. Thus, knowledge is
produced in struggles for power, which is not only possessed but circulates and is
exercised (Foucault, 1980). The application of poststructuralist understanding of
knowledge production to classroom teaching (Andreotti, 2011 on teaching about
global issues; Nelson, 2009 on queer theory) is useful for overcoming some of the
difficulties discussed so far.
A poststructuralist approach to critical CBI encourages teachers and students
to explore how knowledge is socially, culturally, historically, and politically
constructed based on the understanding of knowledge as “contingent, partial,
and provisional” (Andreotti, 2011, p. 192). It unpacks what symbolic meanings
are attached to our knowledge; how such knowledge has been constructed;
and how the knowledge has individual, institutional, and social impact. In a
poststructuralist approach informed by queer theory, for instance, teaching
about homosexuality shifts its focus from a rights-based gay-inclusive agenda
to a “discourse inquiry approach” (Nelson, 2009, p. 210)—an approach that
rejects the essentialist understanding of gender and sexuality as fixed categori-
cal facts waiting to be learned. It instead examines how discursive meanings
of all sexual identities are socially constructed through media, education, and
everyday interactions, and problematizes the knowledge that legitimates cul-
tural normativity. Nelson (2009) contrasts this approach with “a controversies
approach” of debating whether one should acknowledge homosexuality and
argues that such a debate runs a risk of essentializing gay identity as a homo-
geneous category.
For primary and secondary school teachers in the United Kingdom who
teach about global issues on environment, poverty, development, and so forth,
Andreotti (2011) developed the Open Spaces for Dialogue and Enquiry (OSDE)
Methodology. Conceptualizing knowledge as a discursive product, OSDE
assumes that all knowledge is partial, unfinished, and thus subject to scrutiny.
By raising questions, OSDE offers a structured approach to engage students in
exploration of how people arrive at a particular point of view: How can a certain
statement be interpreted differently in different contexts? What assumptions are
behind the statements? What could shape a certain understanding of a real-
ity? Who decides what is real and who benefits from the judgment? What are
the limitations and contradictions of a perspective? Whose interests are repre-
sented in the statement? The goal is not to reach a consensus or to determine the
right answer but rather to analyze the production of meaning (Andreotti, 2011;
Andreotti, Barker, & Newell-Jones, n.d.). In addressing ethical problems arising
from social and cultural values, OSDE employs contextual relativism. Unlike
absolute relativism, which traps people in moral universalism, contextual relativ-
ism allows teachers and students to “engage with the existing rules of knowledge
production in different contexts and to perceive these rules as heterogeneous and
conflictual, provisional, and historically, culturally, socially, and politically situ-
ated” (Andreotti, 2011, p. 213).
Poststructuralist inquiry approaches would encourage teachers of critical
CBI to unpack various competing views by examining the diverse knowledge
reflected in teaching materials and students’ voices. However, unresolved ques-
tions remain: How should teachers approach seemingly outrageous or illegiti-
mate opinions? Should they be still unpacked? How can unpacking be done
without falling into moral relativism? Although contextual relativism or peda-
gogical situatedness is essential (Benesch, 2001; Pennycook, 2001), how does it
work in practice? Just as a form of critical pedagogy may be critiqued as dog-
matic, repressive, and privileging rational assumptions, postcolonial theory, some
of which resonates with the poststructuralist thought, has been critiqued for an
elitist tendency to overlook the realities faced by subalterns in the Third World
(e.g., Ahmad, 1992; Dirlik, 1994; Moore-Gilbert, 1997; Sethi, 2011). Can the
rationalist unpacking of knowledge informed by poststructuralism concur with
confronting unjust ideas and practices, such as racism, sexism, homophobia, and
xenophobia? How can we draw a line between absolute relativism and contex-
tual relativism? There are still questions that need to be explored.
Conclusion
Reflecting on my own teaching of “Memories of War” and the TESL methods
course, the critical awareness of victimizer’s responsibility that I wanted to foster
among students was motivated by a “privilege” approach that critical pedagogy
tends to rely on. I created little space for discussing and unpacking opposing
208 Ryuko Kubota
ideas. An exploration of the scholarly literature on teaching about controversial

issues and a poststructualist approach to pedagogy provided me with an alterna-
tive that allows more space for accepting divergent views for unpacking their
discursive meanings and examining the mechanisms of knowledge construction.
Specifically, I could have included materials that convey ideologically oppos-
ing views and asked questions that would unpack knowledge production for
all points of view. I would still disclose my position but would employ strategic
neutrality (Hitchings, 2011) on certain topics to encourage students’ expression
of ideas. Whether, when, or how harmful views expressed by students should
be pointed out as unacceptable is an unresolved question for me. However, in
practicing an inquiry-based approach of questioning and unpacking, I should be
careful not to become entrenched in a logocentric pursuit of knowledge decon-
struction only.
In this regard, it is useful for both teachers and students to pay attention to the
affective dimensions of challenging issues. Employing imagination to try to feel
what it is like to be in an opposing position (Dewhurst, 1992), critical affirmation
for fostering the attitude of openness and tolerance (Ashton & Watson, 1998),
and hyper-self-reflexivity (Kapoor, 2004) for movable praxis (Pennycook, 2001) is
essential for critically committed teaching for social justice. Teaching critical
CBI has great potential for raising students’ critical awareness of challenging
issues. It can also help both teachers and students learn to unpack how knowl-
edge supporting different positions is produced, maintained, or transformed and
to employ empathy, openness, and tolerance when confronting ideas different
from our own.
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PART 4
Exemplars of Cognitively
Engaging Curriculum
Planning for the Foreign
Language Classroom
10
LE MAINE FRANCOPHONE
An Expeditionary Unit Targeting the
Development of Higher-Order
Thinking Skills
Francis J. Troyan
Introduction
The integration of non-linguistic content as an important goal in foreign lan-
guage (FL) education is an agenda that naturally calls for the use of alternative
curricular approaches, which could allow teachers to expose learners to meaningful
content while helping them develop proficiency in the target language (e.g.,
Cammarata, 2009, 2010; Tedick & Cammarata, 2012). In essence, the exploration
of alternative approaches to curriculum design such as content-based instruc-
tion (CBI) and project-based learning (PBL) could help transcend the language-
content divide (Tedick & Walker, 1994) facilitating the concurrent teaching of
both language and content. Moreover, a CBI approach aligns with the goals
of standards-driven initiatives that have influenced curriculum and instruc-
tion in FL education. For instance, the Standards for Foreign Language Learning
in the 21st Century (National Standards in Foreign Language Education Proj-
ect [NSFLEP], 2006) in the United States, promote the integration of content
through the Connections goal area, which states that students will “reinforce
and further their knowledge of other disciplines through the foreign language”
(Standard 3.1). The National Standards, as a guide in the development of FL
curriculum, provide additional justification within the field for overcoming the
language-content divide:
The National Standards—a consensus regarding what is believed should

guide curricular choices rather than a prescriptive agenda to promote
school reform—call for the integration of particular content (e.g., cultural
content or content that is linked to other disciplines) into foreign lan-
guage instruction and make a case for developing educational experiences
that are not dissociated from the learners’ world and their experience of
it. . . . The call for language and content integration in the National Stan-
dards can also be interpreted as a clear movement against the division that
has traditionally existed between language and content, which continues
to dominate the field of language education.
(Tedick & Cammarata, 2010, pp. 246–247)
The National Standards organize the outcomes for language learning accord-
ing to five goal areas: Communication, Cultures, Connections, Comparisons,
and Communities. Representing a shift in the traditional paradigm for language
learning, which focused primarily on decontextualized instruction of language
forms, the National Standards (NSFLEP, 2006) included language, cultural
knowledge, and disciplinary content in an expanded definition of the content
of the FL curriculum. This expansion of “content” in the National Standards to
specifically include other subject areas and critical thinking skills has created a
need for the use of instructional approaches that can integrate content and lan-
guage in ways that promote critical thinking, reflection, and inquiry within the
context of learning an FL.
Other initiatives have enhanced the objectives of standards-based FL learning
movement by infusing so-called twenty-first century skills into FL education.
These initiatives, such as The Partnership for 21 Century Skills (2011), for example,
seek to integrate the knowledge the skills necessary for learning and work in the
twenty-first century. As an illustration of the core competencies, the Partnership
for 21st Century Skills (2011) suggests that FL learning must provide students
with opportunities to develop
• visual and information literacy

• cultural literacy and global awareness
• curiosity, creativity, and risk-taking
• higher-order thinking and sound reasoning
• teaming and collaboration
• interactive communication
• effective use of real-world tools
• life and career skills.
In addition to developing students’ critical skills for learning, working, and liv-
ing in the twenty-first century, FL education plays a vital role in helping students
develop “translingual and transcultural competence,” which has been defined as
the capacity to function across languages and cultures (Modern Language Asso-
ciation, 2007). In essence, the National Standards, the Partnership for 21st Cen-
tury Skills, and the MLA Report call for the use of instructional approaches that
integrate the teaching of both language and content to achieve the goals articu-
lated in these policy documents. For this reason, CBI is a logical choice as an
approach that can operationalize in classroom instruction of FL the principles
Le Maine Francophone 217
described in these frameworks. However, despite these calls in the field for new
approaches to instruction in the FL classroom, few models exist that put CBI
into action in FL settings. In light of this need for approaches to instruction
to overcome the language-content divide, engage students in critical thinking,
and develop their awareness of translingual and transcultural competence, this
chapter describes a hybrid approach to curriculum design that combines the fol-
lowing into one instructional framework:
• The Expeditionary Learning (EL) curricular model that fosters inquiry and
reflection in the core content areas;
• A CBI curricular model used to ensure a balance between content and lan-
guage in instruction, a key to make the EL framework compatible with FL
instruction; and
• The National Standards goals for content and language integration in the FL
classroom.
The proposed approach, referred to as EL-CBI, provides a concrete example of

how FL teachers can actualize the principles and practices espoused in the stan-
dards through the merging of CBI with an inquiry approach to learning. This
inquiry approach creates a stimulating learning environment that maximizes
students’ motivation to learn and develop their critical thinking skills through
engagement in “learning by doing” (Dewey, 1916, 1929).
Background
What Is Expeditionary Learning?

Expeditionary Learning is a model of school reform that features learning
expeditions (commonly referred to as “expeditions”) as the primary way of
organizing the curriculum. Expeditions are long-term, inquiry-based instruc-
tion units that are designed according to backward design principles (e.g.,
Wiggins & McTighe, 2005). Students construct deep understandings of con-
tent through investigations that are guided by essential questions. To dem-
onstrate their learning, they create products for real audiences that integrate
interdisciplinary content (Expeditionary Learning, 2014). In this way, the EL
approach is highly compatible with the objectives articulated in the National
Standards to expand the view of content to include other disciplines articulated
in the Connections goal area of the standards (National Standards in Foreign
Language Education, 2006). Furthermore, given the EL focus on authentic
learning in the community, the model is also particularly well adapted to tar-
get the Communities goal area, recently referred to as “The Lost C” because it
is most commonly absent from FL curricula at the K–12 level (Troyan, 2012;
Troyan & Cammarata, 2014).
The organization that is EL today began in the early 1990s as the Outward
Bound urban education initiative, which sought to create and sustain insti-
tutional change rooted in the philosophies of Outward Bound Europe and
Outward Bound USA (Farrell, 2000). Among the philosophies promoted and
advanced by Outward Bound’s founder, Kurt Hahn, were the development of
core character traits, such as confidence, tenacity, and perseverance, in addi-
tion to service to community. Expeditionary Learning Schools (EL) infused the
principles of Outward Bound into a model of reform for entire school communi-
ties. The motto “We are Crew, not passengers” (Expeditionary Learning, 2014)
encapsulates the school-wide approach to creating a learning community that is
collaborative and reflective, and views service as an essential component of the
learning experience.
EL in Action: The Human Face of Human Rights

In an EL school, learning expeditions are organized as a series of case studies.
Each case study is composed of smaller phases while, at the same time, function-
ing as a phase of the larger expedition (See Figure 10.1 for an illustration).
The case studies move the student through the phases of an expedition:
Immersion, Building Background Knowledge, Investigation, and Culmination.
In the Immersion phase, students are immersed in a topic to get a sense of its
breadth and depth. Students find immediate engagement through mystery texts,
gallery walks, and fieldwork. During the Building Background Knowledge
phase, students deepen and refine their knowledge of a subject in order to address
a guiding question. Students use primary sources, fieldwork, experts, and case
studies to expand their knowledge base. Through investigation, students work
independently or in small groups to develop expertise on a specific subtopic
that explores the guiding question. The expedition ends with the Culmination
phase where students come together to share their understanding in an authentic,
meaningful way. Culminating events usually involve a synthesizing presentation
designed to include those impacted by the results of the students’ exploration.
The products shared are designed to address a need, offer solutions, and give back
to the community. To exemplify learning in an EL school, an example from a
humanities expedition taught in an EL high school entitled The Human Face of
Human Rights is described. This humanities expedition, which was taught in
English, informed the design of the French expedition and the EL-CBI model
that will be described later in the chapter.
The core of the expedition The Human Face of Human Rights lasted from
December through April and was focused on the development of human rights
by answering the guiding question How Should Members of Society Identify and
Treat the “Other”? The academic year began with a case study of the atrocities of
Rwanda, and was followed by a broad overview of the key events that occurred
in the two world wars, the formation of the United Nations, and the concept of
Expedition Topic/s: School/Grade:
Long-Term Learning Targets:
Guiding Question/s:
Case Study Case Study Case Study
Project Project Project
Product: Product: Product:
Final Product:
Culminating Event:
Expeditionary Learning 2011
FIGURE 10.1 Expedition planning template, reproduced by permission of Expeditionary Learning.

human rights versus civil rights. Through the in-depth case study of Rwanda,
students conducted extensive research projects and wrote research papers captur-
ing the geography, politics, government, economics, and culture of the region
and how this crisis occurred. Once students had developed the necessary back-
ground knowledge, they began in-depth investigations into a human rights
crisis, most commonly genocide, which affected current residents of Portland,
Maine. Among the national origins represented were residents of the city who
were refugees from Rwanda, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, to
name a few.
Throughout the expedition, the humanities teachers partnered with a local
institute for documentary studies to teach students the skills necessary to complete
their projects. Experts from the institute taught lessons in class on interviewing
and photography and assisted the teachers in building the skills necessary for the
students to conduct interviews and represent the experiences of their interview-
ees in original video documentaries. Based on the case studies of human rights
crises that the class had conducted throughout the year and their interviews
with local subjects, students designed documentary panels that represented the
experiences of those community members interviewed. At the end of the year,
the expedition culminated in a public documentary exhibit at the institute for
documentary studies. Through the learning activities in this expedition con-
ducted in English, the students were engaged in authentic documentary work
for a public audience and with a meaningful purpose that reflected the work of
documentarians. Meanwhile, they were developing skills that they would revisit
in the French learning expedition for which the EL-CBI model was designed.
Linking EL and CBI in the FL Classroom

The EL-CBI approach originated from a collaborative research project between
the author, a veteran K–12 French language teacher working at an Expedition-
ary Learning school at the time, and Laurent Cammarata, a university researcher
whose work centered around the development and implementation of content-
based curricula. We were interested in developing a model that could merge
CBI and the EL model to help better integrate language and content in the K–12
classroom. Alone, the EL model provided a curricular framework for teachers to
organize the exploration of content knowledge, helping them sequence content
into inquiry modules called expeditions. However, it lacked a framework to guide
language teachers in the design of language instruction; that is, teachers were left
alone to decide what language to teach and when within that context. In CBI,
by contrast, meaning and form are both treated as primary instructional goals
(Gibbons, 2002). It is a curricular and instructional approach whose goal is the
concurrent mastery of content learning and language learning (e.g., Cammarata,
2009, 2010; Met, 1999). For this reason, we viewed CBI as the ideal curricular
companion in the addressing of language in FL instruction in the EL context. This

led us to the development of the hybrid EL-CBI curricular model described next
designed to fulfill the EL mission while concurrently helping students develop
proficiency in the target language within that context.
EL-CBI in Action: An Expedition on Francophone Maine

In the EL-CBI model, EL serves as a framework to guide the selection and
sequencing of content knowledge while CBI serves as a planning framework to
ensure that both language and content instructional objectives will be targeted
at once within the context of EL instruction. For our project, we adapted the
CBI unit/lesson templates developed for the Content Based Language Teach-
ing with Technology (CoBaLTT) Project1 at the Center for Applied Research
in Language Acquisition (CARLA) because this planning model had already
been piloted/field tested by many teachers with success (for concrete illustra-
tions, see Cammarata & Tedick, 2007). To exemplify EL-CBI and the ways in
which it promotes higher-order thinking skills, an expedition called Le Maine
Francophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui (Francophone Maine: Yesterday and Today) is
described.
The Francophone Maine expedition was designed and implemented in a com-
bined French 3 and 4 classroom in an EL high school. At the time of this work
during the spring of 2008, the Franco-American community was in the midst
of reclaiming its cultural and linguistic identity, which was evident in a series
of ongoing events and the overall heritage language movement in the state of
Maine. To assist in this effort, the student-developed products in this expedi-
tion documented the Franco-American experience and shared the experience
with the community. In contrast to the Human Face of Human Rights exam-
ple described earlier, the expedition in the French classroom was conducted in
French, the target language of instruction. Thus, the work of this expedition met
a mutual need of the Franco-American community and the high school French
curriculum in the EL high school. In other words, the Franco-American experi-
ence provided the compelling community-based content that EL calls for while
the students’ projects provided a service to the Franco-American community
in that they documented, validated, and made visible the familial stories of the
individuals interviewed. The Francophone Maine expedition spanned a period of
six months and was divided into three extended case study units that culminated
in an exhibit at the Franco-American community center for an audience at the
center’s monthly gathering, which was conducted entirely in French. In line
with the standards-based goals of the curriculum, the project with the Franco-
American community allowed for the design of a FL expedition that integrated
language, content, and engagement with the community in a variety of ways
and across the stages of the expedition.
CASE STUDY #1—IMMERSION AND BUILDING

BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE
The first case study completed by students within the context of the EL
expedition described here was oriented around the overarching question
What is the Franco-American Experience? and included the Immersion and
Building Background Knowledge phases that typically make up the begin-
ning of any expedition. The goal of the inquiry in this case study was to
familiarize students with the overall content; the broader Franco-American
experience in Acadia, New England, and Louisiana; and the role of local
Franco-American communities in that historical context. Alongside that
overarching goal, this case study prepared the students to travel to the
local Franco-American community center where they each met a Franco-
American and were immersed in an interaction in French. The intention of
this initial interaction was to allow the student and the Franco-American
to get to know one another. It was also meant to allow the student to col-
lect some general information about the Franco-American and to build
essential background knowledge about the content. To prepare for the
initial interview with the Franco-American subject, Lesson 2 of this case
study engaged students in mock interviews in class. Each student was
assigned an identity as either the interviewer or the subject. The inter-
viewer’s task was to ascertain descriptive information about the subject’s
family, life, and work. Through the mock interview, the teacher identified
which students were ready for the one-on-one interview and those who
needed further development before the interview. In terms of language,
the students reviewed introductions, simple questions, family vocabulary,
polite expressions, and so on essential when one meets a new person for
the first time. Lesson 3, described in detail in Appendix 10B, involved the
actual travel to the Franco-American community center for the interviews.
In Lesson 4, the class session following the interviews, students used the
information collected from the interview to make comparisons between
the Franco-Americans they interviewed and the themes encountered in
the film Réveil that they viewed in Lesson 1 of the case study. After this
initial introduction to the topic and the people living the experience, the
learning activity shifted to Investigation.
CASE STUDY #2—INVESTIGATION

During the investigation phase of Le Maine Francophone, students were
engaged in inquiry in which they discovered the major themes in the
history of Franco-Americans in the region, such as the immigration of
Franco-Americans to the region, the discrimination that they faced once

in Maine, and the role of the French language in their lives today (i.e., the
revitalization movement that the community was experiencing at the time
of the project). As they learned about the historical content, they returned
monthly to the Franco-American community center to engage in dialogue
with their assigned Franco-American partner and learn about their family
history as it related to the particular historical theme being studied. Through
these interactions, students developed expertise on the lived experience
of the Franco-American history through the stories shared by their Franco-
American partner during the interactions. In terms of language objectives,
while interpreting the Franco-American stories and synthesizing their own
versions of the Franco-American experience, students applied the passé
composé and imparfait, as well as context-specific vocabulary to depict life
in Lewiston, for example. The data gathered by students during investiga-
tion became the content that informed their work in Case Study #3.
CASE STUDY #3—CULMINATION

The Culmination phase in this expedition consisted of an Integrated Per-
formance Assessment (IPA) designed specifically for CBI that assessed con-
tent, language, and academic literacy.2 A typical IPA focuses mainly on the
assessment of the three modes of communication—interpretive, interper-
sonal, and presentational—by engaging students in communicative tasks
in each of the modes. The IPA-KF integrates content understanding and the
linguistic representation of content understanding of text(s) created in IPA
task to enhance the traditional focus on the communicative modes.
In the interpretive task, students were prompted to view footage from
a video documentary of Franco-American residents of the town of Water-
ville, Maine, and summarize their understanding of the video excerpts.
Using the information gained in this interpretive task, students proceeded
to the interpersonal task. This task was the fifth of the five interviews with
the Franco-American community member. For the presentational task,
students were prompted to prepare a final documentary panel that syn-
thesized their learning about the Franco-American experience through the
life and story of their assigned Franco-American subject. The students pre-
sented their documentary panels at a culminating event, which consisted
of an exhibit at the Franco-American community center, where the stu-
dents and the Franco-Americans gathered to view and celebrate the work
representing the Franco-American experience.
Promoting Higher-Order Thinking

Given that the development of critical thinking is at the core of both EL and
CBI, the development of advanced thinking skills is also a primary aim of
the EL-CBI hybrid curricular approach. According to Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy
(Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001), activities that promote the use and development
of higher-order thinking skills are those that require students to analyze, evaluate,
and create. Analyzing requires students to make information comprehensible by
dividing it into consumable parts. Evaluating involves judging material against
specific criteria or standards. Creating calls for the development of original ideas
based on the combination of previous ideas, information, and critical think-
ing. Together, these higher-order thinking skills represent what Anderson and
Krathwohl (2001) refer to as divergent thinking. Through the identification of
overarching questions and “big ideas” (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005), the EL-CBI
approach to planning promotes the overlapping of different types of thinking,
that is, both higher-order and lower-order thinking skills (i.e., remembering,
understanding, and applying) in learning activities.
For instance, Lesson 3 provides a good illustration of how the EL-CBI frame-
work can stimulate the development of higher-order thinking skills. To compare
and contrast the experiences described in the film Reveil and those of the sub-
ject interviewed, students must begin to understand the nature of the Franco-
American’s experience, evaluate it, and compare it to other experiences. Another
example of higher-order thinking skills is articulated in the description of the
culminating documentary panel and exhibit. In the description, the verbs “cre-
ate” and “synthesize” signal the expectation that students need to engage in criti-
cal thinking to complete the task. Similarly, the rubric for content understanding
for this documentary panel (see Troyan, Chapter 7, this volume, Appendix 10B)
includes verbs such as “evaluate.” Finally, students must think critically about the
content-specific language and make context-appropriate choices regarding how
to organize and represent their content understanding.
Student Reflection on the Learning Experience

Reflection is a core practice embedded in the EL school culture (Expeditionary
Learning, 2014) and therefore in EL-CBI. Reflection occurs at multiple points
during an expedition: at the end of lessons, during formative and summative
assessments, and at the end of a school year. Through the use of structures and
protocols, teachers provide time for students to reflect on their individual and
collective progress in public and private spaces.3 Such reflective practice is com-
mon in experiential learning. For example, Kolb (1984) described an experiential
learning cycle that moves students through four stages: (1) concrete experience,
(2) observations and reflections, (3) formation of abstract concepts and gener-
alizations, and (4) testing implications of concepts in new situations. When it
comes to the EL-CBI hybrid curricular model, reflection offers a space for the
explicit identification of the interdisciplinary connections and for the develop-
ment of students’ awareness of their learning of core content understanding (i.e.,
the content of science, humanities, mathematics) through the FL. For example,
when students were prompted to reflect on such interdisciplinary connections,
one student wrote:
So far this project we are currently working on in French Class reminds

me a lot of the Human Face of Human Rights Project that we worked for
a long time on last year in Humanities. I enjoyed the Humanities Project
last year, and . . . I am also enjoying the interview process accompanied
with this project.
The student clearly sees the link between the knowledge, interview skills, and
documentary work of the Humanities Expedition, The Human Face of Human
Rights, and the expedition in French class. In fact, the skills and structures from
that expedition served as scaffolding for this expedition in the Franco-American
community. Another student reflected on her growing knowledge awareness of
the evolving relationships between the students and Franco-Americans through
the inquiry:
I am enjoying this project very much. . . . I absolutely LOVE going up

to the Franco-American town and meeting the adorable old people who
really enjoy telling us their story. They’re not afraid to tell us things and I
really think that’s great because a lot of negative things happened to them.
I also appreciate the respect between the two age groups. The teens are
respecting the older folk and they’re respecting us, which is hard to find
these days.
This student was clearly cognizant of the power of the intergenerational relation-
ships that were developing as a result of the project. Some of those bonds that
developed during the project were so significant that some students maintained
contact with the Franco-Americans well beyond the work of the expedition.
Finally, reflection mediated the development of certain students’ identities as
members of the Franco-American community:
I did not know anything about Franco-Americans, except for the fact that
my grandfather is French-Canadian. But I didn’t know anything about his
family history at all. So everything I’ve learned in our studies has been new
information to me.
Beyond the insights students gained into the connections to other content areas,
the relationships that they were building in the community, and insights they
gained on their own identities, students developed their ability to use language
across the contexts and, in fact, looked for opportunities to use this language skill
in novel ways. One student, for instance, created a music video about the Franco-
American experience instead of creating a documentary panel. The music video,
titled “La Survivance (The Survival),” depicted—through words and historical
and contemporary images of the town—the experience of a Franco-American
family that was simultaneously unique and representative of the collective
experience.
This “alternative” culminating product proposed by the student demonstrated
the student’s use of language to represent his understanding of the content in a
creative format. Overall, in addition to learning language and content, as this
student’s experience revealed, the EL-CBI approach facilitated deeper reflection
on their identities within their school, their communities, and their families.
Conclusion
This chapter has presented a framework for the integration of content and lan-
guage within an inquiry-based approach to instructional design called Expedi-
tionary Learning. To increase the potential for FL education to play an important
role in the concurrent development of advanced thinking skills and language
proficiency, the EL framework for planning was combined with the CBI cur-
ricular approach using the CoBaLTT Project planning tools to develop EL-CBI.
The example presented highlighted the potential of EL-CBI to engage students
in inquiry that promotes the authentic use of language in the discovery of com-
pelling content, while deepening their understanding of themselves as learners
and as community members. Such an approach in the FL classroom is important
because it not only addresses the often underrepresented aspects of the National
Standards but also, congruent with theme of this volume, can help to facili-
tate the development of critical thinking and content-specific literacy skills. As
a general framework for the implementation of CBI in the FL classroom, the
EL-CBI approach provides a practical planning model to identify compelling
content, design units of inquiry, and, if possible, integrate community connec-
tions. EL-CBI holds great potential to help FL teachers transform their curricu-
lum into an engaging, content-rich experience that facilitates authentic use of
language beyond the walls of the classroom.
Notes
1. For more information, see the CoBaLTT website: http://www.carla.umn.edu/cobaltt/
index.html
2. This IPA-KF and the criteria for the assessment of content understanding are depicted
in Chapter 7 of this volume.
3. For an extended example of such reflection in an FL classroom in an EL school, see
Adair-Hauck and Troyan (2013).
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APPENDIX 10A
EL-CBI Planning Template
Guiding Questions and Goals

Guiding Question: What is the nature of the Franco-American Experience?
Projected time frame: 3 months
Case Study #1
Overarching Question: What is the history of Franco-Americans in Maine?
Lesson #1: Lesson #2: Lesson #3:
Content obj.: identify Content obj.: identify Content obj.: understand
major themes in the the key components of a the variety of experiences
Franco-American Experi- good interview aiming at that exist within the
ence in Maine: Immigra- unveiling the life-stories personal histories that
tion, Discrimination, of individuals being comprise the Franco-
French Today interviewed. American experience;
Language obj.: Use past Language obj.: Review assess whether the
tense to summarize events introductions, simple Franco-American subject’s
questions, family vocab., experience is representative
Text utilized: The film
polite expressions, etc. of the experience
Réveil by Ben Levine
essential when one meets articulated in the film
someone for the first time Réveil.
by engaging in a role play Language obj.: Using
to simulate the interview. appropriate comparative
Text utilized: N/A expressions
Text utilized: Interview
with Subject in Lewiston,
Maine
(Lesson #3 is described
in Appendix 10B.)
Assessment: Write a short story about the major events in the Franco-American
history in Maine.
Case Study #2
Overarching Question: Where did the Franco-Americans in Maine come from?
Lesson#1: From where? Lesson#2: Why? Lesson#3: How was life
in Maine?
Content obj.: identify Content obj.: identify Content obj.: identify
from which parts of reasons for which people aspects of life in Lewiston,
Canada the Franco- emigrated from Québec to Maine including
Americans came Lewiston, Maine including - the neighborhood
Language obj.: use the - the terribly difficult in which Franco-
passé composé and conditions in Québec Americans lived
imparfait to recount why - the availability of work - the places where they
people emigrated from in New England worked
Québec to Lewiston. Language obj.: Language obj.:
Text utilized: Frenette, - use vocabulary/ - use vocabulary/
Yves. “La genèse d’une expressions to extract expressions to interpret
communauté canadienne- information from a information from a text
francaise en nouvelle- text to learn about the to learn about life in
angleterre: Lewiston, situation in Québec. Lewiston.
Maine, 1800–1880.” (mai - use vocabulary/ - use vocabulary/
1988). Thèse présentée expressions to describe expressions to describe
à l’Ecole des gradués de the situation in Québec. life in Lewiston.
l’Université Laval pour Text utilized: Frenette Text utilized: historical
l’obtention du grade maps of Lewiston used
de Philosophe Doctor in information-gap
(Ph.D.), Faculté des activities.
Lettres, Université Laval,
Québec.
Assessment: Integrated Performance Assessment: 1. Immigrant Role Play
(Interpersonal Task) 2. CBC Broadcast Les Franco-Américains du Maine
(Interpretive Task) 3. PowerPoint Presentation (Presentational Task)
Case Study #3—Culminating Integrated Performance Assessment

Overarching Question: Who are the Franco-Americans in Maine?
1. CBC Broadcast Les Franco-Américains du Maine (Interpretive Task)
2. Final Subject Interview (Interpersonal Task)
3. Documentary Panel for the culminating event (Presentational Task)—a
documentary exhibit at the Franco-American Heritage Center in Lewiston,
Maine—will tell the story of Franco-American History through the experience
of the 15–20 individuals that students will have interviewed. The documentary
panel that they create will synthesize their learning during the expedition,
including the five sessions that students have with the Franco-American subjects.
The expedition will allow students to know their experience and, through the
documentary products, help to pass on the Franco-Americans’ legacies.
APPENDIX 10B
EL-CBI Lesson Template
Case Study #1, Lesson 3—Immersion
Interviews at the Franco-American Community Center
French 3/4
Content
Students will:
• identify the role of French in their Franco-American subject’s life.

• identify the major themes in the Franco-American experience in Maine:
Immigration, Discrimination, French Today.
Culture
Students will:
• compare and contrast the experiences of their own Franco-American subject

with the experiences of other students’ Franco-American subjects.
Language
Students will:
• use a wide array of expressions and questions to gather information from

their subjects concerning family.
° Bonjour, Je m’appelle, Comment allez-vous, etc.

° Where were you born?
° Does your family regularly speak French?
° When does the family speak French (what is the role of French in the family)?
° Other appropriate questions you’d like to ask in French.
Students will:
• use the present, passé composé and imparfait tenses to summarize details
about themselves.
• use the present, passé composé and imparfait tenses to refer to a previous
comment prior to asking a new question.
• recycle expressions for circumlocution, such as C’est un synonyme de, C’est une
personne qui in order to convey meaning of unknown terms.
Learning Strategies
Students will:
• work cooperatively before going to the interview to brainstorm prior

knowledge and to predict some of the language needed for the conversation.
• summarize the data collected.
Time Frame
Two 80-minute blocks
Materials Needed
Interview Notes Sheet
Blue Reflection Sheet
Pre-task Activities
On the bus to Lewiston, with the assistance of the teacher, students will plan
with a partner the expressions, vocabulary and other language necessary to con-
duct the initial interview with their Franco-American subject (using the Inter-
view Questions Sheet).
Text of the Interview Sheet

Today, you will conduct your first interview with a Franco-American in Lew-
iston. Over the course of several months, you will get to know the person and
prepare a documentary panel and oral history based on your interview. The pan-
els will be presented (by you!!) and exhibited at the Franco-American Heritage
Center in Lewiston in May.
Interview 1 Information
1. Where was he/she born?
2. Ask questions about his/her family.
3. Does his/her family regularly speak French?
4. When does his or her family speak French (what is the role of French in the
family)?
5. Other appropriate questions you’d like to ask? (List questions below in
French)
Before you leave your interviewee, please remember to get the interviewee’s
phone number and confirm that he/she can come back on March 6 at 10:30 AM.
During
Upon arrival, the teacher will work with the Executive Director of the Franco-
American Heritage Center to pair the students with subjects. After a brief group
introduction, students will go off with their subjects to get to know them.
Post
On the ride back to Portland, students will complete the note sheet and reflec-
tion sheet. We will have a group discussion about the major themes that they
discovered during the interviews.
Assessment
Based on the note sheets and reflection sheets, I will assess:
• the students’ ability to gather the information necessary.

• those skills that each student will need to work on before the next interview
in February.
11
EXPLORING ENVIRONMENTAL AND
SUSTAINABILITY ISSUES IN THE
INTERMEDIATE-LEVEL FOREIGN
LANGUAGE CURRICULUM
Elizabeth A. Kautz
Introduction
Why a Focus on Sustainability?

Global warming and climate change are among the most urgent issues confront-
ing us today. Across the globe, scientists have researched the impact of carbon
dioxide (CO2) emissions on the earth’s temperature and documented the devas-
tating impact of rising temperatures: changing landscapes, rising seas, increased
threat of drought, fire and floods, wildlife at risk, stronger storms and increased
damage, more heat-related illness and disease, and economic losses (Nature Con-
servancy, 2014).
As called for by the United Nations, sustainability education is needed
around the globe and in all sectors of society. Only through a multinational,
multipronged approach can we develop the creative solutions needed to meet the
enormous challenges of global warming. The foreign language classroom, as I
argue here, is a particularly conducive environment for sustainability education.
There are a number of reasons for this compatibility. The first is a shared interest
or concern for people and events around the globe. Beginning with the first lev-
els of instruction, foreign language teachers strive to awaken their students’ curi-
osity for people and lands beyond their own borders. They help students learn
not only a new language, but new ways of seeing and understanding the world.
In a related but more complex manner, sustainability studies can build upon
students’ interest and knowledge of foreign cultures by helping them explore the
impact of globalization and how different regions of the world relate politically,
economically, physically, socially, and in other ways with one another. Another
reason for this compatibility is the shared focus on daily practices: caring for our
bodies, maintaining our living spaces, spending time with friends and family,
Exploring Environmental Issues 235
and engaging in activities beyond the private sphere. Paying attention to, analyz-
ing, and perhaps changing how we live our daily lives is a major component of
sustainability studies. Similarly, topics such as what we buy and eat, how we get
around the city, the number and type of electronic gadgets we use for school or
pleasure, and how we interact with people both in and beyond our immediate
community are common chapter units across the curricula for languages.
Sustainability Studies for Developing Critical Thinking

and Advanced Literacy Skills
In the Green German Project (German, Scandinavian and Dutch, 2011), a set of
15 learning modules on sustainability topics funded by the Center for Advanced
Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA) and freely available online at
http://gsd.umn.edu/language/greenproject/index.html, my colleagues1 and I
suggest how sustainability units could supplement or structure intermediate-
or advanced-level language courses and even be introduced in beginning-level
courses with appropriate scaffolding and task adjustments. For example, students
at the novice level can compare the carbon footprint of various products in
addition to the more typical task of comparing purchase prices. Students at the
intermediate and advanced levels, already familiar with basic words and phrases
related to daily themes, are ready to expand their vocabulary by looking at these
topics through the lens of sustainability. Through this new purposeful approach,
students are asked to engage with the content beyond their own survival needs,
learning new vocabulary and considering different points of view as they dis-
cuss food, clothing, transportation, shopping, housing, and so forth in new,
more complex contexts. A focus on sustainability allows students to take these
everyday topics to a higher level, so to speak, as they approach them from mul-
tiple perspectives and in an interdisciplinary fashion. This then sets the stage for
developing critical thinking and advanced literacy skills, such as formulating and
presenting compelling arguments or writing persuasively for different audiences.
By its very nature, sustainability studies requires higher-order thinking—
considering different points of view, understanding complex relationships at mul-
tiple levels, and analyzing systems dynamics. For example, the act of purchasing
organic apples involves many players and impacts far more than the customer. I
can ask, how does my purchase impact the store owner? The farmer? My health?
Land use in my own and other communities? Sustainability studies brings the
interplay of environmental, economic, and social factors into conversation. Sus-
tainable development, as defined in the 1987 Brundtland report, aims to “meet
the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations
to meet their own needs.” What we “need” is determined by looking at all three
areas (i.e., environment, economy, and social factors), and “well-being” is contin-
gent on the three being held in balance. This is aptly illustrated using the analogy
of a three-legged stool where the social, economic, and environment dimensions
236 Elizabeth A. Kautz
represent the three legs: It can’t stand if one of the legs is too short, too long, or
missing. Sustainable development is not only based on this balance, but is also
rooted in systems thinking. As the International Institute on Sustainable Develop-
ment (2013) explains, sustainable development requires that we see the world as a
system—a system that connects across both space and time. What happens today
in one place can affect what happens tomorrow in another place.
Making connections—across time, space, and disciplines—is fundamental
not only to sustainability but to the study of foreign languages and cultures as
well. The 2007 MLA Report suggests we “situate language study in cultural, his-
torical, geographic, and cross-cultural frames” (p. 4). Similarly, Standard 3 of the
World-Readiness Standards for Learning Languages makes direct reference not only
to “making connections,” but also to the higher-order thinking skills involved
in this type of interdisciplinary and systems-thinking endeavor: “Learners build,
reinforce, and expand their knowledge of other disciplines while using the
language to develop critical thinking and to solve problems creatively” (The
National Standards Collaborative Board, 2015, n.p.). Bringing sustainability
issues into the foreign language classroom thus mutually reinforces major goals
of both education programs. Together, they equip learners to understand the
complexity of global problems and teach them the linguistic and intercultural
skills to work with partners from other nations toward solutions.
Instructional Context and Aims

Since the 1980s, the ACTFL (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Lan-
guages) Proficiency Guidelines and the development of the four skills of reading,
writing, listening, and speaking have guided curricular planning in my depart-
ment. As is the case at many other colleges and universities in the United States,
particularly those without a K–12 licensure program housed within the language
department, we were slow to familiarize ourselves with the National Standards
for Language Learning (1996). As post-secondary instructors, we tended to asso-
ciate the concept of “National Standards” with secondary education and did not
fully consider how the 5Cs framework of the National Standards (Communica-
tion, Comparisons, Cultures, Connections, and Communities) could shape our
own curriculum. Over time, we became more familiar with the 5Cs framework
and other models, such as genre studies and culture and languages across the cur-
riculum, and we began to question whether our focus on language proficiency
was too narrow. We clearly addressed the first C (Communication), but while
we believed we addressed culture in our courses as well, we had no articulated
learning objectives related to content. When asking ourselves2 what we wanted
students to take away from our courses or remember five years after graduation,
we agreed that knowledge of the people, practices and perspectives of other cul-
tures, intercultural sensitivity, and skills to be a lifelong learner were as important,
if not more important, than merely producing grammatically accurate sentences.
With this in mind, we agreed we needed to review the content (e.g., themes/
topics, texts, and other curricular materials) in our courses and, more impor-
tantly, what we asked students to do with that content so that our courses could
contribute to the development of critical thinking skills. Learning objectives
that more deliberately address culture and multiple perspectives, we determined,
would align well with the overall student learning outcomes of our institution
and the overarching goals and mission of a liberal arts education. In short, we
agreed that if we truly aspired to the notion of “translingual and transcultural”
competencies (MLA, 2007), then we needed to be more intentional in design-
ing lessons and assessments specifically targeting those competencies. Attention
to all five Cs of the National Standards, which are indeed applicable to both the
secondary and post-secondary level, would provide an effective framework for “a
curriculum offering explicit instruction in a cultural literacy beyond language”
(Arens, 2010, p. 323).
As a course-level coordinator in my department and a member of the orig-
inal Green German Project development team, I led the revision of one of our
intermediate-level courses by introducing CBI units on sustainability-related
themes. The CBI unit I will describe here was developed for the third semester
German course at my large public university. There are four to six sections of the
course taught each semester by a mixture of new graduate student instructors and
experienced adjunct faculty. All sections share a common syllabus and use the
same course materials and assessments. Throughout the semester, instructors meet
for weekly work sessions led by the course coordinator to discuss teaching strate-
gies, classroom management, and student progress. Students generally are 18–24
years old, including both those who began studying German at the university and
those who completed several years in high school. Most are enrolled through the
College of Liberal Arts, which has a four-semester second language requirement,
although a few students come from other colleges such as the School of Business,
the College of Science and Engineering, and the College of Biological Sciences.
Students are expected to reach the intermediate-mid proficiency level according
to the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines (2012) in writing and speaking, and the
intermediate-high level in reading and listening by the end of the fourth semester.
Guided by the 5Cs framework, the new environment- and sustainability-related
content was designed to provide a hook to catch students’ interest and to infuse the
curriculum with a layer of complexity that would encourage students to reflect
critically on important topics and to develop more advanced literacy skills, such as
presenting and defending an argument in a way that remains respectful of others.
Unit Design and Rationale

The following section describes the revised intermediate-level course using CBI
focused on sustainability-related topics as a framework to promote critical think-
ing and advanced literacy skills. As a result of the changes made to the course,
four modules were designed to explore how sustainability relates to each of the
course’s chapter themes: hobbies and free-time activities, travel, education and
careers, and housing. The first module serves as a general introduction to the term
“sustainability” and focuses on the concept of the three pillars or legs of the stool:
the environmental, economic, and social. The second module focuses on sustain-
able travel. The third looks at career preparation and the employment market for
green jobs, and the fourth at urban rooftop and community gardens. For the pur-
poses of this chapter, I will describe only the second module on sustainable travel.
Materials and Tasks

In the textbook for this course, the first part of each new chapter focuses on
vocabulary and grammar. In this particular chapter, students review transporta-
tion and travel vocabulary, verbs of motion in present and past tense, and inter-
rogatives. Students typically complete written exercises in the book, and when
they come to class, they ask and answer questions about their own travel experi-
ences. Charts and graphs3 depicting Germans’ travel destinations, modes of trans-
portation, length of vacation, and preferred activities are presented as cultural
background to help students begin thinking about the choices we make when
we travel. It is at this point that the CBI module begins. Students read several
short texts that introduce the concept of sustainable travel. The first is an article
from an online magazine (Sanfter Tourismus, 2013) that gives brief examples
of sustainable travel practices and comments on how important this sector has
become for the travel industry. The second comes from educational materials for
school children, Umweltfreundlich mobil, developed by the German Federal Min-
istry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety
(Bundesministerium für Umwelt, Naturschutz und Reaktorensicherheit, 2012).
This text asks students to think about both the positive and the negative impact
of travel and suggests criteria by which to evaluate if particular aspects of a trip
are sustainable or not. On a worksheet, students summarize this information by
creating a list of questions to ask themselves when considering travel.
Before students compare responses to the reading texts during the next class
period, the instructor leads students through a series of vocabulary exercises
focusing on the meaning, nuance, and use of words commonly found in texts
describing the environment. Students match key words to simplified L2 defini-
tions; sort words into groups with positive, negative, or more neutral connota-
tions; and make note of typical verb + noun or adjective + noun combinations.
In the next task, students read a flyer with advertisements for four different
travel packages. Students simultaneously fill out an instructor-prepared chart
with factual information from the text regarding destination, transportation,
food and lodging, activities, number of days, and cost; with the help of the list
of questions they created earlier, they then determine which aspects of each trip
stand out as sustainable or not and add this information to the chart. Students
then form small groups to discuss the four advertised trips. To help students con-
sider the merits of each trip from more than their own personal perspective, they
are told that they work for the fictitious travel agency Green Tours Worldwide,
and must evaluate each of the trips and award it 0–5 stars based on how sustain-
able it is. Groups discuss and rank the trips and share their results with the class.
The next lesson, which emphasizes listening and writing skills, was developed
as an online module for the sections of the course taught in a hybrid format,4 but
can be adapted for use in a face-to-face classroom setting as well. The module
is based on a series of video-recorded interviews conducted at the International
Travel Fair in Berlin (Greencasting.TV, 2012). Divided into three sections, the
first interview focuses on Felix Finkbeiner, the 12-year-old founder of Plant-for-
the-Planet,5 who explains that air travel contributes more CO2 emissions than
any other aspect of travel. In the second interview, we hear about examples of
sustainable travel offered by an exhibitor6 at the fair, and in the third interview,
Felix talks with the German Federal Minister for Economic Cooperation and
Development, Dirk Niebel, about the efficacy of educational campaigns vs. leg-
islation in bringing about social, economic, and environmental changes. At the
end, Felix provocatively suggests that his generation should consider foregoing
international air travel and instead explore other parts of the world virtually
via Google Maps. During the first two interviews, students answer multiple-
choice questions and respond to short-answer prompts to demonstrate compre-
hension of the ideas and examples provided by Felix and the exhibitor. After the
conversation between Felix and the politician, however, students write in an
online discussion forum, first briefly summarizing the two proposals as to how
to lessen the negative environmental impact of travel, and then explaining which
approach they favor most and why. In a follow-up class discussion, students also
react to Felix’s comments regarding virtual travel as a more sustainable way to
explore foreign countries and cultures.
The next stage directs students to German and Austrian websites specializing
in sustainable travel opportunities.7 Here students select a region of their own
choice and explore possible accommodations, activities, and means of transpor-
tation. After narrowing their search, they share information with each other
about specific examples by completing a chart and posting an image in an online
class database. This online research into sustainable travel opportunities within
German-speaking countries becomes the basis for the culminating phase of the
unit, a group video project showcasing a “green get-a-way” in Germany, Austria,
or Switzerland. Using the video editing software iMovie to combine a musical
background, still images they selected for the project, and their own voice-over
narration with vocabulary and structures learned during the unit, each group
highlights the sustainable aspects of their chosen destination, accommodations,
activities, and transportation in a short promotional video.
As students progress through the unit, they work with authentic materials of
different genres and discourse levels that model a variety of language uses as well
as degrees of argumentation. For example, the descriptions of the vacation pack-

ages are written with simple sentences consisting of S V O + prepositional phrase
and presented as factual information without any nuance. In contrast, speakers in
the interviews use subordinate clauses to both support and qualify their claims
and accentuate key arguments. Tasks are varied as well so that students engage
with the content in increasingly challenging ways. While students may begin
with tasks requiring relatively low cognitive engagement, such as being asked
to recognize key vocabulary as they skim and scan advertisements and websites
or to restate points of view expressed in the video clips, they must demonstrate
critical thinking and creativity at later stages. For example, students not only list
a set of criteria for sustainable travel, but they apply it as they evaluate and com-
pare different travel options. By the end of the unit, students are called upon to
state and defend their own opinions in response to those expressed in the online
videos and to synthesize all that they have learned when they write a compelling
script and combine it with appropriate images in their own video.
Changes Made during Implementation

While the unit described has three distinct parts, it originally consisted of the
online module only–the activities with the video clips, the online research of
sustainable travel options in German-speaking countries, and suggestions for fur-
ther reading. This arrangement was largely due to directives about departmental
curricular revision at that time. The second time the course was taught with the
implemented unit, the video project was added as a means for students to engage
with the topic in a more cognitively challenging and creative way. Students now
would need to select hotels, restaurants, and tourist attractions that they con-
sidered sustainable and rationalize those decisions through their combination of
imagery and spoken text. This modification also served to address several other
course-level goals, such as including more explicit speaking performance assess-
ments and paying greater attention to twenty-first century skills such as collabo-
ration and media and technology literacies.8 With the addition of a performance
assessment linked to sustainability-related content, students needed more input
that explained the content in a straightforward way and more practice applying
the concepts before they embarked on their creative project. The third time the
unit was taught, therefore, the reading texts and comparison of the four adver-
tised travel packages were introduced. The graphics and didactic tone of the
educational resources created by the German government worked particularly
well to help students understand the new content.
The decision to use authentic educational materials created by and for mem-
bers of the target culture not only supported the pedagogical goals of the units,
but was strategic in another way as well. The fact that environmental and
sustainability-related educational materials are produced, disseminated, and used
in the target culture exemplifies itself how products, practices, and perspec-
tives are related. For instance, when one considers the breadth and volume of
sustainability educational materials available in Germany, that they are pedagog-

ically designed for specific age groups and often include lesson plans for teachers,
and that most are created by state-supported institutions and disseminated free
of charge, learners gain insight into what is valued in German society and how
that culture approaches what it considers a problem.
Balancing Content and Language in Instruction:

Our Experience
Within the context of this intermediate-level course at my institution, it is important
to point out that these new CBI units only constitute about half of the instruction
for the given chapter. Other activities include information gathering mixers target-
ing new vocabulary and interpersonal communication, contextualized focus-on-
form exercises, role-plays practicing speech acts, and writing about travel in the
form of a personal narrative. While the intent is to embed our instruction within
a cultural context, these activities push the course more toward the “language-
driven” extreme on the continuum of CBI models (Met, 1999; Tedick & Camma-
rata, 2012). The degree to which a curriculum can be modified and implemented
based on the CBI approach depends greatly on foreign language teachers’ willing-
ness to experiment with alternative pedagogies that are not exclusively language
driven. In the particular case of the instructional intervention described in this
chapter, the sustainability-related CBI unit was a deliberate attempt to focus on
content to counterbalance the language-driven focus that characterized the origi-
nal curriculum. With this in mind, the revised course did not strive so much to bal-
ance language and content within the CBI units themselves, but within the overall
chapter. Since other course activities addressed linguistic goals more directly, the
sustainability-related lessons could become a space for students to practice previ-
ously learned structures and to experiment with unfamiliar structures they saw
modeled in the authentic materials. Instructor feedback on the content of student
responses, rather than the form of those responses, signaled to students that what
they had to say was as important as how they said it.
In what follows, I share guidelines and practices that stem from our experi-
ence of having redesigned units around meaningful and cognitively challeng-
ing content in our program. These guidelines, I believe, can help teachers and
program designers wishing to embark on similar CBI curricular journeys in
optimizing the integration of content and language in the FL classroom:
1. Select authentic materials carefully to introduce the content. In the particular case
of introducing the three-legged stool concept of sustainability, I looked for
materials written at a discourse level appropriate for a general or youth audi-
ence and with strong visual support. There is a wealth of resources available
online, including educational television programming, consumer education
campaigns, “children’s pages” of governmental or utility company websites,
and lesson-plan portals for teachers in the target culture.
2. Use the L2 consistently throughout the input, practice, and expansion phases. As
Thompson and Harrison (2014) have shown, students’ use of the native lan-
guage (L1) is often triggered by teacher-initiated code-switches (p. 332).
When students struggle to understand the content as presented through
the second language (L2) authentic texts, therefore, I rephrase it or explain
through examples using the L2, rather than switch to English. As Polio and
Duff (1994) have argued, this signals to students that the L2 is not “reserved
for more mechanical, grammatical drills,” but rather is a “vehicle of mean-
ingful communication” (as quoted in Thompson & Harrison, 2014, p. 323).
3. Design tasks appropriate to students’ proficiency level so they can successfully
complete most tasks within the range of their current skills and use scaf-
folding for more complex tasks that encourage them to expand their abilities.
In my particular course, tasks were designed for the intermediate level. To
that end, I made clear to students that I would not expect them to produce
sophisticated written arguments or lengthy formal academic papers. Helping
students express their ideas with the language they do have provides them
with a sense of success, lowers their frustration levels, and motivates them to
work toward the next level of proficiency.
4. Vary the degree of focus-on-form across different activities. I designed the task of
asking and answering factual questions about different trips to elicit the use
of interrogative pronouns and prepositional phrases—the particular gram-
mar focus of the chapter. Consequently, I was more intentional in provid-
ing corrective feedback. Other activities, such as responding in the online
forum to arguments made in the video, did not necessarily contribute to
the explicit grammar focus of the chapter, but rather provided a space for
students to practice previously learned structures while focusing primarily
on the content. Teacher modeling (either verbally or in writing) just prior
to the activity reminded students how to use such structures (in this case,
introducing and stating an opinion using Meiner Meinung nach, followed by
a subordinate clause with weil—“because”—to substantiate the claim).
5. Provide students with web links for further reading in the content area.9 With links
to both English and German resources on sustainable travel, students can
explore their own questions about the topic as well as see additional exam-
ples of contextualized target language use.
Turning to the Standards to Promote Critical Thinking

and Advanced Literacy
A Focus on the Standards

As explained earlier, our goals were to infuse the curriculum with relevant,
sustainability-related content; promote intercultural competency through use of
the National Standards; and cultivate critical thinking and advanced literacy in
accordance with the larger goals of a liberal arts education. In practice, this meant
that, while we still rehearsed navigating a train schedule or reserving a hotel
room—topics commonly explored in traditional post-secondary FL curricula—
we used the lens of sustainability to prompt students to look more closely at
various cultural products and practices related to travel by German speakers and/
or in German-speaking countries. The many topics explored in class led stu-
dents to reflect on the fact that sustainable travel is a viable branch of the travel
industry with its own certification and labeling process, advertising, and online
presence; that Germans often choose beach vacations in foreign countries; and
that many are willing to pay more for a travel package certified as sustainable.
When considering the cultural perspectives that would express themselves in
those practices, we looked to the connections between travel, the environment,
the economy, and social relationships. Questions such as the following were used
to guide and facilitate students’ critical reflections during the process: If financial
cost isn’t the only factor in decisions around travel, what are the other influences?
Here we considered Germans’ relationship to nature and the fact that practices
contributing to global warming (i.e., increased CO2 emissions through use of
fossil fuels for transportation, heating, industrial production) can have devas-
tating effects on life in some of their favorite vacation destinations. Rising sea
levels threaten to wipe out coastal communities near the equator, and changing
weather patterns affect traditional outdoor activities such as skiing and hiking in
the woods. Connections to the economy were made by considering who owns
the vacation hotels, who works there, and where the profits are likely reinvested.
While aiming to increase the intellectual rigor of the course by addressing the
Culture, Connections, and Comparisons standards more explicitly, we did not
abandon the goal of improved communication skills. On the contrary, we hoped
students would make linguistic gains specifically by exploring content in more
meaningful ways. The linguistic benefits of using sustainability-related content
at the college level have been documented in the past. For instance, Horst and
Pearce (2010) describe their students’ progress toward more advanced literacy,
noting “Students were writing more in the environmental forum (producing
more language) . . . and us[ing] more complex structures, particularly subordina-
tion, because of the concepts that they wanted to express, not because they were
explicitly required to use these structures” (p. 372). Melin (2013) noted similar
growth in the fluency of student writing, but also cognitive gains in terms of
students’ ability to brainstorm more sophisticated words associated with the topic
“Umwelt” (environment) and to map out a more complex network of the terms
illustrating the economic, social, and environmental relationships between them
(pp. 190–191). In our course, we did not plan specifically to analyze linguistic
gains before and after the implementation of the sustainability-related content,
and thus could not formally document such changes. Furthermore, for reasons
to be discussed later, teachers’ assessment of student language production in the
video was somewhat negative. Despite this initial setback, I still believe that
our sustainability-related units can elicit the kinds of cognitive and linguistic
gains noted earlier once changes in how we provide formative feedback at criti-
cal stages in the unit are implemented, and after both students and instructors
become more comfortable and familiar with the goals and methods of content-
based instruction.
Twenty-First Century Skills

Digital media projects are particularly pertinent to foreign language courses
because they can help support the development of twenty-first century skills.
These skills encompass much more than the ability to read and write; they
include information, media, and technology literacies; collaboration; initiative
and self-direction; and social and cross-cultural skills, among others (Partner-
ship for 21st Century Skills, 2009). They can provide a framework for students
to bring multiple literacies into play and to practice effective communication.
Learning to work together to present a persuasive message, both in a second
language and in a format that appeals to and is respected by contemporary audi-
ences, is a valuable experience. When students consider both the original context
of an image and how they plan to reuse it, when they formulate their ideas into
words with attention to how people of other cultures may interpret them, and
when they negotiate with classmates over how to edit their video or what to
include in the credits, they are practicing critical thinking and problem-solving
skills. In the words of the 21st Century Skills Map for World Languages, stu-
dents, as inquirers, “frame, analyze, and synthesize information as well as negoti-
ate meaning across language and culture in order to explore problems and issues
from their own and different perspectives” (2011, p. 9). Time spent on such
projects in the foreign language classroom can further equip students to become
linguistically, culturally, and technologically literate and, thus, prepare them to
deal with future challenges on a personal or international scale.
Literacy is, ultimately, a key to agency and power. As Arens and Swaffar
(2005) explain in Remapping the Foreign Language Curriculum,
Literacy describes what empowers individuals to enter societies; to derive,

generate, communicate, and validate knowledge and experience; to exer-
cise expressive capacities to engage others in shared cognitive, social, and
moral projects; and to exercise such agency with an identity that is recog-
nized by others in the community.
(p. 2)
Swaffar and Arens’ description of literacy points to the purpose of education,

including the ability to function in a society by exercising agency and engaging
others. Byram (2010, p. 320) connects literacy, education, and agency as well,
when he argues “that the way forward [for foreign language teaching] is to turn
to education for (democratic) citizenship. . . . [Such education] includes, at the

very least, the ability to analyze, discriminate, and reflect on oneself and on the
society into which one has grown and into which one has been led or “educated”
(as cited in Eppelsheimer, 2012, p. 9). To be sure, developing these multiple
literacies—the skills and attitudes that make learners able to participate fully in
the life of different communities—is no easy task. Grappling with interconnected
environmental, economic, and social issues in a multilingual and multicultural
setting such as the foreign language classroom, however, can help facilitate that
development. As Eppelsheimer (2012) has asserted, while such goals are unlikely
to be achieved in a single semester course at the intermediate level, that doesn’t
mean they are too lofty or ambitious; rather, it is because these educational goals
are so ambitious that they belong in the first and second years of foreign lan-
guage instruction, where they lay the necessary groundwork to enable students
to become literate global citizens of the twenty-first century (p. 10).
Lessons Learned
Important lessons were learned during the implementation phase of the revised
curriculum, and many changes have been made to improve the unit each time
it is taught. Adding reading texts and the activity with the vacation packages at
the beginning of the unit was crucial, as students needed more content-specific
input to process and understand some of the concepts, as when they were asked
to compare environmental costs versus financial costs. This type of content
scaffolding, which added interpretive dimensions in addition to linguistic scaf-
folding, was necessary before students could discuss the topic in a meaningful
way. As I learned over time, scaffolding new content is important not only for
students, but also for colleagues teaching a CBI unit for the first time. It is not
unusual for “language” teachers venturing into CBI to feel unqualified to teach
content they consider outside their discipline or realm of experience. Directing
colleagues to resources to educate themselves, even in a very basic way, can help
them feel more confident in front of their students and enable them to teach with
the passion they bring when working with more familiar topics. Staff meetings
or informal conversations between colleagues can also help teachers learn from
each other and become more comfortable with topics they haven’t taught before.
A second important lesson emerged as a result of the implementation process.
During a staff discussion of the student video project, teachers shared their dis-
appointment with the grammatical accuracy of the written script produced by
students and their inaccurate pronunciation when reading it aloud. We agreed
that we needed to require students to submit a written draft and voice record-
ing partway through the project so that they could receive feedback and revise
as needed. While this problem will be remedied in the future by devoting more
days in the syllabus for practice and revision, it points to the larger issue of
how to balance content and language instructional aims. As discussed earlier,
achieving such balance is difficult; particularly when looking at a single unit and
its relationship to the course as a whole, balance can seem like a moving target.
The fact that the degree to which linguistic goals or content goals are pursued
relies heavily on the individual teacher, not just the stated curriculum or syllabus,
exacerbates the challenge. In my own cohort of teachers, it was clear that just as
instructors’ comfort level with teaching a particular content area varied, so too
did their philosophy and comfort level regarding how much to attend to content
versus language during instruction. In this regard, my experience echoes the
conclusion reached by Tedick & Cammarata (2012) who argue that, “[b]ecause
teachers are the ultimate decision makers as to what enters their classroom and
because all curricular reforms are filtered through their beliefs and perceptions,
CBI has little chance to succeed without their support, interest, and motivation”
(S48). Clearly, ongoing discussion among teachers themselves is needed, not only
to clarify the purposes and merits of CBI, but also to determine the appropriate
balance of language and content in particular instructional contexts.
Impact on Students’ Motivation and Achievement

Although I have not conducted a formal survey measuring the impact of the sus-
tainable travel unit on students’ motivation and achievement, feedback obtained
through other means, such as teachers’ informal observations, points to positive
developments. One teacher, for example, observed students incorporating infor-
mation learned through the sustainability lesson into other course assignments.
This unprompted transfer of knowledge suggests both an understanding of the
content as well as intellectual stimulation to apply the new knowledge. Similarly,
when seeking out opportunities for extra credit, some students have opted to
attend and report on university-sponsored panel discussions featuring politicians
and experts in the field of renewable energy from both Germany and our own
city and state. Another student, a freshman interested in chemical engineer-
ing, asked for sustainability-related articles he could read for extra credit. On
a larger scale, the most recent set of student evaluations for all sections of the
course showed an increase in positive responses to questions related to levels of
interest and understanding of the subject matter as a result of the course. While
too many variables exist to link this improvement solely to the implementation
of CBI units based on the exploration of sustainability issues, I believe that the
shift toward exploring more meaningful content such as this, which naturally
stimulates the use of higher-order thinking skills, is a major contributing factor.
Students today can no longer disregard the environmental changes occurring
around the globe; in turn, we cannot afford not to incorporate sustainability educa-
tion in our courses. This global topic affects us all and calls for interculturally com-
petent, multilingual responses. The foreign language classroom is a place where
students can develop the critical thinking and literacy skills needed to navigate
these complex problems of the twenty-first century. When we address meaningful
content in our courses, we not only set the stage for dynamic teaching and learn-
ing; we also inspire a new generation of creative problem-solvers and advocates for
the expanded study of foreign languages in our schools and universities.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Charlotte Melin for her support and for her feedback on an
earlier draft of this essay. I would also like to thank the College of Liberal Arts
and the Department of German, Scandinavian and Dutch at the University of
Minnesota for granting me a professional development leave in spring 2014 to
begin writing this chapter and to travel to Germany to meet with various leaders
in the area of sustainability education. Funding for my travel was granted in part
by a Global Programs and Strategy Alliance International Travel Grant and the
European Studies Consortium at the University of Minnesota.
Notes
1. Prof. Charlotte Melin initiated the project and was involved in all aspects. Dr. Adam
Oberlin, who at that time was a Ph.D. Candidate at the University of Minnesota,
wrote the instructional materials for the 15 modules. Peter Schmitt, an undergradu-
ate German major and Sustainability Studies minor, helped frame the list of topics to
be included and provided overviews of content that aided other project developers in
their subsequent work.
2. Thank you to my fellow language coordinators, Ginny Steinhagen, DeeAnn Sime,
and Jennifer Peterson, for fruitful discussions during our weekly meetings.
3. See http://www.statista.com/ for examples.
4. Meagan Tripp, a graduate student who was part of the curriculum development team
for the hybrid course project at the time, developed this online module.
5. For more information on Felix and his worldwide initiative, see http://www.plant-
for-the-planet.org.
6. Interview with Ute Linsbauer of the travel association forum anders reisen.
7. Suggested sites include www.forumandersreisen.de, www.nachhaltig-reisen.at, and
www.viabono.com.
8. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills (P21) was founded in 2002 as a coalition
bringing together the business community, education leaders, and policy makers to
position twenty-first century readiness at the center of U.S. K–12 education. In 2011,
the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) partnered
with P21 to create the 21st Century Skills Map for World Languages, which defines
12 twenty-first century skills, including examples of how they can be are integrated
into interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational communicative tasks at the nov-
ice, intermediate, and advanced levels. https://www.actfl.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/
21stCenturySkillsMap/p21_worldlanguagesmap.pdf
9. Thank you to Meagan Tripp for suggesting this idea.
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12
A LOOK AT CBI IN ACTION
An Exploratory Journey into the Arts and
History in the Foreign Language Classroom
Nancy Hagstrom
Introduction
I have always loved learning languages. I was the student who, despite having a
rather droll, textbook, grammatically driven high school language experience,
tried to translate into Spanish every sign, shampoo bottle, and advertisement
that I saw. In high school I was consistently awarded the end of the year Span-
ish award, but was then confounded when I was unable to orally communicate
to teachers, peers, and visiting native speakers. Though I sensed that learning
languages held a greater power than what I was experiencing, I dropped Spanish
class as soon as my language graduation requirement was fulfilled. What I didn’t
know then is that what I was missing was a content-rich language learning envi-
ronment, which would have helped me engage in the language in an authentic
way and thus would have motivated me to utilize my emerging and developing
communicative sills.
When, as a student in college, I finally encountered a classroom environment
that was structured around rich content and tasks that were meaningful to me,
the result was transformative. I found myself engaging in the Spanish language
because it would allow me to discuss with my peers and teachers about what I
had done over the weekend, or would help me to delve into a piece of Spanish
literature or film, or would help me work on comprehending and communicat-
ing with local migrant worker families who spoke only Spanish, but who had
signed up to be tutored to learn English. Suddenly, for ninety minutes every
other day, I was immersed in a world that was language and content rich and
that was focused not on verb conjugations and gender agreement but on actual
use of the language. I was hooked. Years later when I became a high school
Spanish teacher, the lessons I learned from having been immersed in this highly
motivating, content-rich and learner-centered environment became my guide as
A Look at CBI in Action 251
I worked to ensure that my classes would end up providing a similar motivating

learning environment, one where learners are made responsible for their learning
experience and required to complete tasks that really matter to them and oth-
ers. What follows in this chapter are some concrete illustrations of the type of
content-rich language teaching curricula I developed throughout the years that
are reflective of content-based instruction (CBI), a curricular and instructional
approach whose guiding principles align with my teaching philosophy and have
allowed me to target instructional goals well beyond the development of lan-
guage skills in my foreign language (FL) classroom.
How Content-Based Instruction Works in My Classes
My School My Vision: Implementing CBI in a Supportive

Educational Context
From my perspective, learning a language is a difficult undertaking if those
learning the language can’t quickly see the benefits and fun in doing so. Though
what might be considered as “fun” is highly subjective and might vary greatly
from person to person, I believe that there are some commonalities to what
can make a learning environment more or less engaging. To me an engaging
language learning environment can be defined as follows: Having fun while
learning means engaging in an activity which is (1) meaningful to oneself,
(2) has a clear and ideally authentic goal, (3) is intellectually demanding while
not being overwhelming, and (4) is not dangerous (we know we can succeed if
we work hard).
For many students learning a language is a highly risky task. They are rou-
tinely presented with content that is difficult and specific, and they are often
asked to reproduce grammatical perfection with limited focus on how the gram-
mar that they are learning is applicable to their use of the language in a future
context. Thus, what I try to accomplish in my classes is a marriage between the
teaching and learning of important knowledge and skills I know will stimulate
students’ intellectual curiosity and motivate them (e.g., use content related to
the arts or history, for instance, as well as tasks targeting higher-order think-
ing skills such as evaluating, critiquing, and more) and the teaching of founda-
tional linguistic knowledge (e.g., vocabulary, grammar, syntax) that I know will
enhance students’ ability to communicate their thoughts, ideas, and questions
in a comprehensible way for authentic purposes. By “authentic purpose” here I
mean that learners will engage in activities whose ultimate goals will be mean-
ingful to them, that is, lead them to learn something new, think deeper about a
topic of interest, tackle questions they personally have about life in general and
those of others, and/or solve real problems, to name a few. I am fortunate to
work in a school that holds similar core values, a school that both encourages and
trusts their teachers to creatively construct their work to best serve all learners.
252 Nancy Hagstrom
Expeditionary Learning Instructional Guiding Principles

Casco Bay High School for Expeditionary Learning (CBHS) matches the district
demographic of the small city to which it belongs. Within the Expeditionary
Learning (EL) educational model for school reform that CBHS implements, teach-
ers are encouraged to help students see the big picture behind what they are learn-
ing. At our school students are primarily engaged through their classes in work
that in some way relates to them or an issue that they are passionate about. As part
of this model teachers are asked to base their practice and the development of pro-
grams on what is known within the EL model as the 3Rs framework—Rigor, Rel-
evance, and Relationships (Margolin, 2015)—which, for me, are foundational to
how I think about curriculum planning for the FL classroom. As I work to engage
all students in the content of my classes, I keep those 3Rs in mind. In my classroom,
rigor is the use of the language and the focus on having students inquire into how
they can make sense of, and with, the target language; relevance is content that is
either immediately relevant to students or compelling enough to become relevant
to students; relationships is about trust that is built within the class that allows stu-
dents to engage with one another and with me in the target language.
In our school, and with EL in general, creating a culture of trust is regarded as
an essential component because trust is what leads students to take risks and thus
gain ownership of their learning experience. In my own FL classroom context,
establishing a culture of trust means that language learners will not be shy about
using the language they learn when asked to communicate with their peers,
exchange ideas in Spanish about topics of interest to them, or answer questions
that might be academically relevant. Because all teachers in all content areas in
our school hold the same intention and follow the same principles, students see
their learning as a process rather than a series of finite goals.
Authentic Content as the Engine for Increased Motivation

and Communication
In order to implement the EL model in my FL Spanish classroom and meet the
goals targeted by the approach, I make strategic curricular decisions when it
comes to the choice of content I use for different grade levels and levels of lan-
guage proficiency. For instance, in my Spanish Two classes, I use content that
I know will be of interest to learners to help them begin to feel comfortable
speaking and “playing with” the language. My primary goal here is that learn-
ers use language that is comprehensible to others and that allows them to make
a point that is personal and relevant to themselves even if the language used to
convey that point isn’t perfectly constructed. So, I might give students a macro
level task (e.g., an article about Bill Gates’s proposed “house of the future”),
spending a lot of time working on comprehension of the article, communicating
through drawings and simple language (for example, “I like that he has a pool”
or “it’s interesting that he has sensors that notice when different people arrive”)
to communicate thoughts and opinions of the article before tackling what the
future tense is, specifically. By using authentic texts, I ensure that the study of
language is not dissociated from the meaningful use of it—language practice
in this context remains grounded in learners’ personal interests, curiosity, and
motivations to communicate with others for a genuine purpose.
In the sections that follow I will describe some content-based mini expedi-
tions I have developed and taught throughout the years for my Spanish 3 and 4
classes. These four- to six-week-long curricular units are based on the 3Rs, use
authentic texts and resources, and culminate with a “high-stakes” (something
that is meaningful to students) task. I have selected these specific units because
they can help me showcase the use of varied content for varied purposes as well
as the use of authentic materials to motivate and engage students throughout
their learning experience. For example, the content in Spanish 3 uses compel-
ling art history to learn the story of two Mexican artists, and the Spanish 4
mini expedition draws on a current event to have students engage with learning
about two countries’ mutual history. From these illustrations, I am hopeful that
those who are interested in experimenting with CBI will be able to see that it
is a viable curricular and instructional approach for teachers working in varied
school contexts and for students of all walks of life.
A Focus on the Arts in the Foreign Language

Classroom: A Unit on Frida Kahlo and
Diego Rivera
I chose the content of the art of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera because it is
content that is interesting and compelling to me. When, as a student, I studied
Kahlo and Rivera I, for the first time, realized the power that art held both to
help heal and convey personal pain and struggle (as in the works of Kahlo) and
to communicate with and educate the masses (as in the art of Rivera). Because
I felt moved by their art, I began to research it independently and discovered
that the themes that show up again and again in their works (i.e., social justice,
personal struggle, politics, family strife) were themes that my students could
and would relate to.
The mini expedition “El arte de Frida Kahlo y Diego Rivera” kicks off with a
quote from Frida Kahlo’s father who said, “[E]ra el casamiento entre un elefante
y una paloma” (It was the marriage between an elephant and a dove). I use this
quote because it is wry, shocking—students can’t imagine that a father would
say that to his daughter. Students think about what this quote might mean,
discuss their various interpretations, and are then presented with a picture of
the two artists together in which the diminutive Frida Kahlo and the very large
Diego Rivera stand happily together. Students quickly realize that the quote from
Kahlo’s father was quite literal—Rivera dwarfs Kahlo in size and stature—and
they muse about what would happen if their own father said something to them
to that effect on their wedding day.
254 Nancy Hagstrom
This quote is powerful because of its simplicity. Guillermo Kahlo, Frida’s

father, wasn’t framing a metaphor when he said it; he was simply comment-
ing on a marriage of which he was skeptical and that visually was shocking to
him. Students can relate to the parent-child sentiment behind what he said, and
though at this point most students are either unaware or only vaguely aware of
who Kahlo and Rivera are, reading this quote and seeing the picture of Kahlo
and Rivera evokes a reaction in them. After discussing this quote and seeing this
picture students are hooked: They want to know more, and it is exactly in that
state of mind I want them to be. They can tell that there is a bigger story than
just simply a father brusquely commenting on his daughter’s marriage, and they
are primed to enter the Immersion phase of this expedition.
One of the most powerful aspects of studying the work of Kahlo and Rivera
is that it is visual. For students who struggle with studying language, engaging
with art can level the playing field. Yes, they will still have to be able to commu-
nicate their thoughts about the art that we look at and give their opinions about
the lives of Kahlo and Rivera, but I often find that those students who have to
really work hard to put their thoughts together in Spanish are more willing to do
so because of the content of this mini expedition. After the introductory activity
related to Guillermo Kahlo’s quote, which occurs during the Immersion phase of
the expedition, students are asked to participate in a silent gallery walk. A gallery
walk is a method of immersing students into a variety of content that they will
be studying throughout the mini expedition. It serves to set up the big picture
and spark interest in what is to come. Used widely in EL it is, true to its name,
a gallery of information (set up like an art gallery) new to students and designed
to give them insight into various components of the expedition. For this mini
expedition I set up a gallery of artwork, quotes, maps, and pictures that relate to
the work and lives of Kahlo and Rivera all displayed on the walls in the hallway
outside of my classroom. Students are then handed a guided notes sheet that will
help them navigate the gallery (see Appendix 12A, which provides the first page
of a four-page document). At this stage, students are permitted to record what
they are looking at as well as their thoughts or questions about what they are
looking at in English or Spanish because my goal during this phase is that they
fully engage with the gallery, that is, with what they are seeing, and not worry
about how they will convey their thought on the matter in Spanish. I want them
to finish the gallery hungry to know more.
Different people react to art differently, and I want each student’s individual
experience to be valued during the actual gallery walk. To that end, the gal-
lery walk is intentionally set up as a silent activity to ensure that everyone will
have a chance to experience the new information individually and reflect on it
prior to moving forward. Before they begin I assure them that they will have
a chance to discuss and dissect what they have seen. By the end of this gallery
students will have engaged with sixteen different gallery aspects. About half
of what students look at in the gallery comes from Kahlo—everything from a
quote from Frida Kahlo that says “[N]o pinto sueños ni pesadillas, pinto mi pro-
pia realidad” (I don’t paint dreams or nightmares, I paint my own reality), to a
relatively benign self-portrait (Self-Portrait with Monkeys), to an intriguing paint-
ing called Las dos Fridas (The Two Fridas) to the shocking El Venadito (The Little
Deer). Kahlo is compelling to students because her work is intensely personal and
was not intended for the public eye. She painted her life, her pain, and her emo-
tions. Her work is sometimes called surrealist, and in her lifetime she caught the
attention of other such artists as André Breton and Pablo Picasso. When students
look at her art, they are looking into her mind and into her soul.
The other half of the gallery is devoted to Diego Rivera. Rivera is perhaps
most commonly known for a series of paintings called La Vendedora de Flores
(The Flower Seller), which beautifully depict campesinos (field laborers/farmers)
on their way to market hauling flowers. However, Rivera often used art as a
sociopolitical tool and so his portion of the gallery shows not only La Vendedora
de Flores, but also murals that he painted in Mexico City that visually depict the
indigenous history of the peoples of Mexico. It also contains a map of the loca-
tions of those murals that are located along the route that the campesinos would
take into the city to arrive at the market. These murals offer a visual represen-
tation of the story of indigenous Mexicans, a group to which the campesinos
would pertain. As the campesinos were largely illiterate, the murals provided a
way to educate and celebrate indigenous history and build indigenous pride. The
Rivera section of the gallery also includes examples of murals that he was com-
missioned to create in Detroit and San Francisco. The art of Rivera is engaging
to students in a completely different way than the art of Kahlo is—the art of
Rivera is big (often the size of buildings), and it makes bold public statements:
for example, many of these murals contain controversial figures such as Leon
Trotksy or Stalin or highlight social inequities such as the white labor boss beat-
ing the indigenous worker. Some students struggle with the intimacy of Kahlo’s
paintings, but are able to understand and champion the work of Rivera. For me,
the juxtaposition of these two types of artists, and the fact that the two artists
were married to each other, sets the stage for a high level of student engagement
with both content and language in my classroom.
The culminating event for this mini expedition is a “live” eight- to ten-
minute discussion that students have in small groups (four to five students per
group) with me present as simply a listener. During this discussion students work
toward the Interpersonal Speaking standard, and are assessed on a rubric spe-
cifically designed for the task (see Appendix 12B). By the time this culminat-
ing event happens students have, through the Building Background Knowledge
phase of this expedition, developed specific content knowledge, increased their
linguistic repertoire, and practiced skills allowing them to engage independently
in research. When it comes to developing content knowledge about the topic,
students have (1) seen a PBS documentary called The Life and Times of Frida Kahlo,
(2) grappled with a color analysis that Frida Kahlo wrote about her own use of
256 Nancy Hagstrom
color in her paintings, and (3) read historical summaries about the Mexican rev-
olution and the ensuing goal of the newly-in-power revolutionary government
to commission artists to paint public murals to educate the illiterate campesino
masses about their common history. Regarding language development, during
this phase students have studied pertinent vocabulary taken from the gallery
walk, the text of the Kahlo color analysis, and the historical summaries that will
support them in their eventual discussion about what they have seen. When it
comes to grammar, students have been introduced to the basics of the present
subjunctive, the tense in Spanish used to discuss opinions, hopes, desires, and
uncertainty. They have also practiced with the present subjunctive in writing
and speaking as a way to accurately communicate their opinions on the work of
Kahlo and Rivera. Finally, when it comes to the development of important aca-
demic literacy skills, throughout the building background phase students have
practiced specific research skills essential to the successful completion of the final
project such as using online search engines effectively to find pertinent and reli-
able information on a given topic.
When students enter into the Independent Investigation phase, they are armed
with enough knowledge of, and exposure to, the art of Kahlo and Rivera that
they are ready to choose one artist to pursue. What they are asked to do in this
phase is research one work of art by either of the artists and write their own
analysis of it in Spanish (toward the Presentational Writing standard), and then
present that work of art to the class (Presentational Speaking). This allows stu-
dents a high level of choice and also asks them to become the experts on one
work so that they can contribute to the general knowledge of the class.
Embedded into each day during this mini expedition is dedicated interper-
sonal conversation time, in Spanish, to build confidence and capacity for discuss-
ing “live” this content. By the time the culmination happens, students will have
participated in one-on-one, small-group, and fishbowl-style discussions where
one small group discusses while another small group observes and takes notes
on what the speakers did well, what they could improve upon, how many times
each person spoke, and the questions and themes they talked about. During this
activity students are expected to provide feedback to each other be it of a warm or
cool nature (e.g., “you did a nice job including everyone in the conversation”; “I
noticed that you sometimes slipped into speaking English; you should pay atten-
tion to speaking only in Spanish”) using the provided rubric (see Appendix 12B)
as their guide. This allows students to become very familiar and comfortable with
the rubric prior to the conversation assessment so that, when the culminating
event arrives, students are able to fully engage in the task at hand and not worry
about what they are being assessed on.
The question that I ask the groups during their final discussion is intentionally
vague, but requires them to call upon much of the content that we have cov-
ered as a class. The question is “What do you think of the art and lives of Frida
Kahlo and Diego Rivera?” In order to meet the standard on the discussion rubric
students must be active participants, which we define as a class as both asking

and answering questions. Thus, a student who might attempt to participate with
a simple “I like their art” would not, on their own, meet the standard. However,
because at this point the students have had so many shared experiences with
the content, and because they can meet the level of exceeding expectations not
only by remaining focused on the topic throughout but also by actively engag-
ing other members of their group (e.g., using follow-up questions, asking non-
participating students questions to try to help them earn credit), there becomes
a team mentality about the assessment, and students work hard to have a mean-
ingful, example-rich conversation about the art and lives of Kahlo and Rivera.
A Focus on Historical Content in the Foreign Language

Classroom: A Unit on the Tumultuous Relationships
between Cuba and the United States
In planning content to drive my mini expeditions, I do not always follow a lin-
ear path. I tend to find what is most compelling to me, and then build the mini
expedition around it. In the case of “El arte de Frida Kahlo y Diego Rivera,” for
instance, I was moved and intrigued by their art and their life story, and felt that
my students could engage with their stories as well. The mini expedition that I
am going to describe from Spanish 4 holds central the historic decision this past
year (2014–2015) by the Obama administration to lift the embargo with Cuba,
which I was convinced would be a compelling topic for my students to explore
because of its politically charged symbolism and because it is culturally and his-
torically relevant to them. During the planning of this mini expedition, I used
Cuban broadcast news as well as American Spanish language broadcast news as
mediums through which my students could begin to understand the historical
significance of this political decision. I then used the current event platform to
have students delve into why this decision was so historic and significant as I will
describe in this following section.
I remember, as a college student, following the plight of Elian González,
then a six-year-old Cuban national who, along with his mother, attempted to
flee Cuba on a raft in hopes of arriving on U.S. shores. I was intrigued by the
humanistic aspect of this story—how desperate must life be for some people in
Cuba that they would want to risk their lives traversing the Straits of Florida on
a raft in hope of a better future? I was also amazed at the political battle that
ensued over where Elian would live, the United States or Cuba. As the news of
the lifting of the embargo on Cuba came out, I knew that I wanted to use this
current event to engage my students in the relatively recent history between the
United States and Cuba.
When I begin a mini expedition I am often very surprised to realize that my
students’ prior knowledge is very different from what I originally anticipated.
For that reason, before delving into this mini expedition, I quickly surveyed
258 Nancy Hagstrom
students to assess what they already knew about Cuba. Although most students
knew its general location (e.g., the fact that it’s near Florida, that it’s an island),
and some knew the name Fidel Castro, almost none were familiar with the
history between Cuba and the United States I realized, as I read their survey
responses that I would have to start with foundational knowledge and work up to
more complex and intriguing content in order to ensure that all students would
appreciate the impact of the Obama–Raul Castro agreements. So, I kicked off this
mini expedition titled “Las Relaciones entre Cuba y los EEUU” (Relationships
between Cuba and the U.S.) with a simple web-quest, which asked students to
find information about the political structure in Cuba (e.g., Who is the presi-
dent? What type of government does Cuba have? What is the population?), the
geography of Cuba and its neighbors, and some specific aspects of the culture of
Cuba. Some examples of the prompts I gave them were: Find a song by a Cuban
musician; listen to it and give your reaction. Find a picture and a description of
a typical Cuban meal. Identify and describe different ethnic groups in Cuba.
Describe the most popular sports in Cuba.
After having established some common knowledge about Cuba, we began the
immersion stage of this mini expedition by looking at the current events. I knew
that I wanted my students to be able to listen to and watch the news broadcasts
about the agreement between Obama and Raul Castro, but I also knew that for
some of my students much of the content would be lost as they struggled to listen
for comprehension to native Spanish-speaking news broadcasters. So, I began the
immersion stage by having my students grapple with an article from Univision
that described the agreement. After this preparation phase that provided students
with the background knowledge necessary to be able to listen for content as well
as comprehension—by reading the article students knew what they were sup-
posed to listen for and some key terms related to the content that would allow
them to listen more closely—we watched the news broadcasts, discussed what
was happening in them, and noted cultural aspects of the news as well. At this
point students were beginning to realize how important this bilateral agreement
was, but they still didn’t fully understand why it was so significant. At this stage
we were primed to begin building background knowledge.
The central focus of the Building Background Knowledge phase was a time-
line from Univision, a site that, although is not the most academic, provides lan-
guage that is really accessible to students. The timeline outlined and summarized
a series of major events between the United States and Cuba beginning in 1960 and
ending with our current event. In small groups, students worked to comprehend
the short summaries of a series of events, and then, as a class, we made sure that
everyone knew what had happened for each event listed. This provided a sense
for students of how complicated the relationship between the United States and
Cuba had been for the past fifty-five years and also segued us into the Indepen-
dent Investigation phase of the expedition where students were asked to research
a topic independently related to their culminating product. After we had dis-
sected and made sure that there was general class comprehension of the timeline,
I told the students that they would each be responsible for one of the events on
the timeline. We discussed the product descriptor and the rubrics that aligned
with this component of the culminating assessment task (see Appendix 12C). As
clearly indicated in the rubrics, students were assessed toward three standards
during the course of the independent investigation and culmination: Interpre-
tive Reading, Presentational Writing, and Presentational Speaking. In order to
succeed in their culminating presentation, students not only needed to be able
to communicate and present (both through writing and verbally) in Spanish, but
also needed to have a clear grasp on the content they were presenting. A presenta-
tion lacking the comprehension of the content they were responsible for sharing
with the class would undermine the importance of their presentation. Because
each student became an expert in a specific historical event, the class became
dependent on that student as their expert, a fact that made the importance of the
content that much more relevant.
The assessed part of the culmination, the high-stakes finale to our mini expe-
dition, was a fairly traditional presentation to the class about the particular event
that each student had researched. After the culminating event, in which students
presented and then responded to questions about their topic, I invited a former
CBHS student from Cuba, Ramses, who had grown up in the elite sector of
Cuban society and whose family had fled the country as so many other have
in the past to come to our class to be an expert. Now enrolled at a local col-
lege, Ramses was invited to join our class to give his perspective on growing up
in Cuba and what it was like to come to the United States. The unit prepared
students well for this encounter by providing them with enough understanding
of the history of the United States and Cuba to fully grasp the significance of
Ramses’s story. Ramses told his story in Spanish, and students engaged with him
thereafter in Spanish as well. For this mini expedition, though students weren’t
formally assessed on the interaction with Ramses, the fact that they knew that he
would be coming to class provided a reason and impetus for them to really delve
into their topic and listen closely to the presentations of their peers.
Conclusion
By using the EL model as an overarching curricular framework to guide the
development of well-balanced CBI instructional modules, I am able to success-
fully target both the development of content and linguistic knowledge in my FL
classroom. As I have tried to show throughout this chapter, the EL framework
(also discussed and illustrated in Troyan, Chapter 10, this volume) affords much
potential when it comes to making the FL classroom an intellectually stimulating
site conducive of language learning:
• the Immersion phase piques student interest while helping them practice
essential vocabulary and grammatical structures needed to complete subse-
quent tasks;
260 Nancy Hagstrom
• the Building Background Knowledge phase provides students with the

necessary content and skills to be able to fully engage with what they are
studying;
• the Independent Investigation phase pushes students to conduct research and
rehearse skills and knowledge on their own and, by so doing, practice essen-
tial academic skills needed across disciplines as well as help them develop
intellectual autonomy; and
• the high-stakes culmination—usually a presentational task that presents the
work that students have researched during the independent investigation
phase—where students are responsible for using or presenting content in a
meaningful way allows them to use language in an authentic context while
also requiring them to provide evidences that they have understood the con-
cepts that were explored during unit.
Because of this structure I am able to help facilitate the language learning process
and meet students where they are both individually and creatively, helping them
to see the relevance of what we are studying, engage in the rigorous content-
based and linguistically based activities, and build relationships with content as
well as peers and teachers.
Students want to feel connected to the content that they are studying. After
the culmination of “El arte de Frida Kahlo y Diego Rivera” I had a student this
year share with me that she now felt deeply connected to Frida Kahlo because she
struggled with advanced juvenile rheumatoid arthritis and was in almost con-
stant pain. This student found that, like Frida, she could artistically represent her
pain and help explain to others through her art what she was going through. She
also shared that she was excited to use her newly acquired Spanish knowledge to
read portions of a journal of Frida Kahlo that had been published. For me, the
knowledge that this choice of content helped a student discover a way to grapple
with a difficult situation was transformative and confirming.
The power of language for students is truly evident in the mini expedition
exploring the relationships between Cuba and the United States because of the
fact that their research and preparation leads them to an authentic interaction with
a native Spanish speaker. What makes the interaction between Ramses and my
students all the more meaningful is that Ramses did not speak English when he
arrived in the United States and so can give a perspective on the power that lan-
guages hold. After having engaged with Ramses in Spanish for ninety minutes,
students left the class period feeling empowered linguistically as well as more sensi-
tive to issues related to immigration and the real human stories that are associated
with such experiences. The preparation that students participated in throughout
this mini expedition allowed them to adequately interact with Ramses and there-
fore made the work that they engaged in throughout purposeful and relevant.
I am confident that strong content is of connecting with students emotion-
ally and/or intellectually. And is content that pushes them to engage with the
rigor of what they are studying. Although I will admit that finding and creating
strong content to drive lessons certainly puts more onus on the teacher initially
than it would be the case in traditional textbook-driven contexts where materials
are readily available, the results that come from it are second to none. If students
leave my classroom feeling as though they have a connection to language, to
culture, to a story, to each other, then I feel that I have done my job well. It then
becomes my responsibility to perpetuate the cycle of engagement and help show
students the power and magic that languages hold.
Reference
Margolin, A. (2015). Culture first: Setting the table for deeper learning. Expeditionary
Learning. Retrieved from http://elschools.org/best-practices/culture-first-setting-table-
deeper-learning. Accessed on August 23, 2015.
APPENDIX 12A
Guided Notes Sheet for Students during
Kahlo/Rivera Gallery Walk
El arte de Frida Kahlo y Diego Rivera Kick-off/Immersion

Task: Observe the different aspects of the gallery to get a broad sense of what
we will be engaged with during the expedition. In the “¿Qué hay?” (What is
there?) column, please record what you see/read (if you are reading a quote,
please write the quote). In the “Pensamientos/preguntas” (thoughts/questions)
section, record your initial thoughts and any questions you may have. You may
write in English or Spanish.
Componente ¿Qué hay? Pensamientos/preguntas

(Component) (What is there?) (Thoughts/questions)
La cita por Alberto Giacometti (The quote
by Alberto Giacometti)
La cita por Andrea Imaginario (The quote
by Andrea Imaginario)
La cita por Frida Kahlo (The quote by
Frida Kahlo)
La cita por Guillermo Kahlo (the quote by
Guillermo Kahlo)
La foto de Diego y Frida (The photo of
Diego y Frida)
Mural: Rivera, Vendadora De Flores (The
Flower Seller)
Mural: Rivera, El Agitador (The agitator)
Pintura: Frida 1, Diego on my Mind
(Painting)
APPENDIX 12B
Rubric for Interpersonal Discussion on
Frida Kahlo/Diego Rivera Using the
Interpersonal Speaking Standard
Task: Participate in an 8- to 10-minute discussion about the art and lives of

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera with your peers.
Standard Exceeds Meets Approaching Does Not Meet

Interpersonal - I actively - I actively - I somewhat - I do not
Speaking engage other participate participate in participate in
Learning members of in group the discussion. the discussion.
Target: I can my discussion discussion. - I speak in
actively engage group. - I use Spanglish.
in a discussion - I cite specific appropriate - I am off topic.
with my peers examples from vocabulary. - I read off of my
in Spanish. what we have - I stay on topic notes.
studied. and stay in
- I speak Spanish.
accurately - I use the
without the support of my
support of my notes, but I do
notes. not read my
notes.
APPENDIX 12C
Rubric for U.S. and Cuba Relations
Presentation Using the Presentational
Speaking Standard
La presentación (The presentation):
Standard Exceeds Meets Approaching Does Not Meet

Presentational - I present - I present - I present a - I do not
Speaking an accurate an accurate somewhat present.
Learning summary summary of my accurate
Target: of my event specific event in summary of
I can speak without the comprehensible my event in
accurately in support of Spanish. somewhat
Spanish about my notes. - I use the support comprehensible
a specific topic of my notes, but Spanish and/or
to my peers and I do not read my Spanglish.
teachers. notes. - I read from my
notes.
The class period after your presentations we will be inviting a CBHS alum-
nae, who grew up in Cuba and came to the United States when he was a junior in
high school, to come to class to share his experience with you. The presentations
will help you understand some of the social and cultural context that he grew up
in and that he experienced when he moved here.
CONTRIBUTORS
Laurent Cammarata is Associate Professor in Education at the Faculté Saint-

Jean, University of Alberta, Canada. His work concentrates on helping foreign
language and immersion teachers implement meaning-oriented curricular
approaches such as content-based instruction that make possible the concurrent
teaching of language and content. His research has been published in well-
respected scientific venues such as the Canadian Modern Language Review, Foreign
Language Annals, L2 Journal, and the Modern Language Journal. He is also the 2013
corecipient of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages/
Modern Language Journal Paul Pimsleur award for Research in Foreign Language
Education.
Joy Cumming is a secondary French Teacher in Central New York. She received
her B.S. in Elementary Education at the State University of New York (SUNY)
at Plattsburgh, and graduated from McGill University with an M.A. in Second
Language Education. She counts herself fortunate to have had the opportunity to
study and teach in Ireland, Québec, France, and China. Her M.A. thesis research
involved planning and implementing the classroom intervention study discussed
in this volume. Today, she is happy to be back in the classroom, putting theory
into practice.
Richard Donato is Professor and Chair of the Department of Instruction and

Learning, University of Pittsburgh. His research interests include early foreign
language learning, sociocultural theory, classroom discourse analysis, and teacher
education. His research on foreign language education earned him the American
Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages/Modern Language Journal Paul
Pimsleur award (1997 and 2006), the Northeast Conference Freeman Award
266 Contributors
(2004), and the French Institute of Washington Award (2003). He is the coauthor
of the book A Tale of Two Schools: Developing Sustainable Early Language Programs.
He is currently the codirector of ACTFL’s Research Priorities Task Force.
Nancy Hagstrom is a secondary Spanish language teacher in Portland, Maine.

She received her B.A. in Spanish from Gettysburg College and her M.A. in
Teaching and Learning from the University of Southern Maine. She has been
fortunate to study and work in a variety of Spanish-speaking countries and
enjoys making the Spanish language exciting and relevant for her students. She is
thrilled that she works in a school that is structured around learning expeditions,
two of which are highlighted in this volume.
Elizabeth A. Kautz works at the University of Minnesota, with a dual-appointment

in the Department of German, Scandinavian and Dutch and the College of
Liberal Arts Language Center. She is the Coordinator for third-semester German,
where she has integrated online learning modules on sustainability-related topics,
introduced Integrated Performance Assessments, and developed and taught a hybrid
version of the course. She was Director of Language Instruction in German,
Scandinavian and Dutch from 2006 to 2012 and has cotaught the CARLA
Summer Institute Using Technology in Second Language Teaching since 2005. She
earned her Ph.D. in German from the University of Minnesota in 1997.
Ryuko Kubota is Professor in the Department of Language and Literacy Educa-

tion in the Faculty of Education at the University of British Columbia, Canada.
She teaches second/foreign language teacher education and Japanese as a foreign
language. Her research draws on critical applied linguistics, critical multicul-
turalism, critical race theory, and critical pedagogy. She is a coeditor of Race,
Culture, and Identities in Second Language Education: Exploring Critically Engaged
Practice (Routledge, 2009) and Demystifying Career Paths after Graduate School:
A Guide for Second Language Professionals in Higher Education (Information Age
Publishing, 2012). Her publications also appear in many academic journals and
edited books.
Roy Lyster is Professor in Second Language Education in the Department of

Integrated Studies in Education at McGill University, Canada. His research
examines content-based second language instruction and the effects of instructional
interventions—such as teacher scaffolding and corrective feedback—designed to
counterbalance form-focused and content-based approaches. His research interests
also include collaboration among language teachers for integrated language
learning and biliteracy development. He was copresident then president of the
Canadian Association of Applied Linguistics from 2004 to 2008 and is author
of Learning and Teaching Languages through Content: A Counterbalanced Approach,
published by Benjamins in 2007.
Contributors 267
Jason Martel is Assistant Professor of TESOL/TFL at the Middlebury Institute

of International Studies at Monterey, where he teaches courses in curriculum
design, assessment, second language acquisition, and language pedagogy and
directs the Institute’s Summer Intensive Language Program (SILP). His research
interests lie principally in the domain of foreign language teacher learning, with
a particular focus on identity construction. Recent publications can be found
in The New Educator, The French Review, The Routledge Handbook of Educational
Linguistics, and Foreign Language Annals.
Terry A. Osborn is Regional Vice Chancellor for Academic and Student Affairs and
Professor at the University of South Florida at Sarasota–Manatee. Dr. Osborn is an
internationally recognized scholar of language education and critical pedagogy,
having published a dozen books and thirty-four articles and chapters, serving
as editor of six academic book series, and serving as the founding coeditor of
the top-tier international journal Critical Inquiry in Language Studies. Dr. Osborn’s
scholarly work on critical reflection and the world language classroom received
many awards among which are the American Educational Studies Association
Critics’ Choice Award and the NECTFL Stephen Freeman Award.
Timothy Reagan (Ph.D., University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana), is currently

the Dean of the Graduate School of Education at Nazarbayev University, in Astana,
Kazakhstan. He has held faculty and administrative positions at Gallaudet
University, the University of Connecticut, Roger Williams University, the
University of the Witwatersrand, and Central Connecticut State University. He
is the author of more than a dozen books and 150 refereed journal articles and
book chapters, dealing with issues related to foreign language education, applied
linguistics, and language planning and language policy studies.
Marianna V. Ryshina-Pankova is Assistant Professor at the German Department

at Georgetown University. As Director of Curriculum she is actively involved
in the maintenance and revision of the undergraduate curriculum and graduate
student teacher mentoring. She teaches at all levels of the undergraduate program,
as well as graduate seminars on foreign language learning and teaching, advanced
literacy development, and Systemic Functional Linguistics. Her research interests
include content and language integrated curriculum design, language teacher
education, second language writing, and literacy development. She has published
on such topics as genre-based pedagogy, grammatical metaphor as a feature of
advanced literacy, cohesion and coherence in advanced foreign language writing,
and development of interactional resources in foreign language writer texts.
Diane J. Tedick is Associate Professor in Second Language Education at the

University of Minnesota. She directs and teaches courses in a graduate certificate
program in Dual Language/Immersion Education and provides professional
268 Contributors
development for immersion educators in the United States and internationally. Her
current research focuses on immersion teaching and immersion students’ language
development. Recent publications include coedited volumes on immersion research
(Multilingual Matters) and articles in Applied Linguistics, the Modern Language Journal,
and Language, Culture and Curriculum. She serves as founding coeditor of the Journal
of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education (John Benjamins).
Francis J. Troyan is Assistant Professor of Foreign and Second Language Education

at The Ohio State University in Columbus. His research and teaching focus on
foreign language teacher development, genre, and functional linguistics in K–12
foreign language education. His research has appeared in The Canadian Modern
Language Review, Foreign Language Annals, and Language and Sociocultural Theory.
He is a coauthor of Implementing Integrated Performance Assessment. His work in
content-based instruction featured in this volume unites his work as a former
teacher of French at Casco Bay High School and his interests in performance
assessment and Systemic Functional Linguistics.
INDEX
Abbott, M. 111 approach 224; grammatical gender 91;

academic language 128–30 high-stakes 147, 253, 259, 260; impact
academic literacy 130–3 of language on 148–9; imperative
Achugar, M. 36 forms 91–2; see also Integrated
ACTFL/CAEP see American Council on Performance Assessment (IPA)
the Teaching of Foreign Languages; asyndetic constructions 36, 46n7
Council for Accreditation of Educator Atomic Bombs Casualty Commission
Preparation (ABCC) 196
activism, in foreign language education 14 Aue, M. 69
advanced literacy: and the connection
between situations 56–7; developing Bacon, Francis 31
72–3; and the use of incongruent Baker, C. 7
genres 57–8; and sustainability studies Barnes-Karol, G. 111
235–6, 242–4; see also critical literacy Bateman, B. 113
Advanced Placement (AP) courses 68 Benesch, S. 204, 205
advertisements, critical digestions of 110 Biermann, Wolf 72
air pollution thematic unit 135–41 bilingual education 56
American Council on the Teaching of bilingualism 1, 7
Foreign Languages (ACTFL) 4, 18n2, Bloom, B. S. 112
102, 149, 236, 247n8; proficiency Bloom’s Taxonomy 103, 108, 135, 224
guidelines 237 Blow, Peter 196
Anderson, L. W. 224 Bonferroni method 91
Andreotti, V. 207 Brinton, D. 93
Arens, K. 244 Broner, M. A. 111
Articulation and Achievement Project Bruner, J. 125
105–6 Burke, B. M. 103–4
arts, in the foreign language classroom Byram, M. 6, 244
253– 7, 260, 262–3 Byrnes, H. 28, 35, 58, 68
aspect, in Russian 183–4
assessment: in CBI 84–5, 90–2, 147–8; CAEP see Council for Accreditation of
classroom-based 147; content Educator Preparation
knowledge 92; critical pedagogy CALP (cognitive academic language
and 179–80; and the EL-CBL hybrid proficiency) 130
270 Index
Cammarata, L. 12, 30, 79, 147, 148, 150, content-based instruction (CBI)
246 implementation: benefits 94; challenges
Canagarajah, Suresh 175 78–9, 92–4; classroom observations
CARLA see Center for Advanced Research 83, 85–6; counterbalanced instruction
on Language Acquisition; University of 77–8; discussion of results 92–5;
Minnesota example of 251–61; interviews 83–4,
Casco Bay High School for Expeditionary 86–9; learning assessments 84–5,
Learning (CBHS) 141n2, 252 90–2; methodology of study 80–5;
CASLS see Center for Applied Second questionnaires 84, 89–90; rationale and
Language Studies research questions 79–80; results of
causality 35–6, 58 study 85–92
CBI see content-based instruction content-based instruction (CBI) research:
Center for Advanced Research on and the Culture, Connections, and
Language Acquisition (CARLA; Communities Standards 111–13; link
University of Minnesota) 15, 235 with thinking 107–9; studies/projects
Center for Applied Second Language by standard 122
Studies (CASLS) 2 content-based instruction (CBI)
Chiarelott, L. 133 theoretical foundations: dichotomies
Chikamatsu, N. 194–5 vs. dialectics 28–9; disciplinary
classroom observations 83, 85–6 language practices 29–30; and the
CLIL see content and language integrated effects of content-based mediation
learning 32–3; sociocultural theory 26–7, 29,
CoBaLTT see Content-Based Language 30; Swain’s output hypothesis 26
Teaching with Technology Content-Based Language Teaching with
Coffin, C. 59 Technology (CoBaLTT) 15, 18n4,
cognitive academic language proficiency 134, 141n4, 149; Project planning
(CALP) 130 tools 226
cognitive depth 132–3 contexts, of language use 53–4
Cognitive Linguistics 29 controversial issues 201; should balanced
cognitive psychology 26 views be presented? 202–3; should
Cold War politics 198 controversial issues be discussed?
collaboration 42, 44, 68, 80, 81, 86, 93, 201–2; should the teacher stay neutral?
105, 216, 240, 244 203–4
COLT (Communicative Orientation to Council for Accreditation of Educator
Language Teaching) 83, 85 Preparation (CAEP) 102
Communicative Orientation to Language Council of Europe 4
Teaching (COLT) 83, 85 Craig, Barbara 176
computer-mediated communication 113 critical affirmation 208
content and language integrated learning critical CBI 193; example of in Japanese
(CLIL) 12, 56, 78 classroom 194; poststructuralist
content-based instruction (CBI) 1–2, 192, approach to 206
215; and the Communities Standards, critical linguistics 6, 173
112–13, 122; and the Connections critical literacy: defined 66; in CBI 192,
Standards, 112, 122; content and 193; see also advanced literacy
language interface in 116n2, 150–1; critical pedagogy 109–10; assessment
and the Culture Standards, 111, 122; as activities and 179–80; in CBI classes
inspiration 250–1; intervention topic 179, 192; challenges of 188; class
80–2; linking with Expeditionary discussion in Russian classroom 185–7;
Learning 219–23; program models class discussion in Spanish classroom
for 12–13; recommended features for 182–3; and controversial issues 201–4;
inclusion 78; sustained 109; theme- and the curriculum 176–8; examples in
based 109; see also critical CBI; inquiry- the foreign language classrooms 180–7;
driven language programs explained 174–5; in foreign language
Index 271
education 173–4; transformative Early Language Learning research 32

potential of 175–6, 193 Echevarría, J. 129
critical thinking skills 9–10, 193; emphasis Edelson, D. 127
on 107; and foreign language 102–7; education: bilingual 56; dialogic 201;
and sustainability studies 235–6, 242–4 goals of 201, 237, 243; immersion 25,
Cubberley, Paul 183 26, 78, 192; peace 195, 199; see also
cultural awareness 10–11, 13, 14, 17 foreign language (FL) education
cultural borders, crossing 7 Edwards, John 173
culture: in foreign language education EL-CBI hybrid approach 217–26; lesson
104, 106; and language 4, 6; learning template 231–3; planning template
through genre 54–6 229–30; student reflection on the
Cummins, J. 130 learning experience 224–6
curiosity 123, 141n1 ELL see English language learners
curricula/curriculum: content-rich 113–15; Ellsworth, E. 205
CBI model 217; Expeditionary Learning Emory University 56
model 127, 217; genre-based 55–6, Empowering education (Shor) 174
58–69, 70–1, 73; inquiry-driven 125, English as a Second Language (ESL) 30,
133–41; more cognitively challenging 126, 147, 151; see also teaching English
124; relationship to textbook 176; as a second language (TESL)
textbook-based 141n3 English classrooms: content-based
curricular nullification: additive 177–8; instruction in 58, 108–9, 192; content
subtractive 178 and language assessment in 147;
curriculum planning: arts and history functional linguistics in 159; historical
in the foreign language classroom literacy approach in 126; politics and
250–64; EL-CBL hybrid approach ideology in 175, 178, 200, 202, 204
217–26; exploring environmental and English language learners (ELL) 192
sustainability issues 234–247; Green Environmental Issues (Les problèmes de
German Project 235–47; Le Maine l’environnement) theme 80–95
Francophone, 221–3 Eppelsheimer, N. 245
curriculum planning examples 145–6: ESL see English as a Second Language
focus on the arts (Kahlo and Rivera) essentialism 206
253–7, 260, 262–3; historical content ethics, in foreign language education
(U.S.-Cuba relationships) 257–9, 260, 14, 17
264; The Human Face of Human Rights Expeditionary Learning (EL): in action
218, 220, 221; Le Maine Francophone 218–20, 252; curricular model for
215–33; My School My Vision 251–2 127, 217; example planning form 219;
Curtain, H. 114 explained 217–18; linking with CB
219–23
Dahlberg, C. A. 114 Expeditionary Learning (EL) phases:
Davin, K. 38, 39, 40 Immersion 218, 222, 231, 254, 258, 259,
de Oliveira, L. C. 126 262; Building Background Knowledge
decentering 6, 10, 204–5 218, 222, 255, 258, 260; Investigation
deep structure 101, 104 218, 222–3, 259, 260; Culmination 218,
Dene people 196–7 223, 256, 259, 260
developmental psychology 26
Dewey, John 125, 179 Fairclough, N. 6
dialogic education 201 Fang, Z. 35, 40
diversity: bio- 13; cultural 8; linguistic 8, feedback 39, 56, 154, 155, 160–2, 241–2,
177–8; of opinion 202–3; racial, ethnic, 244–6, 256
gender, sexuality 204 feminism 205
Donato, Richard 112, 133 Fiedler, Heidi 135, 137
dual-language programs 25 Finkbeiner, Felix 239
Dynamic Assessment 29, 37, 43 First Nations people 196
272 Index
Fitzgerald, J. C. 36, 43 86–8; neutrality of 203–4; opinions

Fitzsimmons, S. 131 of 201, 204–6; perspectives of 192–3;
foreign language (FL) classrooms: arts preparation of 42–5; support for CBI
in 253–7, 260, 262–3; observations in by 245, 250–1; see also foreign language
83, 85–6; see also English classrooms; teaching
foreign language teaching; French foreign language teaching: as political
classrooms; German classrooms; activity 175; situatedness of 199–200;
Russian classrooms; Spanish classrooms and the use of textbooks 176–80;
foreign language (FL) education: activism see also foreign language teachers
in 14, 202; critical thinking in 102–7; Fortune, T. W. 134, 138
“deep structure” of 101–4; and the French classrooms: content-based
development of critical and cultural instruction in 15–16, 77–94, 135–41,
awareness 7–8; and the development of 145; curricular nullification in
self-consciousness 5–7; as enhancement 178; expeditionary learning in 218,
for native language 7; ethics in 14, 17; 220–5; and the IPA-KF design 151–62;
evaluation of by CASLS 2–3; failure planning materials and examples
of 2–3; “four thematic pillars of world 165–9, 229–33
language education for social justice” Freud, Sigmund 28
14; frameworks for 105–7; frontloading Fröhlich, M. 83
language 30; implementation of Fukushima nuclear disaster 197–8
change in 68–9; integration of
language and content 29; and the Gee, J. 6
intellectual empowerment of learners genre(s): critical literacy through 65–7;
5; issues applicable to 177; language as incongruent 57–8; and the learning of
cultural knowledge and understanding culture 54–6; sequencing with 58–9;
4–6; language choices in 14; linguistic in teacher education 70; teaching
emphasis in 8–9; literacy development language and content through 59–65
in 51; long-term vision for 9–12; need Georgetown University 52, 56
for 1; need for reform in 1–2; non- German classrooms: content-based
linguistic content 102, 104, 215; new instruction in 56–69, 72; sustainability
goals for 8–9; re-envisioning 3–4; role studies in 235–46
of motivation in 3–4, 9, 11; thematic Gerwin, D. 112
emphasis in 14–17; see also foreign Gibbons, P. 30, 106
language teaching Gibson, M. 108
foreign language (FL) education types: Glogs (graphical blogs) 81, 90
communicative 187; dual-language GMs see grammatical metaphors
programs 25; genre-based 55–6, goals: of advanced literacy pedagogy
58–67; grammar-based 55; immersion 65–7; of the Articulation and
programs 25, 26, 78, 192; sheltered Achievement Project 105; authentic
instruction 192; student-centered 251; communicative 53, 55, 59;
179; study abroad 113; task-based 187; community and environmental 13; for
theme-based 187–8; see also content- content-based instruction 9–13, 18, 25,
based instruction (CBI); inquiry-driven 41, 129–31, 135, 138, 244, 246; content,
language programs language, and learning 81; of education
Foreign Language Research Centers, 201, 237, 243; of foreign language
national 2, 18n1 education 8–9, 123–4, 175, 220, 242–3;
Foreign Languages and Higher Education: of mediation 37–8; multiple 179, 188;
New Structures for a Changed World see also National Standards in Foreign
(MLA report) 111 Language Project (NSFLP)
foreign languages, use of term 188n2 González, Elian 257
foreign language teachers: authority Gordin, D. 127
of 204–6; and the inquiry-driven Gore, J. M. 205
approach 128–9; interviews with 83–4, Grabe, W. 27
Index 273
grammatical gender 82, 84, 85, 91 129–30; implementation of 123–4;

grammatical metaphors (GMs) 57–8, 63 inquiry as the core 124; and the
Green German Project : balancing intersection of content, language
content and language in instruction and literacy 138–40; key challenges
241–2, 245–6; changes made during 128; and the reconceptualization
implementation 240–1; and critical of language teaching 129–30; and
thinking and advanced literacy skills sociocultural theory 125–6; as support
235–6, 242–4; instructional context for reform 127–8; see also content-based
and aims 236–7; lessons learned instruction (CBI)
245–6; materials and tasks 238–40; and Integrated Performance Assessment (IPA):
twenty-first century skills 244–5; unit and the Communications Standards,
design and rationale 237–8 149–50; development of 147–9;
Gross-Pisarek, Ruth 61 interpersonal task 155; interpretive task
154–5; IPA-KF assessment model 148,
Habermas, Jürgen 4 151–62; and Knowledge Framework
Hadashi no Gen [Barefoot Gen ] 196, 199 148, 151–62; modifications for use in
Hahn, Kurt 218 CBI 150–1; presentational task 155–6;
Halliday, M. A. K. 4, 57, 151, 158 student example 168–9
Harrison, K. 242 interdisciplinary approaches 5, 10, 17–18,
Hendry, H. 112 108, 112, 201, 217, 225, 235, 236
Heroes without Names (Stoltzfus) 62, 63, 65 International Baccalaureate (IB) courses 68
Hess, D. E. 202 Interpretive Reading 259
higher-order thinking skills 10, 107, 112, interviews: with Franco-American
127–30, 135, 216, 221, 224, 235–6, subjects 231–3; with students and
246, 251 teachers 83–4, 86–9
historical content, in foreign language
classrooms 257–9, 260, 264 Japanese classrooms: content-based
historical literacy approach 126 instruction in 114, 115, 126–7; critical
history: as “mystery” 112; as narrative CBI in 192–208
content 59–65 Johnson, K. 34
history texts 35–6
Hoare, P. 78 Kahlo, Frida 253–7
Horst, E. E. 243 KCA formula (Knowledge targeted,
Höyng, P. 69 Cognitive complexity, and Activities)
Huang, J. 151, 158 134–5
The Human Face of Human Rights planning Kelly, T. E. 203
model 218, 221 Kennedy, T. J. 107–8
human rights, in Expeditionary Learning KF see Knowledge Framework
218, 220 Kincheloe, J. L. 199
hyper-self-reflexivity 208 Kitamura, T. 197
Klein, N. 2
ianfu [comfort women] 197 knowledge: acquisition of 124, 126;
identity: in foreign language education background 135–6, 152, 157, 195, 218,
14; gay 206; social 4, 125 220–2, 255, 258, 160; boundaries of
imagination 208 127; construction of 52, 55, 57, 58,
immersion programs 25, 26, 78, 192 159, 193, 204, 206, 208; content 12,
information-gap tasks 43–4, 230 30, 34, 41–2, 44–5, 72, 79, 84, 88, 92,
inquiry-driven language programs: and 94–5, 126, 134–5, 137, 139, 147–8, 149,
advanced literacy growth 130–3; 158, 161, 195, 220, 259; cultural 11,
brief overview 126; content-driven 111, 234; as discursive product 207,
objective formula 138–9; crafting 255; as intellectual commodity 176;
curricula for 133–41; examples of interdisciplinary 10, 17; language/
126–7; focus on academic language linguistic 5, 17, 26, 30, 43, 78, 84,
274 Index
158, 174, 188, 251, 260; limits to Mabuni no anmâ [A mother of Okinawa ] 197
127; marginalized 200; practical vs. Manhattan Project 196
theoretical 151–2, 157–8; prior 14, 232, Martel, J. 12
257–8; social and historical 199; static Martin, J. R. 40
115; transfer of 246; unpacking 203, Massachusetts Foreign Language
206, 207–8 Curriculum Framework 106
Knowledge Framework: applying to IPA Maxim, H. 69
planning for CBI (example) 152–6; McLaren, Peter 174
creating a documentary panel using McTighe, J. 10, 113, 115, 125
165; and IPA 148, 151–62; practical vs. mediation: content-based 32–3; in a
theoretical knowledge in 152, 157 content-based interview 39–40; of
Kolb, D. A. 224 content talk 42–3; in ESL classrooms
Kong, S. 78 30; of language and content 36–7; and
Krashen, S. D. 26, 27 sociocultural theory 31–4; of tasks
Krathwohl, D. R. 112, 224 43–4; of texts 43; two approaches
Kumashiro, K. K. 109 compared 33–4; in written texts 40–2
Kuroi ane [Black Rain] (film) 195 Melin, Charlotte 243
“Memories of War” course 194–6; atomic
Lancaster, M. 69 bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
language: academic 129–30; in history texts 195, 196; the Battle of Okinawa 197;
35–6; integration with content 215–16; Canada’s involvement in atomic
“intertwined” nature of 148–9; linguist’s bombing 196; and the Fukushima
view of 8; as meaning-making resource nuclear disaster 197–8; political nature
159; political nature of 13; situational of course content 199–201
and cultural contexts of 53–4; as social Met, M. 12, 77, 107, 112
semiotic 54 microgenesis 37
language assistants 95 Mind in Society (Vygotsky) 28
language for specific/academic purposes Miracle and Reality (Habbe) 61, 62, 64, 65
192 Modern Language Association, report on
Language Learning Continuum 105, 106 foreign language education 216, 236
Lantolf, J. 34, 38 Moeller, A. J. 107
learners see students Mohan, B. 148, 151, 152
learning assessments see assessment; moral relativism 207
Integrated Performance Assessment motivation: in foreign language (FL)
(IPA) education 3–4, 9, 11; of students
Lee, H. 112 246–7, 252–3
Legendre, J. 11 movable praxis 194
Le Maine Francophone: Hier et Aujourd’hui multilingualism 1, 56
(Francophone Maine: Yesterday and Today)
expeditionary unit 153–8, 160–1, 215; Nanking Massacre 195, 199, 200
content rubric for 158, 160–2, 166–7 National Standards in Foreign Language
Leontiev, A. 34 Project (NSFLP) 101, 104, 226, 236;
Liaw, M. 102, 108 5 Cs comprising 105, 216, 217, 218,
Likert scale 89 236–7; Communications Standards
linguicism 177, 189n4 149–50, 156, 216, 236; Communities
linguistics, critical 6, 173 Standards, 112–13, 122, 216, 236;
literacy skills 9–10, 136–8; academic Comparisons 216, 236; Connections
130–3; in foreign language education Standards, 112, 122, 216, 236; Culture
51; historical 126; technology 240, Standards, 111, 122, 216, 236
244; see also advanced literacy; critical Natural Approach 45n2
literacy Nelson, C. D. 206
LTO formula (Literacy skills, Texts, New London Group 51
Outcome) 136, 138 Niebel, Dirk 239
Lyster, Roy 44 No Child Left Behind (NCLB) 147
Index 275
Okinawa 197 Remapping the Foreign Language Curriculum

Open Spaces for Dialogue and Inquiry (Arens & Swaffar) 244
(OSDE) Methodology 207 Rheme and Theme relationships 159,
Osborn, Terry A. 5, 7, 14, 104, 108, 110, 160–1
112, 177, 180 Rivera, Diego 253–7
Other, sensitivity to 7, 10, 30–1, 33, Rose, D. 40
188n2, 218 Rosenstrasse protest 60–4
output hypothesis 26 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 125
Outward Bound urban education Russian classrooms: content-based
initiative 217 instruction in 180, 183–7; teaching
aspect in 183–4
Pally, M. 109 Ryshina-Pankova, M. 58
Partnership for 21st Century Skills 216,
247n8 Santos, T. 202
Pavlov, Ivan 28 Sapir, E. 4
Pea, R. 127 scaffolding 30, 134–9, 245; of language
peace education 195, 199 instruction 71; of literacy 64, 66
Pearce, J. M. 243 Schaumann, C. 69
Pearson, Jill 15–16 Schleppegrell, M. J. 33, 35, 36, 40, 126
pedagogy: genre-based 55–6, 58–69, 71 second language acquisition 26–7; PPP
Pennycook, P. 194 approach to 101
Pessoa, R. R. 204 semantics 54, 57
Pessoa, S. 112 semiotic systems 35–6
Phillips, J. 111 service learning 112–13
Piaget, Jean 6, 125 Sfard, A. 31–2
Plant-for-the-Planet 239 sheltered instruction 192
politics: Cold War 198; of the content and Shor, Ira 174
situatedness of instruction 199–201; of Short, D. J. 129, 131
history textbooks 198–9 Skehan, P. 35, 78, 93, 94
postcolonial theory 207 SLA see second language acquisition
poststructuralism 193, 201, 206 social architecture, in foreign language
power relations: repressive 206; teacher- education 14
student dynamics of 200; unequal 193, social identity 4, 125
197 social issues 193–4
pragmatics 54 social justice 14, 17, 109–10, 206
praxis, movable 194 socialization, in language instruction 32
Presentational Speaking 256, 259, 264 sociocultural theory 125; and the CBI
Presentational Writing 161, 256, 259 approach 42, 45; and content-based
Present-Practice-Produce (PPP) model language instruction 25–7, 29, 30; of
101 learning 46n5; and mediation 39; and
Processing Instruction 45n2 the need for tools 31; role of mediation
project-based learning 125, 215 in 31–4; and the Teaching-Learning
psychology: cognitive 26; developmental Cycle 41
26; Vygotsky’s unified theory of 28 sociolinguistics 6, 178
Spada, N. 83
queer theory 206 Spanish classrooms: content-based
questionnaires, for CBI implementation instruction in 180–3, 253–61; cultural
study 84, 89–90 content in 110–11, 178; guided notes
and rubrics 163–4; reflections of a
rationalism 206, 207 Spanish teacher 250–3; research in
Reagan, T. G. 5, 6, 7, 104, 108, 110 32–4, 38–40, 103
relationships: dialogic 36–7; Theme and St. Olaf College 111
Rheme 159, 160–1 Standards see National Standards in
relativism: contextual 207; moral 207 Foreign Language Project
276 Index
Standards for Foreign Language Learning Thorne 38

in the 21st Century 215–16 Tokyo Electric Power Company
Stoller, F. 27 (TEPCO) 197
students: active participation of 11, Total Physical Response Storytelling
13; critical thinking ability of 103; (TPRS) 46n2
development of 32; intellectual TPRS (Total Physical Response
empowerment of 5; intellectual Storytelling) 46n2
sensitivity of 10–11, 14, 15–17; travel, sustainable 239
intellectual stimulation of 10, 13, 14, Troyan, F. 38, 40–2, 43, 112
15–17; interviews with 83–4, 88–9; Tucker, G. R. 112
motivation and achievement of 246–7, 21st Century Skills Map for World
252–3; reflection on the learning Languages 247n8
experience 224–6
study abroad 113 Understanding by Design (UbD) 115,
sustainability studies 234–5; and critical 116n5
thinking and advanced literacy skills Unsworth, L. 66
235–6, 242–4 Urzêda Freitas, M. T. 204
Swaffar, J. K. 244
Swain, M. 26, 27 Van Lier, L. 6
Sydney School 43 verb forms 82, 84, 85, 91–2, 183–4, 187
Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) verbalization 70
29, 36, 45, 46n10, 52–3, 57, 147; and victim/victimizer relationships 195,
analysis of the text 160–2; and the 196–7, 200–1, 204
IPA-KF design 158–62; theory of Village of Widows (documentary film) 196
159–60 vocabulary, thematic 30, 44
Vogt, M. 129
Tanaka, T. 198 Vygotsky, Lev 4, 5–6, 26–8, 30, 31, 36–7,
teacher training 69–72 125
teachers see foreign language teachers
teaching English as a second language Walker, C. L. 111
(TESL) 200; see also English as a Second water conservation unit 15–17
Language (ESL) Wesche, M. B. 35, 93, 94
Teaching-Learning Cycle 41 Whorf, B. L. 4
Teaching Proficiency through Reading Wiggins, G. 10, 113, 115, 125
and Storytelling 46n2 Wink, Joan 174
Teaching World Languages for Social Justice World-Readiness Standards for Learning
(Osborn) 177 Languages 236
technology literacies 240, 244
Tedick, D. J. 12, 111, 147, 148, 150, 246 Young, R. 32
textbooks 176–80; in Japan 195, 198–9; Yûnagi no machi, sakura no kuni [Town of
revisionism in 197–8 evening calm, country of cherry blossoms]
texts: analysis of 160–2; comparison of 237 196
thematic units 113–15
Theme and Rheme relationships 159, Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) 27,
160–1 37–8, 70; collaboration in 44; dialogic
thinking processes, and language 4–5 38–42; dynamic aspect of 46n9
Thompson, G. 242 Zwiers, J. 129–30

Content Based Foreign Language Teaching - Book

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CONTENT-BASED FOREIGN

Content-Based Foreign Language Teaching

Advancing alternatives to conventional curriculum design, this volume posits

Laurent Cammarata is Associate Professor in Education at the Faculté Saint-

Edited by Laurent Cammarata

1 Content-Based Instruction and Curricular Reforms:

2 Sociocultural Theory and Content-Based Foreign

3 Scaffolding Advanced Literacy in the Foreign Language

4 Integrating CBI into High School Foreign Language

5 Tapping the National Standards for Thought-Provoking

6 Foreign Language Education and the Development of

7 Assessing What Matters within Content-Based Foreign

8 Language Teachers in Foreign Territory: A Call for a Critical

9 Critical Content-Based Instruction in the Foreign Language

10 Le Maine Francophone : An Expeditionary Unit Targeting

11 Exploring Environmental and Sustainability Issues in the

12 A Look at CBI in Action: An Exploratory Journey into

About the Contributors 265

Laurent Cammarata, Diane J. Tedick,

curricular and instructional frameworks like CBI, which is specifically designed to

The Crisis of FL Education and the Need

The majority of students studying a foreign language in a traditional high

Re-envisioning FL Education as a Discipline:

Appraising the “True” Potential of FL Education

Beyond Language as a Tool for Communication

The Potential of FL Education to Support Learners’

The Potential of Foreign Language Learning for

consciousness is dynamically organized (Roebuck, 2000). Vygotsky’s legacy

Language is not simply a reflector of an objective cultural reality. It is

understanding of his native language is enhanced by learning a foreign

This notion that FL education can help individuals develop self-consciousness as

Language Learning and the Development of Critical

In studying languages other than our own, we are seeking to understand

It is the benefit of providing learners with a transcending learning experience

position when it comes to preparing individuals to function in plurilingual and

New Goals, New Curricular and Instructional Directions

Overcoming the Obsession with Linguistic Concerns

impossible. A quick review of FL textbooks (which drive the curriculum in

Redefinition of the Primary Goals and Re-envisioning

development of such traits. The power of FL education to achieve such a laudable

Learning a language means learning to be closer to others. Learning a

Curricular Choice Really Matters: CBI as the Engine

Content Really Matters: The Case for a Focus

Content Selection Must Strictly Align with Our

An Illustration of What It May Look Like in Practice

To provide a concrete example of how FL teachers could begin to infuse their

Content objectives Language objectives

The water conservation theme is particularly potent because it can lead to

of students’ cognitive, literacy, and linguistic abilities in the language classroom.

A Brief History of the Theoretical Foundations of CBI

1985b). Against this backdrop and in a climate of growing theoretical skepticism

Dichotomies versus Dialectics

Frontloading Language versus an Emergent View

Situating Language Learning in Disciplinary

described earlier, may potentially create, however, is a view of content-based

The Role of Mediation in Sociocultural Theory

Evidence of the Effects of Content-Based Language Mediation

conceptual knowledge of the benefits of various sustainable energy resources. She

Results of End-of-Year Writing Assessment

The Semiotics of Disciplinary Content and Concepts

Language and Content Connection in History Texts

constructed in historical texts through the juxtaposition of sentences and clauses