Learning Diary Module

Learning Diary

As you read through each Module, you will be directed to tasks in a Learning Diary. You should record your answers to the tasks in your Learning Diary.

Together with the PAPeR (Pre-Assignment Planning e-Record), this will become your e-Portfolio.

Click on the Module Number below to download the part of the Learning Diary for the Module you are doing:

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Learning Diary Module 1	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 2	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 3	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 4	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 5	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 7	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 9	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 10	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 6	Download	Download	Download
Answer Sheet	Download	Download	Download
Learning Diary Module 8	Download	Download	Download
Pre-Assignment Planning e-Record	Download	Download	Download

Module 10 - Sample CLIL Lessons

Module 10 – Sample CLIL lessons The aim of this module is to show what some other teachers teach through the CLIL approach, and how they translate CLIL theory into practical teaching ideas.
‘Clil4U’ is an EU-funded project intended to assist implementation of CLIL in schools throughout Europe and beyond. As part of the project, 48 ready-to-use Primary and VET scenarios, complete with instructions and materials, have been prepared by working CLIL teachers. These scenarios show aims and objectives, and describe how to plan and teach a CLIL-based module (a subject module from the national curriculum, which is taught through a foreign language).
Learning Stages:

1. To see what scenarios have been written, follow these links:
Primary Scenarios (these can also be used at Secondary Level):
http://languages.dk/clil4u/#Scenarios4Primary
VET Scenarios:
http://languages.dk/clil4u/#Scenarios4VET

2. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 1 – Critiquing a scenario.

CONGRATULATIONS!
You have finished the online component of the CLIL4U Blended Learning Course.
The next step is to attend a 1 day Face-2-Face workshop where you can share your ideas and questions, and discuss the problems facing a CLIL teacher.
You can use the ideas you have collected in your PAPeR to prepare for an Assignment. This will involve a practical application of the CLIL approach by preparing and teaching a lesson.

Module 9 - Evaluation

Module 9 – Evaluation

This module provides guidance in designing a rubric.
Teachers are used to assessing their students’ achievement and progress in the subject(s) they teach. For teachers adopting the CLIL approach, however, the new factor of assessing achievement and progress in the targeted language as well as in content can be a challenge, and can pose many questions:

• What do I assess, content or language or both together?


• In what language should I assess?


• Can students answer in their Mother Tongue?


• What tools do I use for assessment?


• How can I assess previous knowledge?


• If I assess in the targeted language, how can I minimise the effect in the content assessment of student use of the targeted language?


• How can I evaluate skills or processes, such as planning and investigation, reaching conclusions, or creating or designing something new?


• How can I assess group work?

There is no simple answer to these questions, but the CLIL approach can suggest some ideas to explore.
Learning Stages:

1. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 1 – Reading about evaluation.


2. It is motivating for students when they know assessment criteria in advance because they can then set targets for themselves.
At the start of a lesson, the criteria for the language focus of a lesson can be displayed on the IWB (for example: understanding new words related to the topic; using them orally in class; and spelling them correctly). Similarly, criteria for the subject focus can be made clear.

Alternatively, at the start of a project or task, students can be given a copy of the evaluation rubric to be used by the teacher.


3. Motivation can be increased by giving students the opportunity to participate in the design of a rubric. Together with the teacher, they can brainstorm possible assessment criteria, select which will be adopted and then decide their relative importance. Descriptors can also be created jointly.


4. Where peer evaluation is suitable, for example in student-led presentations, use of a shared rubric makes assessment by classmates valid and effective.


5. To encourage self-assessment, students can be given a series of Yes/No questions to answer, which will help them to review their output objectively. Students can be directed to ask themselves, for example:


• ‘Have I included a detailed explanation of ...?’


• ‘Have I provided evidence to support my ideas?’


• ‘Is the layout clear?’


• ‘Do all members of my group have an opportunity to take part in our presentation?’


6. The Guidebook provides examples from various rubrics, including samples of assessment criteria for content and communication, creativity, cooperation and competence. Other criteria which can form part of assessment and evaluation processes are communicative skills, cognitive skills and attitudes towards learning.

Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 2 – Designing a rubric.

Module 8 - CLIL in the Classroom

Module 8 – CLIL in the Classroom

This module asks you to consider three important parts of the CLIL approach to teaching:

• Scaffolding
• Interaction
• Learner Autonomy

Just as learners learn in different ways, so teachers teach in different ways. However, probably all teachers would agree with the simple definition of their role as ‘helping learners to learn’. Different teaching techniques are the specific behaviours that teachers adopt in order to achieve this.   
A. Scaffolding 

Learning Stages:

1. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 1 – How you support learning.


2. In the CLIL approach, we describe ways that teachers support learning as ‘scaffolding’. To understand this metaphor, look at the picture below.



In the real world, scaffolding is a framework builders use to help them reach higher. ‘In education, scaffolding refers to a variety of instructional techniques used to move students progressively toward stronger understanding and, ultimately, greater independence in the learning process... ‘
(taken from http://edglossary.org/scaffolding/)
Listen to a description of scaffolding.

3. Go to your Learning Diary and do:

Task 2 -  Reading about scaffolding
Task 3 – Is scaffolding new to you?
4. Scaffolding is particularly important in the CLIL approach. Both teachers and students are unable to rely on communicating as easily as they can in a non-CLIL classroom.


1. In each module of this course, your attention has been directed towards other examples of simple techniques to support learning.


2. Here is a table showing some of the Scaffolding Techniques used in the CLIL approach. Click on it to enlarge:



3. When teachers scaffold instruction, they typically break up a learning experience, concept, or skill into discrete parts, and then give students the assistance they need to deal with each part. For example, teachers may


• give students an excerpt of a longer text to read


• engage them in a discussion of the excerpt to improve their understanding of its purpose


• teach them the vocabulary they need to comprehend the text before assigning them the full reading

(taken from http://edglossary.org/scaffolding/)


4. Steps a CLIL teacher can take to scaffold understanding of a written text:


• Highlight the important content words which you would like your students to know, and decide how you are going to help your students learn them


• Underline ‘difficult’ vocabulary and grammar structures. Replace these with simpler words and grammar


• Notice the length of the sentences. Where possible, replace one long sentence with two or three shorter ones.


• Split the text into short sections, each with a side heading


• Put the text into bullet points


• Find or create illustrations, diagrams or maps to help students understand better


• Choose a graphic organiser to enable students to extract information from the text more easily (You can read more about Graphic Organisers below)


5. Go to the your Learning Diary to do Task 4 – Making a text more accessible.


6. Graphic Organisers are a valuable tool for scaffolding understanding. Teachers will already be familiar with using representations of information such as timelines and mind maps. Graphic Organisers are particularly useful in developing organisational and thinking skills, and in allowing transfer and collection of information and ideas with little reliance on the written or spoken word.

There is a huge variety of Graphic Organisers available on the Internet, at sites such as: http://my.hrw.com/nsmedia/intgos/html/igo.htm or http://www.studenthandouts.com/graphicorganizers.htm
There is a selection of graphic organisers in ‘The TKT Course – CLIL Module’ by Kay Bently (CUP). Click here and click again on Page 43 >> on the webpage. Then scroll down to Pages 44-46 to see the graphic organisers.
7. Now go to your Learning Diary and do Task 5 – Choosing a graphic organiser.


8. Here are two spider diagrams showing the different ways in which teachers and students utilise Graphic Organisers. Click on them to enlarge them:

This Venn Diagram shows some of the advantages of Graphic Organisers to both teachers and students. Once again, you can click on the image to enlarge it.

     

B. Interaction 

Learning Stages:

1. The CLIL Approach stresses the importance of interaction between students. Interaction is an opportunity to bring together students’ existing ideas and language with new ideas and language, in the meaningful context of subject development. It provides an opportunity for students to think about what they are learning, and make sense of it. Interacting with other students results in the creation of joint understanding and new knowledge. With the CLIL approach, this is done in a different language. The students have to work and think harder, and so their learning is deeper than that of students who learn in their first language.

Go to the diary to do: 
Task 6 – Reading about interaction
Task 7 – Adding interactive opportunities to your planning outline 

 
C. Learner Autonomy 

Learning Stages:

1. Teaching and learning through CLIL mean there is more focus on what students do to learn, and less on the active role of the teacher. Learners have to become more independent and to take responsibility for their work. To achieve this, of course, they need support and encouragement from their teacher.

Go to your Learning Diary to do Task 8 – Reading about learner autonomy.
2. There are several ways that CLIL teachers can help students to become autonomous. Increasing pair and group interaction and co-operation is a good starting point. It is also important to train students in how to learn for themselves.


• For language learning, for example, a personal vocabulary notebook or computer file, where students write down the words they want to learn, should be the student’s responsibility, and not the teacher’s. However, the teacher can train learners how to store their chosen vocabulary, with meaning, use and associated words and phrases noted, all in the targeted language.


• Students can also be encouraged to keep records of Can Do achievements at the end of each lesson, so that they are made aware of their own progress and needs.


• Students can think about and plan their own learning. Raise students’ awareness of the relative amounts of time they spend outside school on health and fitness, hobbies, socialising, ‘down time’ – and studying. Encourage them to commit to useful patterns of homework and study.

Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 9 - Self-assessment through Can Do statements.
3. In the CLIL approach, it is important for students to realise that they are responsible for their own learning, and to move away from reliance on the teacher towards making their own decisions about how, when and where to learn.

Go to your learning diary and do Task 10 – Planning a classroom discussion.

Module 7 - Multimodality

Module 7 – Multimodality

In this module, you will think about how to adopt and/or adapt multimodular resources and activities in your CLIL teaching.

The CLIL4U Guidebook says:
“In CLIL, it is important to use audio-visual aids and multimedia in order to overcome problems caused by the use of a new language” (Page 24)

According to Dale, van de Es, Tanner (CLIL Skills, European Platform 2010 Page 41):

“Since learners use different ways to take in input, it is useful if input is multimodal at various stages of a lesson or lessons. In the CLIL classroom, it is even more important to exploit as many input modes as possible , both linguistic and non-linguistic, to ensure as many learners as possible understand the input.”

For the CLIL teacher, a multimodal approach to the classroom can result in the creation of attractive and professional resources, and can provide linguistic support.

For the CLIL student, a multimodal approach can be a powerful motivator. It can add variety and interaction to a lesson and provide stimulating visuals to support understanding of language. It can also be a rich source of cultural awareness. Most of all, it can allow students to work both collaboratively and independently.

Learning Stages: 

1. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 1 – Reading about 'Why CLIL?' 
2. It is helpful to find different ways (multimodal ways) to introduce new vocabulary to your students. Using a short video to introduce new vocabulary, or a gapped text, where students can choose words to fill the gaps, is very effective. 
Another way to introduce new vocabulary is by using classroom posters. These can show categorised mindmaps, labelled diagrams or pictures, or a short topic-related text. 

           Examples

          

          Click on the images to enlarge them.

1. Now go to your Learning Diary and do Task 2 – Creating resources. 
2. The CLIL teacher’s role often consists less in teaching material to students, and more in guiding them towards resources and information. Their investigations help them to learn for themselves as they work to complete an assignment. The teacher monitors their learning and ensures that any gaps in curriculum outcomes are achieved. 
See this table for some useful tips for finding online resources: 


Resources	Examples
Video Clips	YouTube
Spoken Text	iTunes, podcasts
Educational Documentaries	TED, TeachersTV
Written & Spoken Input	How Stuff works
Online News Resources	CNN, BBC World Service, Guardian Online, CBBC Newsround, Kidson Media-Link
Visuals	Google images
Maps	Google Earth
Lyrics	Lyrics, Azlyrics



3. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 3 – Finding resources. 
4. Students can read online texts such as webpages more easily by using Wordlink, which is part of the Multidict suite. 
Download and watch this demonstration of Wordlink in use: 


• Processing a Webpage - Click Here
• Creating a Page - Click Here

5. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 4 – Practising with Wordlink. 
6. We can see from the diagram of 21st Century Learning below that as part of a multimodal approach to CLIL learning, Digital/ICT Literacy is vital for our students. Click on the image to enlarge it.

Indeed, it is a necessary job requirement in today’s world. 
It is also integral to a CLIL approach to teaching. ‘ Using ICT as a teaching resource’ is one of the Competences of a CLIL Teacher. 

http://lendtrento.eu/convegno/files/mehisto.pdf

7. “ Technology will never replace teachers, but teachers who use technology will replace teachers who don’t”. (Dr Ray Clifford, 1983) 
New technologies become effective and relevant educational tools by allowing students to access new information, to connect with others , and to build links between their lives, their community and the world at large. 
It is good pedagogy which drives education, not technology. However, technology is a tool to support learning. Its value is in enabling students to develop their thinking. 
In the Module on Cognition, we looked at Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy of Thinking Skills, which describes traditional classroom practices, behaviours, knowledge and actions. The Taxonomy has also been adapted to show how ICT tools and technologies can facilitate learning. 
See the chart below - you can click on the image to enlarge it:

http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/03/a-great-concept-map-on-blooms-digital.html
Bloom's Digital Taxonomy lends itself especially to task and project-based learning, where students work independently to solve problems and develop their own knowledge and skills. 

8. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 5 – Exploring ICT tools and techniques.

Module 6 - Community

Module 6 – Community
This module examines another of the 5 Cs of CLIL - Community.

The CLIL approach is learner-centred. It raises awareness of the student’s own culture, including learned attitudes and behaviours, and of how that culture relates to other cultures. This enables learners to understand themselves and others, and to recognise their place in the global community.

The classroom community is a part of the school community, which itself is part of the local community, of the national community, and of the global community. 

In the classroom, students are motivated to learn about themselves and the world they live in, as they interact with each other and with the teacher, with the rest of the school, and with wider communities outside.

Use of an additional language for learning is itself a gateway to connect the classroom to the world outside. In the CLIL approach, community and culture are all about connection. CLIL is a way of connecting learning to students’ lives, to local communities, and to wider communities, cultures and environments.

The task for a CLIL teacher is to find ways of leading students to an understanding of these connections through the content they are learning.

In this module, teachers will have opportunities to explore what is meant by community, to consider how it links to content, and to find ways of building links for their students to the outside world.

Later on in the course, you will have an opportunity to see how other teachers have connected classroom learning and community.

Learning Stages: 

Awareness of Culture and Community

1. We can help our students to better understand how we are affected by the community and culture in which we live. 

Go to your Learning Diary and do:  

Task 1 - What makes us what we are?  

Task 2 – What do you understand by community and culture?  Community within the CLIL context 

1. Teachers often bring the community into the classroom by inviting ‘outsiders’ (such as grandparents, local businessmen and businesswomen and/or members of local government) to come into the classroom and talk to students. 

CLIL teachers can also find members of the community who use or have knowledge of the CLIL targeted language and ask them to share their experience. It could be possible to contact people from local cultural organisations, consulates or embassies, locally-based international employers, or travel agencies. What contacts can you think of in your local community who could bring the targeted language into the classroom? 
2. One of the most useful ways you can help your students see how their learning connects to the outside world is to form a link with a school from another country. Useful sites for finding a school to link with, together with guidance on what to do, are World Class and e-Twinning. 

Links with other schools provide an instant window into another community/culture. 
3. Another site to consider is e-Pals, which connects more than seven million students and educators in over 190 countries. The site helps create links for classroom-to-classroom project-sharing, practising language and literacy skills, and teacher-supervised communication between pen-pals across the globe. 


4. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 3 – Connecting learning to community. 


5. You have now added to your planning outline teaching ideas about four of the five Cs – Cognition, Competence, Communication and Community. The fifth C is Content. 
Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 5 – What Content will you teach?

Module 5 - Communication

Module 5 – Communication 
This module gives you the opportunity to think about and practise some ideas for teaching language. 
Communication as one of the 5 Cs of CLIL refers primarily to the use of a targeted language for learning. For the subject being taught through CLIL, students need to know: 

• Vocabulary 
• Grammatical structures 
• Functional language (the language that is meant to achieve a particular purpose, such as making or agreeing to a suggestion) 

Without this language knowledge, students are unable to understand the subject or to talk and write about it. 
Learning Stages: 

1. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 1 – Reading about the language that CLIL teachers teach. 
2. When students and teachers first change to using an additional (or targeted) language for classroom learning and teaching, language can feel like a barrier rather than a means to communication. However, CLIL language learning is set in the context of content learning, and so is always relevant and of immediate use to students. It develops in step with content knowledge, and is taught in bite-sized amounts which the teacher can plan for outside the classroom. 
3. Some practical tips for CLIL teachers dealing with new language: 


1. There are several things you can do when you are unsure of pronunciation.
Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 2 – Pronunciation tips. 

2. So that learners can be more relaxed in their language use, CLIL teachers focus on subject-related concepts and understanding, rather than on language accuracy. Instead of highlighting language mistakes immediately, you can reformulate (where the teacher responds to a mistake with a correct form of the language in use), or delay correction until a later stage of the lesson.
Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 3 – Practising reformulation. 

3. Try to avoid asking the question ‘Do you understand?’  Students are often unwilling to answer ‘No’; but if they say ‘Yes’, we still can’t be sure that they really do understand, or just think that they do. Instead, to check understanding of new vocabulary, ask questions which are easy to understand, and can be answered with only one word, preferably ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. These are known as concept-checking questions (CCQs). 
Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 4 – Practising CCQs. 

4. Collect useful language for your subject. 
• A good place to collect subject-specific language is a school textbook written for native speakers of the target language. 
• For the language that students need to learn to enable them to communicate with each other and with the teacher (BICS), ask one of the language teachers in your school to show you the language course book(s) used in your school, and find examples of functional language such agreeing or disagreeing, asking for information, making suggestions or sharing opinions. 
• For the words students need to know to organize and express their thoughts (CALP), see the Academic Word List, which gives the words most commonly used in academic texts, divided into sub-lists depending on frequency. 
5. It is helpful to find different ways (multimodal ways) to introduce new language to your students. You will read about Multimodality in Module 7. 
4. Go to your Learning Diary and do: 

Task 5 – Preparing to teach a grammar structure
Task 6 – Preparing to teach vocabulary
Task 7 – Planning classroom instructions and questions.

Module 4 - Competence

Module 4 – Competence 
In this module you will consider the implications of Competence for both CLIL teachers and CLIL students. 
Competence is one of the 5 Cs of CLIL. It refers to the measurable or observable knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviours critical to successful performance. 

Competences reflect successful learning outcomes. They are often subject-specific and are an automatic part of any teacher’s lesson planning. 

Learning Stages:

1. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 1 – Subject-specific competences. 
2. Competence as one of the 5 Cs of CLIL can have a wider application than just Content knowledge. It is useful to consider Competence in other applications
For example, 'CLIL Teacher competences' support the development of a rich CLIL learning environment in a wide variety of contexts. 
Look at the diagram below, which shows areas of competence for CLIL teachers, and consider the relative importance of each to you in your own teaching context. 



3. Go to your Learning Diary and do: 

Task 2 – Assessing your own competences as a CLIL teacher 
Task 3 – Planning to develop your competences. 
4. If you would like to read about CLIL Teacher competences in more detail, click here. 


5. ‘Can Do’ statements are a useful way of defining competences . 

An excellent example of their use for defining language competences is seen the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. This internationally recognised framework describes language ability in a scale of levels which ranges from A1 for beginners to C2 for those who have mastered a language. 



6. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 4 – Assessing your level of English. 


7. In the Module on Cognition, we looked at Bloom’s Taxonomy of Thinking Skills. However, as well as thinking skills, Bloom’s Taxonomy describes different types of knowledge. 


• Factual knowledge (the basic elements of a subject), eg knowing musical symbols, or major natural resources 
• Conceptual knowledge (how parts of the whole are related), eg how periods of geological time are classified, or models used to explain ideas, such as the Theory of Evolution 
• Procedural knowledge (how to do something), eg whole number division, or how to conduct a scientific experiment 
• Metacognitive knowledge (understanding of how to learn), eg how to write an outline summary of a text, or the best method (for the individual student) of learning new information 

Click here to see an interactive diagram showing the relationship between thinking skills, activities and different types of knowledge.



8. Can Do statements as learning outcomes are often a combination of the thinking skills in Bloom’s Taxonomy and and the types of knowledge he defined. 

We can use Bloom’s Wheel to write Can Do statements using a verb to describe the cognitive process, together with the type of knowledge that the student is expected to develop.  See the examples clearly labelled in the table below:  

Cognitive Process	Can	Do (the Thinking Skill)	Knowledge
Remember	I can	recognise & recall	the dates of important events in recent american history
Understand	I can	give examples	of different painting styles
		classify	minerals
		write a summary	of a video presentation
Apply	I can	divide	one whole number by another whole number
Analyse	I can	structure	evidence for and against a particular interpretation of a historical event
		recognise	the point of view of the author of an article
Evaluate	I can	determine	if conclusions follow from data
		judge	if the solution to a problem is valid
Create	I can	devise	a procedure for completing the task
		design	a model of a building

 

    9. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 5 – Writing Can Do statements.

Module 3 - Cognition

Module 3 – Cognition

In this Module, you will begin to think about integrating one of the 5 Cs – Cognition – into a CLIL lesson.

You may be familiar with Bloom’s Taxonomy of Thinking Skills. It was revised by Anderson and Krathwohl in 2004. It includes a focus on knowledge processes.

Here is a diagram showing the progression of the 6 Thinking Skills: 

Learning Stages:

1. Go to your Learning Diary and do: 
Task 1 – Refreshing your memory 
Task 2 – Checking understanding. 
2. In the classroom, one way CLIL teachers help students develop their thinking skills is through the tasks we set. We can define a task as a problem to solve or objective to accomplish, often set as part of a lesson, and usually within a limited amount of time. Learners are left with some freedom in approaching the task. 

The diagram of Bloom’s Wheel below exemplifies the words we can use when setting tasks in order to encourage different thinking skills. 


We can link the taxonomy to classroom activities. 
3. Go to your Learning Diary and do: 
Task 3 – Analysing classroom tasks 
Task 4 – Creating classroom tasks. 
4. There are some criteria for designing a successful task. 
Questions for successful task design: 
• Will the task engage my students’ interests? 
• Is there a clear goal or outcome? 
• Will the students know when the task has been completed? 
• Does the task relate to a real-world activity? 


5. Go to your Learning Diary and do Task 5 – Evaluating tasks.