English Medium Instruction (EMI) in a Spanish University: : Does Integration Ever Happen?

Sonja Andjelkov

doi:10.5565/rev/clil.75

English Medium Instruction (EMI) in a Spanish University:

Does Integration Ever Happen?

Authors

Sonja Andjelkov Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

PDF

Abstract

This article reports on the case of a non-native English-speaking university instructor who teaches her academic subject in the English Medium of Instruction (EMI) track of the Primary Teacher-Education Bachelor’s Degree programme offered by a publicly- funded Catalan university. By means of three semi-structured interviews with the instructor, this study seeks to explore whether and how content and language are integrated into her EMI teaching and assessment practices. Analysis of the instructor’s comments suggests that, on a practical level, the change in the language of instruction seems to change the dynamics of how she teaches and consequently how she assesses, leading to points of conflict among her rationale, institutional policy, and her students’ needs. This tension is most sharply felt when the instructor tries to cope with the lack of clear assessment criteria that could be applied fairly and consistently. The study concludes by noting the practical implications of these results for pre-service teacher education.

Keywords

English Medium Instruction (EMI), Integrating Content and Language in Higher Education (ICLHE), Higher Education, Cognitive Discourse Functions, shaping learner contributions, corrective feedback

References

Aguilar, M. (2015). Engineering lecturers’ views on CLIL and EMI. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13670050.2015.1073664.

Aguilar, M. & Rodríguez, R. (2012). Lecturer and student perceptions on CLIL at a Spanish university. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 15(2), 183–197.

Airey, J. (2011). Talking about teaching in English: Swedish university lecturers’ experiences of changing teaching language. Ibérica: Revista de la Asociación Europea de Lenguas para Fines Específicos (AELFE), 22, 35-54.

Airey, J. (2012). I don’t teach language. The linguistic attitudes of physics lecturers in Sweden. AILA Review, 25(25), 64-79. https://doi.org/10.1075/aila.25.05air.

Airey, J., & Linder, C. (2006). Language and the experience of learning university physics in Sweden. European Journal of Physics, 27(3), 553.

Airey, J., & Linder, C. (2008). Bilingual scientific literacy? The use of English in Swedish university science courses. Nordic Journal of English Studies, 7(3), 145-161.

Dörnyei, Z. (2007). Research Methods in Applied Linguistics: Quantitative, Qualitative, and Mixed Methodologies. Oxford University Press.

Ellis, R. (2000). Task-based research and language pedagogy. Language teaching research, 4(3), 193-220. https://doi.org/10.1177/136216880000400302.

Escobar Urmeneta, C. (2016). Conversación educativa y aprendizaje integrado de competencias lingüísticas y curriculares: las muchas tareas de la maestra AICLE. E-Aesla, (2), 42-55.

Escobar Urmeneta, C. (2018a). Docencia Universitaria en Inglés (DUI) en el grado de Educación Primaria: fundamentación, contexto y toma de decisiones. In C. Escobar Urmeneta & L. Arnau (Eds.), Los retos de la internacionalización de los Grados Universitarios en el Contexto del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior (EEES) (pp. 33–59). Síntesis.

Escobar Urmeneta, C. (2018b). Cuatro años de Docencia Universitaria en Inglés (DUI) en Cataluña. Miradas críticas de los participantes. In C. Escobar Urmeneta & L. Arnau (Eds.), Los retos de la internacionalización de los Grados Universitarios en el Contexto del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior (EEES) (pp. 89–114). Madrid: Síntesis. https://doi.org/10.4272/978-84-9745-387-5.ch7.

Escobar Urmeneta, C. (2020), ‘From EMI to ICLHE: Teacher Development for L2-Medium Instruction in a Teacher Education Institution’, in N. Sánchez-Pérez (Eds), Teacher Training for English-Medium Instruction in Higher Education, 179-204, Hershey, PA: IGI Global. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-2318-6.ch009.

Escobar Urmeneta, C., & Evnitskaya, N. (2013). Affording Students Opportunities for the Integrated Learning of Content and Language: A Contrastive Study on Classroom Interactional Strategies Deployed by Two CLIL Teachers. In J. Arnau (Ed.), Reviving Catalan at School (pp. 158-182). Multilingual Matters.

Escobar Urmeneta, C., & Walsh, S. (2017). Classroom interactional competence in content and language integrated learning. Applied linguistics perspectives on CLIL, 47, 183-200. https://doi.org/10.1075/lllt.47.11esc.

Evnitskaya, N. (2018). Classroom interaction and language learning in CLIL contexts. CLIL Journal of Innovation and Research in Plurilingual and Pluricultural Education, 1(1), 7-17. https://doi.org/10.5565/rev/clil.3.

Graddol, D. (2006). English Next. Why global English may mean the end of English as a Foreign Language. British Council.

Guerrini, M. (2009). CLIL materials as scaffolds to learning. In D. Marsh, P. Mehisto, D. Wolff, R. Aliaga, T. Asikainen, M. Frigols-Martin, S. Hughes and G. Langé (Eds.), CLIL practice: Perspectives from the field (pp. 74–84). University of Jyväskylä.

Hellekjaer, G. O. (2010). Language Matters: Assessing Lecture Comprehension in Norwegian English-medium Education. In C. Dalton-Puffer, T. Nikula & U.J.B. Smit (eds.), Language Use and Language learning in CLIL Classrooms, 233–258. John Benjamins.

Horwitz, E. K., Horwitz, M. B., & Cope, J. (1986). Foreign language classroom anxiety. The Modern Language Journal, 70(2), 125-132. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.1986.tb05256.x.

Housen, A. & Kuiken, F. (2009). Complexity, accuracy and fluency in second language acquisition. Applied Linguistics, 30(4), 461- 73. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amp048.

Hultgren, A. K. (2020). Global English: From “Tyrannosaurus Rex” to “Red Herring”. Nordic Journal of English Studies, 19(3), 10–34.

Jenkins, J. (2015). Repositioning English and multilingualism in English as a Lingua Franca. Englishes in Practice, 2(3), 49-85. https://doi.org/10.1515/eip-2015-0003.

Jensen, C. & Thøgersen J. (2011). Danish University lecturers’ attitudes towards English as the medium of instruction. Ibérica, 22(fall), 13–34.

Knight, J. (2008). Higher Education in Turmoil: The Changing World of Internationalisation. Sense Publishers.

Kuteeva, M. (2013). English in Academic and Professional Contexts. Special Issue of Nordic Journal of English Studies, 13(1), 1–6.

Lasagabaster, D. (2018). Fostering team teaching: Mapping out a research agenda for English-medium instruction at university level. Language Teaching, 51(3), 400-416. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0261444818000113.

Lincoln, W. G. T. Y. S. (1997). Representation and the text: Re-framing the narrative voice. Suny Press.

Llinares, A., & Lyster, R. (2014). The influence of context on patterns of corrective feedback and learner uptake: A comparison of CLIL and immersion classrooms. The Language Learning Journal, 42(2), 181-194. https://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2014.889509.

Long, M. (1991). Focus on form: A design feature in language teaching methodology. In K. de Bot, R. Ginsberg, & C. Kramsch (Eds.), Foreign language research in crosscultural perspective (pp. 39–52). John Benjamins.

Lyster, R. (2007). Learning and teaching languages through content: A counterbalanced approach (Vol. 18). John Benjamins Publishing.

Lyster, R., & Ranta, L. (1997). Corrective feedback and learner uptake: Negotiation of form in communicative classrooms. Studies in second language acquisition, 19(1), 37-66. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0272263197001034.

Macaro, E. (2018). English Medium Instruction. Oxford University Press.

Merriam, S. B. (2002). Qualitative Research in Practice. Examples for Discussion and Analysis. Jossey-Bass.

Miles, M. B., & Huberman, A. M. (1994). Qualitative Data Analysis: An Expanded Sourcebook. Sage.

Mohan, B. A. (1986). Language and content (Vol. 5288). Addison Wesley Publishing Company.

Morse, J. M. (1991). Strategies for sampling. In J. M. Morse (Ed.), Qualitative Nursing Research: A Contemporary Dialogue (pp. 127–145). Sage.

Morton, T. (2020). Cognitive discourse functions: A bridge between content, literacy, and language for teaching and assessment in CLIL. CLIL Journal of Innovation and Research in Plurilingual and Pluricultural Education, 3(1), 7-17. https://doi.org/10.5565/rev/clil.33.

Nikula, T., Dalton-Puffer, C. & Llinares, A. (2013). CLIL classroom discourse: Research from Europe. Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education, 1(1), 70–100.

Orden, ECI/3857/2007, de 27 de diciembre, por la que se establecen los requisitos para la verificación de los títulos universitarios oficiales que habiliten para el ejercicio de la profesión de Maestro en Educación Primaria. Boletín Oficial del Estado (29 de diciembre de 2007). https://www.boe.es/boe/dias/2007/12/29/pdfs/A53747-53750.pdf.

Patton, M. Q. (1990). Qualitative Evaluation and Research Methods. (2nd ed.). Sage Publications.

Patton, M. Q. (2015). Qualitative research & evaluation methods: integrating theory and practice. Fourth edition. SAGE Publications, Inc.

Smit, U., & Dafouz, E. (2012). Integrating content and language in higher education: An introduction to English-medium policies, conceptual issues and research practices across Europe. Aila Review, 25(1), 1-12. https://doi.org/10.1075/aila.25.01smi.

Smith, L. E., & Nelson, C. L. (1985). International intelligibility of English: Directions and resources. World Englishes, 4(3), 333-342. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971x.1985.tb00423.x.

Torras, B. (2016). The role of student-teachers’ imagined identities in their investments in English in an “Integrating Content and Language in Higher Education” (ICLHE) Catalan pre-service teacher education context (Doctoral Dissertation). Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. https://ddd.uab.cat/pub/tesis/2016/hdl_10803_400872/btv4de4.pdf.

Unterberger, B. (2012). English-medium programmes at Austrian business faculties: A status quo survey on national trends and a case study on programme design and delivery. AILA Review, 25, 80–100. https://doi.org/10.1075/aila.25.06unt.

Unterberger, B. & Wilhelmer, N. (2011). English-medium education in economics and business studies: capturing the status quo at Austrian universities. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 161, 90-110. https://doi.org/10.1075/itl.161.06unt.

Ushioda, E., & Dörnyei, Z. (2009). Motivation, language identities and the L2 self: A theoretical overview. In Z. Dörnyei & E. Ushioda (Eds.), Motivation, language identity and the L2 self (pp. 1–9). Multilingual Matters.

Walkinshaw, I., Fenton-Smith, B., & Humphreys, P. (2017). EMI issues and challenges in Asia-Pacific higher education: An introduction. In B. Fenton-Smith (Eds.), English medium instruction in higher education in Asia-Pacific (pp. 1-18). Springer, Cham.

Walsh, S. (2006). Investigating classroom discourse. Routledge.

Walsh, S. (2011). Exploring classroom discourse: Language in action. Routledge.

Walsh, S. (2012). Conceptualising classroom interactional competence. Novitas-ROYAL (Research on Youth and Language), 6(1), 1-14.

Author Biography

Sonja Andjelkov, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Sonja Andjelkov is a PhD candidate at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), Spain, and a member of the LED (Language and Education) research group at the UAB. Her main research interests are EMI (English Medium Instruction), CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning), and ICLHE (Integrated Content and Language in Higher Education).