Language attention in content-based instruction: The case of language instructors teaching content in a foreign language in Mexican higher education

• Autores: Andrés Arias de la Cruz, Jesús Izquierdo
• Localización: Journal of immersion and content-based language education, ISSN 2212-8433, Vol. 3, Nº. 2, 2015, págs. 194-217
• Idioma: inglés
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• Dialnet Métricas: 2 Citas
• Resumen

  • Subject-matter specialists teaching content via a foreign/second language in higher education often exhibit a meaning-based pedagogy, unsystematically attending to inaccurate language. This observational study examined whether two foreign-language-teaching-trained instructors teaching content in English in a Mexican undergraduate program would emulate these instructional patterns, or would attend to language favouring language-and-content-integrated pedagogy. In the study, over 400 instructional episodes, video-recorded during 18 hours of regular-classroom teaching, were analyzed using the COLT observation scheme (Spada & Fröhlich, 1995). Results showed that the foreign-language educators favoured content, erratically attending to inaccurate language during communication breakdowns. Language attention occurred reactively through word translations, lexical-gap scaffolding, and isolated explanations for non-target phonological forms. These instructional patterns may result from the language teachers’ newly assumed content-based instructional roles. To favour language attention during subject-matter teaching, language instructors need training and curricular support that helps them draw on their foreign language teaching experience as they deliver content.