Assessing Student Learning Outcomes in both Language and Content in NSW Primary CLIL Programs

Project Member(s): Harbon, L.

Funding or Partner Organisation: NSW Department of Education and Training

Start year: 2015

Summary: This research will focus on student language learning achievements.The NSW bilingual programs have now been in operation for five years. At a time when politicians and policymakers are citing the bilingual mode of delivery as the way forward to achieving the new Federal Government's aims of 40% of school leavers with proficiency in an additional language, it is imperative that student learning outcomes in these bilingual programs are explored. The proposal for this new phase of research, funded by the Department of Education and Communities NSW, is to explore research questions about the learning of the additional languages and about the learning content: How do CLIL teachers in the 4 language programs assess student learning? How is KLA content assessed in the CLIL programs? How does student performance compare with their peers in the non-bilingual stream? Are they assessed in both languages? How and in what ways? What assessment frameworks have they utilised or developed to do this? How do CLIL teachers perceive the standards and levels of their students' language learning outcomes (in one of Japanese, Chinese, Korean or Indonesian)? How do CLIL teachers perceive the standards and levels of their students' learning of the content outcomes? How do bilingual program students' NAPLAN results for literacy in English compare with their peers and with students in other schools? How do students' language outcomes compare with language learning outcomes of students in non-bilingual classes in the same school and against the K-10 syllabus? Specifically the research questions are shaped around how language and content achievements are measured within the NSW bilingual programs. The researchers will examine NAPLAN scores to compare CLIL program students with peers in non-CLIL programs within the populations of 4 schools. They will also examine the language learning and assessment in the schools.

Publications:

Fielding, R & Harbon, L 2022, 'Dispelling the monolingual myth: exploring literacy outcomes in Australian bilingual programmes', International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 997-1020.
View/Download from: Publisher's site

FOR Codes: Curriculum and Pedagogy, Education and Training Theory and Methodology, Other education and training not elsewhere classified, Pedagogy

Acknowledgement of Country

UTS acknowledges the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the Boorooberongal people of the Dharug Nation, the Bidiagal people and the Gamaygal people, upon whose ancestral lands our university stands. We would also like to pay respect to the Elders both past and present, acknowledging them as the traditional custodians of knowledge for these lands.