From Principles to Competences: Student-Teachers’ Understandings of CLIL in an ELTE Programme

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) promotes the learning of content and an additional language in a joint holistic manner. Among other aspects, CLIL success depends on teacher education and professional development. This study investigated student-teachers’ prior experiences as CLIL learners and their understandings of CLIL main theoretical underpinnings while in the process of developing CLIL teacher competences in a Didactics module of an English Language Teacher Education (ELTE) programme in Argentina. The participants’ prior knowledge of underlying theories together with their conceptualisations of CLIL principles and teacher competences and roles paved the way for the acquisition of scientific knowledge and the development of reflective, and to a lesser extent, pedagogical knowledge. This research study makes a contribution to current concerns for the CLIL research agenda and enhances practitioners’ enactment of situated pedagogical practices through CLIL.