HOW DO IN-SERVICE TEACHERS PERCEIVE CLIL IMPLEMENTATION AT SCHOOLS IN SPAIN? A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

Abstract

Owing to the emergence of the new paradigm in the linguistic arena in which all the citizens are required to be competent in more than one language, an issue outlined in the White Paper in 1995 by the European Commission, schools had to undergo a radical transformation and implement new language policies in the curricula to comply with the new emerging requirements, and it is within this context that Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) has been brought up to the fore. Thus, the present systematic review has undertaken a search of empirical studies into the primary and secondary school teachers’ perceptions of CLIL implementation with the main aim of providing a thorough evaluation of bilingual education in Spain. For this purpose, a total of 46 publications that met the inclusion criteria have undergone an in-depth analysis and the results reveal that despite prevailing enthusiasm among CLIL teachers and the numerous benefits that the implementation of the bilingual programme offers to students, the programme presents several serious shortcomings such as insufficient and inadequate teacher training, increased workload, scarce collaboration, the paucity of well-designed materials or the lack of special attention to diversity. Overall, this systematic review highlights the urgent need to address these issues to ensure a success-driven implementation of the bilingual programme and guarantee high-quality education.