As has been established, the theoretical bases of this material package lie in CLIL and cooperative theories. Thus, the theoretical background was rather rich. This of course created some problems in creating the material. It was impossible to take all the factors related to CLIL and cooperative learning into account in each exercises of the material package. Thus some compromises needed to be made in order to create easily usable material. For example, some exercises have a stronger focus on language or content goals, whereas in some exercises the focus is on cooperative issues. Furthermore, the teacher has the chance to choose when to implement and concentrate on some of the time consuming features, such as group processing.
Another issue that needed consideration in the creation of the material was the setting where the material would be implemented. Both CLIL and a cooperative learning environments have typical characteristics, which separate them from other learning environments. The assumption in creating the present material was that the classes were, of course, CLIL classes. Thus, the characteristics that need to be considered in a CLIL setting were taken into account. Some of these characteristics supported also a cooperative setting, for example, giving the students language they could use in cooperative exercises. However, some compromises needed to be made in terms of a cooperative classroom setting.
Since the exercises were designed to be used separately, it was not expected that the classrooms would be implementing cooperative learning in their daily routine. Rather, the exercises provided a glimpse into the world of cooperative learning. Thus, the fact that the students might not be familiar with some of the cooperative practices had to be taken into account. Furthermore, it also needed to be recognized that by using random cooperative exercises it would not be possible to create a fully cooperative classroom.
However, the two theoretical backgrounds also complement each other in many ways.
For example, since in a CLIL setting it is not unusual to use different practices, the practices of cooperation are justified. In fact, group work is seen as one of the important practices that should be provided in CLIL classrooms (Mehisto, Marsh and Frigols 2008, 27).
In addition, in a CLIL setting cooperation and especially communication can be seen as the underlying concept that needs to be implemented in teaching. Communication is, of course, a crucial element of cooperative learning as well since without functioning communication, cooperation cannot exist. Thus, it could be said that the two methodologies complement each other well.
Furthermore, as Coyle et al. (2010, 29-30) point out, the cognitive engagement of the students is crucial in terms of achieving proper learning. In order to achieve cognitive engagement, the students need to be active learners. Coyle et al. (ibid.) emphasize the importance of students’ cooperation in order to benefit from each other’s knowledge.
Thus, taking into account the features of cooperative learning, it seems to provide a solution for this demand as one of the most important elements of cooperative learning is activating the learners and teaching them the skills needed in cooperation. Thus, there are important connections between CLIL and cooperative learning which enable the infusion of these two ideologies.
5 DESCRIPTION OF THE MATERIAL PACKAGE
As has been established, the current material package aims at providing teachers English teaching material for biology for Finnish-speaking students. The methodological basis of the material lies on cooperative learning and the emphasis is on communicative use of English language. The aim was to address the need for practical CLIL material that has strong theoretical basis. As the early introduction of CLIL can be seen advantageous, the target group chosen for the material package was fifth grade students. Thus, the material can be used in all elementary school CLIL programs in Finland. The content decisions were made according to three school specific curricula which followed the outlining presented in the national core curriculum for basic education (POPS).
Furthermore, the purpose in this material package was to provide exercises that could be used when seen appropriate. In other words, the material was not designed to be used as such, one exercise after another. Rather the purpose was to provide a material archive of communicative and cooperative exercises. Furthermore, it needs to be recognized that also other types of exercises are important in creating comprehensive learning. For that reason it needs to be noted the material was created for communicational purposes and the exercises can and should be used separately
The themes in the material package concern human anatomy and senses. Furthermore, human anatomy at fifth grade consists of the different systems in human body. Thus, the package consists of eight sections: muscular system, skeletal system, digestive system, circulatory system, respiratory system, nervous system, senses and systems combined.
Each section then focuses on a different theme with the exception of the final section, systems combined. The final section includes exercises that deal with all the themes included in the material. Thus, the final section could be regarded to be a concluding section.
Each section includes three to six exercises. Each exercise reviews the theme from different perspective or is of different difficulty level. There are some introductory exercises as well as exercises that are supposed to be used after some content has already been learned. Furthermore, each section in the material package begins with a vocabulary list which includes the important theme specific vocabulary that is needed in
each section. The vocabulary list is followed by the exercises. Each exercise, then, has a teacher’s page and a students’ page. On the teachers page the aims, preparations needed for the exercises and procedures of the exercises are introduced. Thus, the page functions as the teacher’s tool in understanding the function and purposes of the exercises. Furthermore, each exercise in the material package includes aims set in terms of content, language and cooperative learning. Thus, as the aims are specifically listed, the teacher knows which issues should be focused on in each exercise. This should improve the usability of the material and help the teachers in managing their workload.
In addition, one of the important tools that could be of help for the teachers that was incorporated into the material package was the CLIL matrix. In order to get an idea on the level of difficulty in terms of language and cognition, the exercises in the material package were divided into different categories according to the CLIL matrix. The CLIL matrix was situated on the teachers’ page. The matrix helps the teacher to choose an appropriate exercise for the particular student group and situation.
The content aims for the material package were decided on curricular basis. In addition to the content aims, also the cooperative and language aims needed to be chosen. The
Thus, some grammar-related goals were also set for the exercises. In addition, the basic skills reading, writing, listening and speaking were focused on.
The cooperative aims for each exercise included some group skills. The group skills that could be practiced through cooperative learning, however, were various. Since there are so many skills to be practices, it was impossible to include all of them into the current material package, especially when the scale of the present thesis was considered.
However, the aim was to include as many group skills into the material as possible, but in addition to the overall scale of the package also the incorporation of CLIL aims restricted the possibilities to concentrate on all of the group skills. Thus, the nature of the exercises and content dictated the selection of the group skills that could be practiced through the material.
Furthermore, also other aspects of cooperative learning needed to be taken into account in the material package. Since the cooperative method has many features crucial for it, it cannot be expected that all teachers are aware of these features. For that reason the most important features are briefly presented to the teacher in the beginning of the material package. Furthermore, the important issues that the teacher needs to consider in implementing cooperative learning are also discussed in the beginning of the material package. For example, group formation was an issue that was discussed in the beginning. Different ways of choosing group members were presented for the teacher and also the suggestion of using different ways to form the group was made. In addition, other important factors that could not be incorporated into each separate exercise were included in the material package as appendices. For example, a group processing sheet was added to the material. This way the teacher can choose according to appropriate situation, when to focus on group processing. Thus, also the appendices in the material are an important tool for the teacher.
6 TESTING THE PACKAGE
The aim of this thesis was to provide the teachers material that that they could easily use in their teaching. One of the ways to ensure the usability of the material was to test it and take into account the advice from professionals working in the field. Thus, after creating some exercises and sections for the material package, some of the exercises were tested by teachers working in CLIL classes. This was done in order to find out whether there were some issues that needed revision in the material. Also other comments were gathered and changes were made to the material according to the feedback received from the teachers. Furthermore, observation of lessons was used in the process. The observations were used as the basis for interviews conducted with the teachers and also some of the observations were used as ideas for improvement. Thus the research questions were the following:
1. Are the aims of the exercises achievable and realistic?
2. Are the exercises usable and practical?
3. What practical improvement ideas arise from the use of the material?
4. Is the material modifiable for different needs?
A qualitative method for collecting and analysing the feedback was chosen, as it would have been impossible to test the material in many places and analyse enormous amounts of data considering the timeframe and size of this thesis. Furthermore, this method enabled me to build trust with the participants, thus the feedback could be considered more reliable.
In this section the process of testing the material is described. First, the participants of the study are introduced. The description of the participants and the school where the material was tested is based on facts gathered through general observations during the cooperation with the school, during the actual observation of lessons and in the interviews. Second, the focus moves on to the methods of collecting the data:
observation and interview. Third, the process of collecting the data is covered and finally, the method of analysis is introduced.