Content and language integrated learning in the Netherlands: teachers’ self-reported pedagogical practices

In recent years, a surging uptake of content and language integrated learning (CLIL) has permeated the European context. This article presents the outcomes of a study about the self-reported pedagogical practices of CLIL teachers in the Netherlands. To investigate these teachers’ pedagogies, a questionnaire was designed, validated and, subsequently completed by 297 teachers (218 CLIL teachers and 79 regular teachers) from secondary schools across the Netherlands. This allowed a detailed investigation of the nature and range of pedagogies of CLIL teachers as well as differences between CLIL teachers of different subject disciplines. The results of the CLIL teachers were compared to a sample of regular teachers. Three main findings emerged from the study. First, CLIL teachers report using more pedagogical approaches focusing on providing students with diverse input and scaffolding than approaches focusing on developing students’ language and their knowledge of disciplinary literacies. Second, the subject discipline of a CLIL teacher seems to influence the pedagogical approaches they report using. Third, there is a notable difference between the kinds of pedagogies reported by CLIL teachers and their regular counterparts.