Abstract:

Due to the Covid-19 lockdown, university courses moved online overnight in Italy in early March. Instructors thus transitioned suddenly to ‘emergency remote teaching’ (Hodges et al. 2020). Implementing effective technology-enhanced activities and keeping students engaged through emergency remote teaching during the pandemic was a challenge (Bozkurt et al. 2020); the challenge was even harder when instructors engaged in teaching content knowledge in a foreign language to students online during the pandemic. The present study aims to analyze the effectiveness of digitally-enhanced activities devised to teach subject-specific content in a foreign language online at an Italian university during the lockdown. To provide a thorough examination of the practices implemented, an analysis of the questionnaire used to monitor the effectiveness of the digitally-enhanced teaching strategies experimented will be carried out. In particular, the rationale underpinning the design of the questionnaire designed to monitor the efficacy of teaching content in a foreign language will be provided. The analysis will also focus on the main features of effective digitally-enhanced teaching practices suitable to teach subject-specific content knowledge in a foreign language at university level in online and blended learning environments. The findings of the present study will provide useful information to higher education institutions engaged in the design and delivery of CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) (Coyle, Hood, and Marsh 2010; Coyle 2020) courses in face-to-face, online, and blended formats especially in the aftermath of Covid-19.

References:
[1] Coyle D. (2020). “Exploring the Potential of a Pluriliteracies Approach”. Kim Bower, Do Coyle, Russell Cross, and Gary N. Chambers (eds.), Curriculum Integrated Language Teaching: CLIL in Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[2] Coyle D., Hood P., Marsh D. (2010). CLIL Content and Language Integrated Learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[3] Hodges, C., Moore, S., Lockee, B., Trust, T., Bond, A. (2020). “The difference between emergency remote teaching and online learning”. EDUCAUSE Review March 27, 2020. https://er.educause.edu/articles/2020/3/the-difference-between-emergency-remote-teachingand-online-learning
[4] Bozkurt, A., Jung, I., Xiao, J., Vladimirschi, V., Schuwer, R., Egorov, G., Lambert, S.R., Al-Freih, M., Pete, J., Olcott, D., Rodes, V., Aranciaga, I., Bali, M., Alvarez, A.V., Roberts, J., Pazurek, A., Raffaghelli, J.E., Panagiotou, N., de Coëtlogon, P., Shahadu, S., Brown, M., Asino, T.I., Tumwesige, J., Ramírez Reyes, T., Barrios Ipenza, E., Ossiannilsson, E., Bond, M., Belhamel, K., Irvine, V., Sharma, R.C., Adam, T., Janssen, B., Sklyarova, T., Olcott, N., Ambrosino, A., Lazou, C., Mocquet, B., Mano, M., Paskevicius, M. (2020). “A global outlook to the interruption of education due to COVID-19 Pandemic: Navigating in a time of uncertainty and crisis”. Asian Journal of Distance Education 15(1), 1–126, 2020.

Keywords:

Emergency teaching, digital learning, CLIL.