“We can do it together!” – But can they? How Norwegian ninth graders co-constructed content and language knowledge through peer interaction in CLIL

Abstract

This study looks into how three groups of different proficiency ninth graders (high-, mid-, and low-achievers in English as the L2) co-constructed content and language knowledge through homogeneous peer interaction during a short-term CLIL intervention in the Norwegian context. Having adopted the sociocultural approach, the study examines, among other aspects, the students’ languaging through the L1 and L2, translanguaging as a learning tool, and use of low- and high-order thinking skills via a qualitative discourse analysis of the groups’ interactions in seven CLIL lessons. The main findings demonstrate that the high- and mid-achieving groups succeeded in building mainly content rather than language knowledge through collaborative dialogue and promoting cognitive development, presumably due to relatively well-developed L2 skills. In contrast, the low-achieving group struggled to collaborate and avoided performing cognitively demanding tasks, unless scaffolded by the teacher, indicating that these learners were in special need of scaffolding by an expert. Although limited in its scale, the research contributes to some understanding of how learners of different levels of L2 proficiency construct knowledge through CLIL and offers implications for teaching and further research.