Gamifying CLIL to narrow the digital, language and numeracy gap for students/learners for whom the language of instruction is not their first language. This project will see the fusion of two innovative pedagogies to help secure equality of access and provision for young people from refugee and/or migrant backgrounds or those for whom the language of instruction is not their first language. A key aim is to equip these young people with the skills and competences to increase employment opportunities, enabling them to contribute positively to economic growth and help create a more socially cohesive and inclusive society within each partner country. Methodology The dual focused approach of CLIL, where an additional language is used for the teaching and learning of both content and language simultaneously, promotes higher order thinking skills such as problem solving and reasoning and creative thinking. Adopting a CLIL pedagogy affords teachers opportunities to exploit the synergies between mathematics and language learning to help combat the language gap. Common to both disciplines and a factor that can have a significant impact on teachers is their own emotional responses to them. Mathematics can provoke anxiety and negative attitudes in the same way as learning a second language. Teachers can lack confidence in their own ability and lack experience of teaching in increasingly diverse school contexts. A recent EU Commission in 2017 found that whilst there are a growing number of learners from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds, teachers in most European countries remain largely homogenous. When playing computer-based games, learners are practising and applying a set of 21st century skills that can be applied in the real world. (Prensky, 2006). Learning does not just involve acquiring knowledge and content, game-based resources can offer a different way to engage and interact with this content and promotes different ways of thinking, as well as inspiring creativity, interest and social interaction. (Squire, 2011). The problem solving elements embedded within the games along with a narrative thread, require the learners to engage with a series of challenges or quests where they assess situations, analyse information, make decisions and decide on a course of action and respond to the consequences of their actions in order to progress through the different stages of the game, all of which are key to cognitive development. The project’s focus on GBL will help to ensure greater equity for all learners, enabling access and opportunities to develop their digital literacy skills, contributing to a ‘narrowing of the gap.’ These digital literacy skills are essential for a 21st century workforce and will enable all learners to contribute positively to social cohesion, economic growth and sustainability. Impact/results Combining Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) and game-based learning (GBL) within a mathematics context, will result in significant linguistic gains with students/learners having opportunities to engage with and exposure to the language of instruction within a meaningful and purposeful context. The GBL resources require students and learners to engage with and access the language to process and assimilate the mathematical concepts, leading to a more secure and deeper understanding. Through engagement with the GBL resources, students/learners will have opportunities to develop their digital and linguistic competences, which in turn will begin to address the current digital and language gap that exists within students/learners from a refugee and/or migrant background. Increasingly, schools and teachers lack the resources and expertise to fully meet the diverse needs of students/learners from migrant backgrounds or students that do not have the language of instruction as their first language. This often results in student/learner disengagement, leading to poor or low attainment when compared to their peers. The innovative practices encouraged through this project and development of the GBL resources, will contribute to a narrowing of the attainment gap and promote inclusive practice. Student/learner participants engagement with these innovative and GBL resources will secure gains in their key digital and language skills and competences. Increased competence in numeracy, digital literacies and communication will facilitate more positive contributions to future economic growth and prosperity and help create a more socially cohesive and inclusive society within the participating EU countries. A longer-term objective of the project is to provide a blueprint to enable schools and teachers to capitalise on and maximise the potential of innovative pedagogical tools to increase student/learner engagement, to enhance digital and language learning and to narrow the attainment gap, promoting inclusive practice, social justice and equal opportunities for all.
This three-year interdisciplinary project focused on the development of digital game-based resources that aim to help migrant and refugee children across the world learn mathematics and new languages at the same time through play. The digital resources developed as part of this project are underpinned by Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) pedagogical principles to support and enhance the teaching and learning of an area of mathematics through a second/foreign language. This project sees the fusion of two innovative pedagogies, CLIL and game-based learning (GBL), to inform the development of these digital resources - to support students’ knowledge and understanding of fractions as well as developing their confidence and competence in the dominant language of classroom instruction. The three main intellectual outputs of the Gamifying CLIL project are: - Intellectual Output 1 (IO1): the development of game-based learning resources designed to deepen learners’ conceptual understanding in mathematics and exposing learners to language in context, aimed at 12-13 year old learners for whom the language of instruction is not their native/mother tongue. - Intellectual Output 2 (IO2): the development of supplementary materials designed to either be used as a standalone resource or in conjunction with the app. - Intellectual Output 4 (IO4): the sharing of best practice and knowledge exchange (IO4) The target audience for GamifyingCLIL is primarily in-service and pre-service teachers who teach 12-13-year-old children across the consortium and beyond with the aim of sharing best practice and knowledge exchange on learning mathematics through languages and languages through mathematics. Project partners were selected based on the complementary skills set and expertise that each partner and their institutions could bring to the project, especially considering their shared interest in helping teachers develop their knowledge, understanding and pedagogical expertise in CLIL and GBL. The members of the consortium also share a commitment to finding solutions to some of the challenges that educators and learners face across the partnership countries and addressing some of the key priorities identified within key EU documentation, including mathematical, linguistic and digital competences, and the inclusion of migrants and refugees. The consortium consists of five universities and one commercial partner from across Europe and experts in different educational contexts and frameworks, working together to exchange ideas and best practice in relation to CLIL and GBL. Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) was the project coordinator, with the following academic partners: Universidad de Córdoba (Spain), Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium), Pädagogische Hochschule Salzburg (Austria) and Università degli Studi di Torino (Italy). We also worked closely with a commercial partner, Cybercoach based in Bolton, UK. The GamifyingCLIL project complements and builds on a two-year UK-funded collaborative Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP), which saw MMU work alongside a small commercial partner to develop a range of innovative game-based learning resources aimed at primary school children. These resources explore some of the big ideas of mathematics through a second language. The intellectual outputs, project results and activities from the GamifyingCLIL project have been disseminated in a variety of different ways, targeting as many different networks and organisations within and beyond the consortium. Social media platforms including Facebook and Twitter have been used to communicate with researchers, schools and teachers across Europe and beyond. The app FractioQuest, published in app stores (e.g., Google Play, the Apple Store), and the digital portfolio, hosted on Genial.ly, have been shared with schools and teachers across the consortium (Salzburg: two schools on four occasions – spring 2020, BG Seekirchen, 1 class - spring 2020, HTBLuVA SBG, 3 classes - spring 2021, BG Seekirchen, 1 class - fall 2021, HTBLuVA SBG, 1 class;, Spain: 7 teachers from one secondary school during the dissemination stage (152 students); Belgium: 3 secondary schools for pilot phase; 3 schools in spring 2022 + publicity to all schools and teachers in Flanders in February 2022; Italy: 1 teacher, class and school in February 2020, just before the COVID-19 school closures, 12 teachers from 11 schools across Italy in February 2022). However, the evaluation of the project is ongoing and will involve direct participation of more schools and teachers in each country. (See section 6 for further details). The consortium has utilised existing networks to communicate with schools and teachers, sharing information about where and how to access the app and digital portfolio (https://bit.ly/3LfnFZ7 ), including: University blogs, press releases and newsletter; the Italian Association of Research in Mathematics Education; the Enabling Education Network; the Flanders government support website, Klascement; the Spanish Society for Research in Mathematics Education (SEIEM); the Andalusian Society for Mathematics Education "Thales" (SAEM-Thales). In addition the project webpage (https://www.mmu.ac.uk/research/research-centres/esri/projects/gamifying-clil, provides an overview of the project along with details of partner profiles and instructions on how to access to the app and the digital portfolio of supplementary materials. Other dissemination activities (described in detail in section 6) include the organisation of the “International Conference on Gamifying Mathematics in CLIL Contexts: Approaches and Good Practices”; participation in several national conferences and international conferences in Iran, Denmark, Portugal, and the Netherlands; training events for pre-service and in-service teachers; an upcoming book entitled Handbook of Research on International Approaches and Practices for Gamifying Mathematics (IGI Global, ISBN: 9781799896609); and book chapters, papers and other works in progress.