Scottie Go! in the CLIL Classroom

What are the differences between an EFL (English as a Foreign Language) and CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning)? The main purpose of the CLIL classroom is to learn content through English, so English is only a vehicle to achieve the learning goals. While in the EFL classroom, English is the learning goal.

I organize CLIL as extra-curricular lessons in primary school but I also integrate cross-curricular activities in the EFL lessons. I have experimented with different topics so far and the most motivating one for my students was coding. The good thing about this topic is that apart from the numerous benefits of learning the basics of coding, there are many authentic materials that can be used in the CLIL coding classroom which makes the preparations much easier. Whether you use ScratchJr, Scratch or unplugged coding, there are lots of materials online or you can buy cards and books for reasonable prices.

In the first term, we worked on Scottie Go!, a Polish invention that teaches the basic concepts of programming. It uses a combination of a mobile app and a board game, which emphasise the kinesthetic and collaborative aspects of learning.

Here is a short summary of how we work on Scottie Go! in the CLIL classroom. You can download the detailed lesson plan from here: CLIL Lesson Plan

I introduced Scottie's story with the following Storyjumper book:

Then we learnt and practised vocabulary with the following Quizlet study set.

During the coding workshops, students worked in pairs or in a group of three. We used laptops and USB web cameras as we don't have tablets or ipads at school. I also created a booklet for my students based on the Teacher Guide of the English version: Students' Booklet