Affect and Motivation in CLIL

Interest in affective variables in foreign language teaching methodology has gathered momentum over the last decades giving rise to the appearance of new threads of research in the Motivation literature (Dörnyei 2001a, 2001b, 2005; Dörnyei, Csizér 1998; Dörnyei, Schmidt 2001; Dörnyei, Ushioda 2009, Ushioda 2006). The choice to introduce CLIL as a means to promoting better language learning can be seen as a way of promoting greater interest and enthusiasm in foreign language learning (Wolff 1997). However, given the added difficulties the CLIL learning environment poses, one may legitimately presume that problems relating to attitude, interest and motivation exist. In order to ascertain the degree of interest and motivation on the part of the pupils following CLIL programmes, questionnaire data was gathered from 189 high school pupils studying a variety of school subjects through English in the Friuli Venezia Giulia region in Italy. The results show a considerable degree of interest and enthusiasm (after a one-year experience of CLIL) but also some highly negative reactions. For those situations where a CLIL experience is non-elective, strategies would need to be found that reduce these reactions, turning them round into more positive attitudes