PPLI Annual Report 2020 - Flipbook - Page 32
There was a broad representation of schools with a mixture of fee-paying and non-fee-paying, mixed and
single-sex, and also Gaelcholáistí and English-speaking schools. Educate Together, ETB schools, Community
and Comprehensive schools and Voluntary Secondary Schools were also represented.
At the outset, the following six steps were planned for the 2020 CLIL training.
MAY 2020
An initial call is
launched for
applications from
MFL teachers
JUNE 2020
Successful
applicants are
invited to
undertake a preweninar task
Teachers take part
in 2x1hr webinars
focusing on
principals of CLIL
JULY 2020
SEPT-NOV
Teachers are
invited to a 1-day
face-to-face
session
2 Communities of
Practice meetings
with current CLIL
teachers
DEC 2020
Final face-to-face
session to reflect
on progress and
discuss next steps.
CLIL Communities of Practice were moved online as a result of Covid restrictions in place.
As the sessions progressed, participation reduced significantly. While it is very important to acknowledge the
extremely challenging situation that all teachers found themselves in due to COVID restrictions in the first
term of the 2020-2021 year, it will also be essential to carefully consider how a higher level of participation
might be encouraged in future cohorts and how teachers who have participated in the training in either Year
One or Year Two could remain engaged with the overall CLIL project.
Activities and Supports
Initial training and preparation consisted of providing opportunities for participating teachers to reflect on
progress using a CLIL competencies self-evaluation based on the ECML’s European Framework for CLIL
Education, simplified and localised to the Irish context.
Participants were asked to evaluate their understanding of each competency using a 5-point scale:
0
I am unsure of what this means
1
I have awareness of competency
2
I have a developing competency
3
I am competent
4
I can develop other CLIL teachers’ competency in this area
Upon completion of this evaluation, a participant is presented with a personal Spikey Profile. It was
envisioned that participants would be able to clearly see their progress by comparing the visualisations of
their profile at different intervals.
After initial self-evaluation, webinars were designed to introduce the teachers who had signed up to
participate in this year’s project to the theory behind CLIL.
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