Changing teacher educator cognition within a collaborative teacher education programme for CLIL: A case study in China

This study reports on a six-month collaborative teacher education programme designed to support the implementation of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) in the Chinese primary education context. ‘Activity theory’ was used as an analytical framework to investigate the changes in cognition regarding CLIL experienced by two teacher educators – one at district level and the other at school level – and the factors that contributed to shifts in their cognition. Thematic analysis was conducted on data consisting of semi-structured interviews, field notes, a reflective report, and project meeting minutes. Results indicate that for both teacher educators, the programme functioned as an activity system that facilitated the emergence of advanced cognition of CLIL over the six months of the project, and did so along two distinct trajectories, one focusing on pedagogical applications of CLIL tenets and the other centring on implementing CLIL as an educational policy. The results also show how the collaborative nature of the teacher education programme fostered the expression of diverse views as well as shared motives through frequent interaction and co-construction of knowledge. As such, it offers a viable alternative to more traditional top-down approaches that are used to foster the professional development of teacher educators.