The IB’s key language policy document, Language and Learning in IB Programmes, sets out a framework of language learning domains, grouped under three strands.
a. learning language – discrete skills, BICS, literacy and the art of language;
b. learning through language – CALP; and
c. learning about language – literary analysis, critical literacy.
Figure 11 illustrates the ways the language domains correlate with the themes
identified in the Literature Review, which then provided a frame for the document analysis in this section of the report.
1 Teacher support material
Basic interpersonal Cskills
Basic literacy skills Discrete skills
Literacy and the art of language
Disciplinary literacy skills Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP)
New literacies Critical literacy
Multilingualism
Figure 11 Relationship between the IB language domains and project analysis themes
4.3.1 Constructivism versus social constructivism
The IB commitment to a constructivist theoretical frame is clearly evident throughout the documentation, from the broad principles continuum documents which run across the programmes to the planning documents in the individual programmes.
Theories of learning Constructivism – learning is an innate capacity, facilitated by others; closely aligned with nativist theories of language acquisition
Social constructivism – learning is a socially mediated event, guided explicitly by others; closely aligned with social
interactionist theories of language acquisition
learning ideologies and the IB’s description of language as a socially mediated construct, as provided in the overview documents, where language is defined as a social act and a vehicle to engage with the world. That is, there is a tension between a description of learning as constructed from within, and a description of language as constructed with others.
The consequence of this disjuncture is that the pedagogy, planning, and assessment documents do not explicitly describe the ways in which languages are used but instead simply offer the opportunities for the language to be used. There are generalised
observations that students who read extensively and who are exposed to academic language will develop skills in that academic language. This stands in contrast to the social
constructivist description of language to be found in the language policy document Language and Learning in the IB Programme, where functional descriptions of language learning are prominent, for example, in the descriptions of the language and text features that characterise various genres, such as a report, an explanation or a persuasive essay.
Genres are social constructions rather than texts that come naturally to a writer or a reader. As such, students require induction into their language and structure. This induction is particularly crucial for students for whom the language of school instruction is not their mother tongue. As their interactions with the language of the school are often limited to their interactions within the school, they require more explicit scaffolding and support into the language of instruction.
The importance of language and literacy, and their fundamental role in learning, is clearly evident throughout the IB documentation in both the PYP and MYP. There are many references to the broad literacy processes that are integral to the IB’s inquiry approach.
However, apart from a reasonably thorough description of the basic skills in the PYP
Language Scope and Sequence, there is no detailed description of the precise ways language demands increase in complexity over the years of schooling, nor how language differs in fundamental ways across the different subject areas in order to produce the necessary literacy texts. General frameworks for describing these shifts in language exist via the BICS and CALP framework, but there is no guidance on what the language would look like within this framework, particularly as students move into the realms of academic literacies.
Language and Learning in IB Programmes notes that as students progress through school they are required to read and write increasingly academic texts in the subject areas.
The document provides some very brief examples of the kinds of language that appears in such texts as follows:
• the increased density of low-frequency and technical vocabulary – much of which, in the case of English, comes from Latin and Greek sources (for example,
photosynthesis, revolution); and
• increasingly sophisticated grammatical constructions (for example, the passive voice).
Language – the set of tools we draw upon to communicate
Literacy – the manifestation of our communication, i.e. the texts we produce
documentation, for example, in the subject overviews or unit planners, which is where teachers are most likely to encounter the need to understand the language specificity of the content area.
4.3.3 Grammar There is clearly a theoretical space within the IB for more
attention to a description of language features across disciplines and across the years of schooling. In Language and Learning in IB Programmes, a clear case is made for the relevance of such grammatical features.
The document acknowledges that traditional grammar pedagogies which have presented language as devoid of context have been supplanted by the development of functional grammar pedagogies which focus on teaching how language works through the examination of language in use. Such grammar pedagogies are ideally suited to an IB inquiry approach. As Language and Learning in IB Programmes states, “Since language has a central role in the construction of meaning and knowledge, the potential of functional and other modern approaches to grammar as a way to better understand how academic language can be learned is particularly relevant.”
4.3.4 Multilingualism Finally, the IB’s commitment to multilingual approaches to curriculum planning and learning is exemplary. The IB is quite obviously at the leading edge of understanding the ways language is learned, and the complex linguistic profiles students possess. However, this strong description of multilingualism as a resource and an asset is let down by an apparent lack of explanation and guidance on how these principles can be achieved in the everyday practice of planning and assessment within the IB programmes. This observation is explored in detail in each of the programme-specific discussions which follow.