CLIL subject selection and young learners' listening and reading comprehension skills

This study compares the development of English receptive skills of two groups of Spanish primary school children who were exposed to two different content and language integrated learning (CLIL) subjects, science and arts and crafts (A&C), during two academic years. Participants were also divided into level groups to explore if their level of English at the beginning of the study influenced language development. Science students generally obtained better results than A&C students but such differences became significant only in the case of listening skills after a certain amount of exposure had been accumulated, once the CLIL implementation process was over and all stakeholders had adapted to it. Low achievers improved more than stronger students and benefitted more from Science than from A&C CLIL, particularly in relation to their listening comprehension skills.