The receptive vocabulary of Spanish students in CLIL and non-CLIL instruction

Resum

AbstrAct: This paper aims at investigating the receptive vocabulary size of two groups of Spanish boys and girls following two different types of instruction: Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) and learning English as a curricular subject (non-CLIL). The 2,000 word frequency band of the receptive version of the Vocabulary Level Test (Schmitt, Schmitt and Clapham 2001) was implemented to determine stu- dents’ vocabulary knowledge. Learners’ word estimates were also analysed in order to determine their ability to understand spoken and written discourse in English …….of non-CLIL learners in their Vocabulary Level Test scores. Non-CLIL girls obtained the highest mean scores, and CLIL boys performed better in the test than CLIL girls. Nevertheless, differences between male and female participants in the present sample DUH words which implies that they may have problems to understand spoken and written discourse in the foreign language.