Innovation in Language Learning

Multicultural education is getting vital importance nowadays as it could be one of the keys in order to get a better understanding of one another in future generations. At the same time, a new trend is born in some schools across Europe: multicultural schools. They are becoming highly important due to the

existing need of reorienting the principles that control human relationships. There should be, at least, two principles which prevail: equality and reciprocity; and these schools bet for them. In the teaching–learning process the equality principle should be remarkable in order to achieve the important goal of

learning how to coexist in multicultural contexts. Reciprocity is another extremely important value in order to get a real coexistence in schools.

The teacher’s job is becoming more and more complex because demands placed upon them are increasing, especially for language teachers whose competences have been amplified in the last decades. They should be trained to deal with cultural differences where the principal problems and

conflicts appears due to the fact that those cultures are ignored or overrated, and not because of their lack of understanding. Foreign/second language teachers should be prepared to promote and implement the concept of plurilinguism and the operational approach in class. It could be the linguistic

skills what places those teachers in a more challenging situation because they are often the first contact for immigrant students. Thus multicultural education in foreign/second language teachers is essential.

Nowadays, one of the most innovative approaches in second language teaching is CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning). It integrates four dimensions (Culture, Content, Communication and Cognition) whose interaction makes effective and efficient the learning of the foreign language and the content. Within these four axes, it is culture the one that needs specific attention, as it is not sufficiently developed.

Our paper will get deeper in the analysis of all these factors, and as a final conclusion, it will state the need to develop the ‘cultural axis’ of CLIL.