Innovation in Language Learning

In the global strive for effectiveness and sustainable results in the Education World, teaching / learning of languages at the tertiary level has been scrutinized not only by the directly involved actors (teachers and students) but also by university administration, curricula designers and policy makers. Since, in most cases, university and college students are supposed to “continue” studying the language(s) they learnt at schools,  the content of the courses offered at universities is pre-conditioned by the level acquired at school as well as the national or supranational ( as in the European Union) language policies.  English for Specific Purposes (ESP) as well as CLIL have been recognized as the most popular approaches to language teaching/learning at universities all over the world.  The article suggests the analysis (based on the experimental activities) of these approaches from the perspectives of universities of two countries - Russia and Lithuania, The authors will debate the advantages and challenges of ESP and CLIL on the basis of their application in Vilnius and Tomsk universities. Such factors as course duration, balance between content and language learning, ICT application will be analyzed from teachers’ and students’ perspectives on the basis of the conducted surveys, interviews, own observations and reflections.

Keywords: Content and language integrated learning, English for specific purposes, adjunct learning, cognitive thinking, language acquisition;