Innovation in Language Learning

The present paper stands to encourage an explorative use of code-switching in the ESP classroom, especially when CLIL methodology is employed to aid differentiated student instruction in successfully managing lower levels of English, while supporting content and specialised vocabulary acquisition at the same time. This potential innovative use of a frequently considered “undesirable” phenomenon in the context of language learning, was identified in the author’s doctoral studies [1] as serving a multitude of different functions in a case study of a highly multilingual and multicultural academic seminar. Some of the most important outcomes of these seminar exchanges in which students were allowed to freely resort to instances of poly-languaging [2], when engaged in task accomplishment, amounted to: providing aid in content and language acquisition, while helping create a sense of social convergence and emotional safety in the classroom between peers and seminar tutor. When established, the latter, in conjunction with teacher attitude and enjoyment in the classroom [3], is considered to be one of the most reliable variables for predicting academic success, according to recent research [4]. Furthermore, code-switching use prompted the appearance of peer-to-peer micro-teaching sessions and determined students’ overall fruitful accomplishment of seminar tasks and goals. Lastly, the importance of plurilingual competence use has been explicitly added to the most recent version of the CEFR [5], highlighting the promising application of such instances to promote cultural and multilingual awareness in the classroom, and in nurturing student leadership, cooperation, and mediation skills, all necessary abilities in effective professional environments [6].