1.5 Learning Skills Across the Curriculum
Key Takeaways
- Learning skills are the study and self-management strategies learners use to work with information, independent of subject — from note-taking to setting their own learning goals.
- Skills such as scanning/skimming text and guessing from context reduce the combined cognitive and language load of studying a subject in a non-native language.
- Setting own learning goals marks a shift from teacher-directed to learner-directed learning, distinct from teacher-led planning.
- A single investigation-based science lesson can draw on estimating, measuring, recording, reviewing, and summarising in sequence.
1.5 Learning Skills Across the Curriculum
What Are Learning Skills?
Alongside language, communication, and cognitive skills, a CLIL lesson also develops learners' learning skills — the practical study and self-management skills learners use to work with information and organise their own learning, regardless of subject. These are sometimes called "learning-how-to-learn" skills, and they matter especially in CLIL because learners are processing subject content through an additional language, so efficient study strategies reduce the extra load that comes with working in that language.
The Official List of Learning Skills
The Cambridge TKT: CLIL syllabus specifies the following learning skills that feature across curricular subjects: carrying out investigations; drafting, writing and editing work; estimating then checking or measuring; guessing from context; locating, organising and interpreting information; note-taking; planning; recording results; reviewing; setting own learning goals; scanning and skimming text; selecting and using reference materials; summarising; and transferring information from one source to another.
The Full List Organised by Purpose
| Purpose | Learning skills |
|---|---|
| Gathering and processing information | Carrying out investigations; guessing from context; locating, organising and interpreting information; scanning and skimming text; selecting and using reference materials; transferring information from one source to another |
| Producing and checking work | Drafting, writing and editing work; estimating then checking or measuring; note-taking; recording results; summarising |
| Managing own learning | Planning; reviewing; setting own learning goals |
Worked Example: A CLIL Science Investigation
Consider a CLIL science lesson in which learners investigate which material is the best insulator. Across the lesson, learners draw on a wide range of these learning skills:
- Planning: In groups, learners plan their investigation, deciding what to test and how.
- Estimating then checking or measuring: Before testing, learners estimate which material will keep water warmest, then measure the actual temperature drop with a thermometer.
- Carrying out investigations: Learners run the timed experiment, wrapping containers in different materials.
- Recording results: Learners record temperature readings in a table at regular intervals.
- Locating, organising and interpreting information: Learners organise their results into a chart and interpret which material performed best.
- Note-taking and summarising: Learners take brief notes during the experiment, then summarise their findings in two or three sentences.
- Reviewing: At the end, learners review their original estimate against their actual results and reflect on why their prediction was right or wrong.
Worked Example: A CLIL History Research Task
A history topic on a historical figure or event draws on a different cluster of the same skills. Learners might be given two short texts about the topic and asked to scan and skim them first to find the general subject, then locate, organise and interpret information relevant to a specific research question. Where a word is unfamiliar, learners practise guessing from context rather than stopping to look up every term. Learners then select and use reference materials — such as a class timeline or glossary — to check dates, and transfer information from one source to another, for example moving key facts from a reading text into a timeline they are building themselves. Finally, learners go through the drafting, writing and editing process to produce a short written account, checking their own first draft against a simple checklist before submitting a final version.
Why Learning Skills Are Taught Explicitly in CLIL
Because CLIL learners are working with new subject content and a non-native language at the same time, generic study skills — such as skimming a text before reading it in detail, or guessing an unfamiliar word from its context rather than stopping to look it up — reduce the combined cognitive and linguistic load of the lesson. A CLIL teacher therefore does not assume learners will develop these strategies automatically; the teacher models them explicitly (for example, demonstrating how to skim a paragraph for its topic before scanning it for a specific date) and builds them into task instructions (for example, requiring learners to set their own learning goal for a project before they start planning it).
Setting Own Learning Goals: A Key Distinction
"Setting own learning goals" deserves particular attention because it marks a shift from teacher-directed to learner-directed learning: rather than the teacher stating the lesson objective, learners are asked to identify, in their own words, what they personally want to achieve or improve — for example, a learner might set the goal "I want to use at least three connectors correctly in my written summary" before starting a writing task. This kind of learner autonomy is a recurring theme across CLIL methodology and is one of the reasons "setting own learning goals" appears as its own separate item in the learning-skills list, distinct from the teacher-led "planning" that usually precedes a lesson.
A history teacher gives learners two short texts and asks them to find key dates and move them into a timeline they are building. Which learning skill is this task primarily developing?
Which learning skill describes a learner comparing their original prediction about an experiment's outcome against what actually happened, once the experiment is finished?
Before starting a research project, learners are asked to decide what they specifically want to achieve, in their own words, rather than simply following the teacher's stated objective. Which learning skill does this describe?
Match each learning skill to the classroom action that demonstrates it.
Match each item on the left with the correct item on the right