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CLIL students’ perceptions of learning along the 4Cs in inclusive primary education

ORCiD logo with link | University of Teacher Education Lucerne
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at [email protected].

This article was made Open Access under a CC BY 4.0 license through payment of an APC by or on behalf of the author.

Published online: 21 May 2026
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https://doi.org/10.1075/jicb.25013.fra
Abstract
This mixed-methods study explored how Swiss primary school students assigned to three different English attainment levels perceived their learning in CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) along the influential 4Cs framework. The approximately 100 students self-assessed their learning regarding the four relevant aspects of the framework (C-Communication, C-Content, C-Cultures, and C-Cognition) with a specifically designed questionnaire. Additional focus group interviews were conducted with selected students. The findings suggest that the perceptions of C-Communication, C-Content, and C-Cultures were generally positive and did not significantly differ across attainment levels, indicating that all students, regardless of their level of English, perceived learning benefits in these three dimensions. The low-attaining students, however, rated the cognitive activation related to C-Cognition significantly differently. The study underscores the need for differentiated scaffolding to enhance CLIL’s inclusivity and effectiveness.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
    • 2.1The 4Cs framework
    • 2.2Young learners’ perceptions of CLIL
  • 3.Study design
    • 3.1Research question
    • 3.2Research context and participants
    • 3.3Data-collection methods
    • 3.4Data-Analysis methods
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Results from questionnaire T2
    • 4.2Results from the focus group interviews
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • Bibliography
References (63)
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