Ivana Marenzi, Forschungszentrum L3S, Germany
Wolfgang Nejdl, Forschungszentrum L3S, Germany

ABSTRACT

In Content and Language Integrated Learning the context is to explicitly teach a subject through a foreign or second language and therefore implicitly to teach the language through this subject. Adding the activity of collaborative search is part of constructing the context, and hence making language learning real. With these goals in mind, collaborative and active learning is supported by our LearnWeb2.0 infrastructure which helps students in collaborative searching and organization of resources. In LearnWeb2.0 searching is focused on a specific subject providing materials from Web 2.0 platforms; ratings and comments are directly linked to the resources and shared within the learning group. We present two CLIL courses, one in Germany and one in Italy, for which LearnWeb2.0 was used. For both courses, we present the tasks we designed to foster students´ active and creative learning, and we discuss how these tasks were supported by our infrastructure. We present our evaluation design and results for both courses. Based on this, we discuss commonalities and differences in both scenarios, from the educational and cultural point of view, and how these influence students´ performance and satisfaction. Finally, we discuss lessons learned and ideas for improving educational setup and functionalities for future LearnWeb2.0 based courses.