The Integration of Biology Content Lessons in the English Curriculum through

8.2 Positive students’ responses 
Regarding the students’ responses, during the implementation of the lessons, it was 
evidenced a positive students’ attitude towards the integration of English topics into the 
Biology class. Students showed commitment with the topics and tasks by developing 
the activities postulated by the implementer, and asking for help when they did not 
understand something related to the topic. This proved the students’ interest towards 

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the project, being thoughtful at the moment of connecting the previous knowledge with 
the new ones related to the Biology content.
Issues
It is important to highlight their commitment with the different activities proposed, and 
their attitude towards the challenge faced when they encounter themselves with difficult 
topics, words or tasks. As this was a 33 students group, it is difficult to find the same 
reaction and responses in the whole group. It was evidenced high stress situations, 
reaching for moments the disinterest on the lesson. Due to the short time provided the 
implementer tried in some cases to motivate those students and get them back to the 
topic; however, the main focus was to end the lesson fulfilling what was planned with 
the less disciplinary issues as possible.
8.3 Students’ linguistic outcomes 
One of the most relevant aspects was that students felt comfortable with the 
reinforcement of both, content and English topics. For instance, in the first two classes, 
they showed a proper general knowledge about possessive adjectives making easier 
the development of the lesson and optimizing the time for the tasks. This is the result of 
a proper articulation between the English teacher and the researchers. As shown in the 
different artifacts provided above, students made use of their different skills and 
knowledge learnt in their L1 biology class and remembered several aspects of the 
English topic. 

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The implementation strategies of the researchers on one skill based lesson made easier 
the analysis and observation of the different linguistic outcomes. Through this process, 
the 4 linguistic skills (writing, reading, listening and speaking) were the focus of each 
lesson. As evidenced in the second lesson where the listening test took place or the last 
lesson in which there was a speaking activity to contrast and compare. 
Assessment
The students did a summative assessment at the end of the project that contained the 
three linguistic topics seen during the project time (possessive adjectives and 
comparatives and superlatives) and the two content biology topics (excretory system 
and DNA and scientific thinking). The set of exercises on the assessment paper were 
similar to the ones previously worked during the implementations (fill in the gaps, 
multiple choices, completing a statement).
Issues
The main issues that were evidenced when grading the assessment was that according 
the institutional English schedule, the students were supposed to work on comparatives 
and superlatives; however, in the day of the assessment the English teacher mentioned 
that they never had the time and possibility to work on it. This meant that the students 
faced that part of the assessment just with the few explanations given by the 
implementer in two of the lessons. 

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