Using Drama in ESP: The Interdepartmental Language Centre as a Learning Community

Abstract

This article seeks to illustrate how the Interdepartmental Language Centre of a university can come to represent a fertile and dynamic learning community. Its specific focus is the use of drama in two ESP courses run by the interdepartmental language centre at the University of Turin (CLA-UniTo). The first was a third-year workshop for trainee primary school teachers, the second a first-year module on a degree course in social work. Both of these courses might be said to bridge the rather ill-defined boundaries between CLIL and ESP, as in both cases language is taught through content and content through language. This cross-curricular focus disrupts the traditional verticalist hierarchy of the teacher-pupil relationship, since the course participants frequently have content-based knowledge and experience in which the “teacher” is lacking. The use of dramatization proved particularly useful in engaging and empowering each individual student in these classes, transforming the learning process into a dynamic, collaborative enterprise.