ABSTRACT
This introduction is intended to help readers understand the contextual presuppositions of the subsequent chapters. It starts with the rationale for Soft CLIL in an EFL environment where the English proficiency level of most students remains up to pre-intermediate (B1 on the CEFR scale), making it difficult to implement Hard CLIL on a full scale. Japan is one such country. The introduction then tells a brief history of ELT in Japan from its beginnings in the last quarter of the 19th century to the most recent move in the first quarter of the 21st century with CLIL as its latest addition. The introduction goes on to describe the development and features of CLIL in Japan since it started about a decade ago. The summaries of individual chapters conclude this introduction.
