ABSTRACT
All Nordic countries offer English-medium programmes in tertiary education, yet their approach to bilingual instruction in primary and secondary education varies. This chapter explores the curricular development of CLIL in Nordic primary and lower secondary education. The chapter begins with a discussion of the national curricular possibilities for CLIL instruction in Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. The focus then shifts to research on students’ content and language learning conducted in those countries between 2010 and 2020. The findings suggest that, although official curricular documents could support CLIL programmes in primary and lower secondary education, such programmes have either encountered resistance or are only recently being developed in Denmark, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. In contrast, Finland has addressed foreign language mediated instruction in its curricula and has been more consistent in developing CLIL in compulsory education.
