ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the design of the project in some detail, describing the hypothesis on which the research was based, the research questions which were investigated, the sample of schools and pupils, and the way in which the research was carried out. The selection of the project schools was made on the basis of a number of criteria: firstly, the schools had to be teaching languages other than French under the same conditions as French; that is, as FLls, with the same time allocation and resources, and to pupils of the same age and experience. In order for valid comparisons to be made between pupils’ experience of learning the various foreign languages, it was important to ensure from the outset that composition of the groups in the French, German and Spanish cohorts was similar in terms of pupils’ ability, previous language learning experience and socio-economic background, and that there were approximately equal numbers of boys and girls in each cohort.
