Communicative competence and didactic challenges : a case study of English-medium instruction in third-level education in Switzerland

Looking in greater detail at the role of lecturers, this publication reports results of a project introducing English as a medium of instruction in a bachelor-level programme in the natural sciences offered by a university of applied sciences in German-speaking Switzerland. The three papers in this publication focus on key aspects arising from the pilot phase, outlining challenges involved when functioning communities of practice are disrupted by the change of the medium of communication as well as communicative processes that are at work in creating a new community of practice on the basis of English as a lingua franca.Diese Publikation untersucht die Einführung von englischsprachigem Fachunterricht in naturwissenschaftlichen Fächern auf Bachelorstufe im Rahmen eines dreijährigen Pilotversuchs, der an einer Fachhochschule der Schweiz durchgeführt wurde. Die drei Beiträge dieser Publikation widmen sich zentralen Fragen, die aus der Einführung des englischsprachigen Fachunterrichts während der ersten Phase des Projektes hervorgingen. Die Publikation untersucht im Speziellen die Herausforderungen, die auftreten, wenn funktionierende Praxisgemeinschaften durch den Wechsel des Kommunikationsmediums gestört werden, sowie die kommunikativen Prozesse, die zur Schaffung einer neuen Praxisgemeinschaft beitragen, die auf Englisch als Lingua Franca fusst.Looking in greater detail at the role of lecturers, this publication reports results of a project introducing English as a medium of instruction in a bachelor-level programme in the natural sciences offered by a university of applied sciences in German-speaking Switzerland. The three papers in this publication focus on key aspects arising from the pilot phase, outlining challenges involved when functioning communities of practice are disrupted by the change of the medium of communication as well as communicative processes that are at work in creating a new community of practice on the basis of English as a lingua franca