This piece of work gives account of a classroom research project done in a rural state institution in Colombia whose main purpose was to contextualize the foreign languages teaching and learning in line with the current curriculum regulations stated by the National Ministry of Education. Content-based instruction inside a rural English classroom was examined and informed. The results revealed that the content-based instruction approach was useful to integrate environmental issues with the grammar and the communicative uses of the language. Rural high school students get more motivated when they feel a stronger and real connection between the language they learn and their touching and closest reality they perceive. It was also found that applying these environmental issues in a rural scholar context caused awareness in students according to the use and importance the English as a foreign language can be imply in their social development highlighting the real relevance in their current lives. Conclusions highlight some perspectives and implications derived from the application of several lesson plans incorporating the crisis of the planet and its possible solutions as the core content.