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Many of us have learnt to spell as a child without being specifically taught the sounds. In the past, the teaching of phonics was discouraged in schools, however, we learnt a lot through sounding out words independently. At a recent course on voice production, the importance of vowel sounds was emphasised as central to pronunciation. They were also emphasised as central to sounding out to help with spelling. Chunking (breaking up words into syllables) also helps to sound out and spell longer more challenging words.
Learners with speech and language difficulties may find it difficult to remember words or think or the word they want to use when they are talking.
Tip or Idea: Think of a category such as ‘animals’ or ‘things in a kitchen’ and then see how many words you can name. Each time you think of a word place a Lego piece on top of another and see how tall a tower you can build!
I have been teaching English for over 20 years and in that time I have held various teaching titles; I had a different acronym depending on which country or school I was teaching in. Over the past 20 years, I have been an ESL, an EFL, an ESP, an ESOL and an EAL teacher. As you can see, ELT - English Language Teaching - comes with a whole host of acronyms. I will identify and describe them below.
*All terms below refer to students whose mother tongue is not English and who are learning English.
Although Inclusion is a central theme of UK policy, there are limited directives on EAL provision in mainstream classes (Costley 2014) This can have implications for international environments too, which model their practice on the UK or have UK trained teachers. Policy has significant implications for teachers who may be underprepared to support EAL pupils.
In previous articles we discussed the need for learners to obtain Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS). These skills need to be the initial focus of learning alongside curriculum content in the early days. Class teachers are required to make significant adjustments to their programme of learning which is not an easy task, especially for those teachers who are new to teaching foreign languages.
It is often easier for learners who are new to English to cope with the arithmetic areas of the mathematics curriculum, rather than with problem-solving activities, as the former require the use of less English. It is important that children learning EAL are familiar with and able to use mathematical language to achieve their potential in all areas of the subject.
As a child progresses through education, the development of strong connections between their parents and teachers is vitally important (Drake, 2000). Effective home-school partnerships and parental involvement in children’s education have traditionally been a strong predictor of student academic achievement and - ultimately - success (Epstein, 2001). Therefore, understanding the powerful role of parents and the ways in which they can be an effective influence on their children is crucial in our effort to provide a truly supportive learning environment for students.
Fostering each learner's cultural identity, what can you suggest to parents? There is more awareness now than ever before on fostering an understanding of migration, refugees, general diversity and mother languages. There is rightly a tremendous sense of pride from parents over their own culture, which is often enhanced due to their distance from home.
As I write this, it is Mental Health Awareness Week in the UK, hosted by the Mental Health Foundation, with World Wellbeing Week fast approaching. My thoughts are turning to the power of nature to lift spirits, lighten moods and provide a positive focus. To celebrate and utilise access to the outdoors, I'd like to share an example of an outdoor home learning project that combines fresh air, exercise and connection with nature with the development of English language proficiency in primary-aged EAL pupils.
Sports are often an integral part of any culture. Children grow up playing or watching sports at home with their family from a very young age. Apart from the immediate family environment, schools also promote the benefits of an active lifestyle with Physical Education (PE) being an essential part of the school curriculum and a process that uses bodily movement to promote learning while playing a variety of sports games (Peter, 2015).
Effective teacher-parent collaboration has undoubtedly been found to be beneficial for a child’s wellbeing and academic performance with relevant research recently highlighting two distinct approaches to home-school partnerships associated with specific parent behaviours each (Epstein, 2001). Below we will attempt to shed light on the differences between ‘parent involvement’ and ‘parent engagement’ in an effort to help schools make more informed decisions on what really matters when it comes to promoting successful collaboration with parents.
Including a useful EAL Progress Review and links to different EAL assessment continua
When teaching EAL, assessment procedures need to be in place in order to have a concrete analysis of student starting points.
This area is a minefield! Without other references or expertise to hand, a new teacher often turns to an expert for help… Google! Results popping up on the first page of a search shows the Oxford placement tests on the first page, but are they the answer?
The popularity of bilingual schools is increasing. This can be seen, for example, in the growing number of French schools in London, where the students follow a bilingual programme.
In many countries there is an emphasis on learning two languages (The Linguist, 2017). In Scotland in 2011 the government pledged to follow the European model of 1+2 languages. Every child would learn two languages in addition to their mother tongue, to celebrate linguistic and cultural diversity and thus facilitate the inclusion of other languages within the school.
"One look is worth a thousand words." Barnard (1921), Chinese proverb.
Images are powerful as they can usually be interpreted regardless of the language spoken.
Have a look at this image:
Someone sitting alone isn’t always negative. A title can make all the difference. For example, ‘Hope!’ What does this picture mean to you? ‘Alone!’ Now what does it mean?
Assistive technology plays a crucial role in education, by removing barriers to learning, especially for students who face challenges in traditional classroom settings. It is becoming a greater priority within education.
For the first time, the UK’s Department for Education plans to include training on assistive technology for all new teachers. There is a vast range of assistive technology from mobility aids to communication tools and visual aids.
Whilst reading a book on reclaiming childhood ('Their name is today' by Johann Christoph Arnold) the chapter on 'learning differences and how to cater for them' triggered thoughts on teaching differences. At the end of the October article it was mentioned that EAL teaching should be evaluated in a different way due to the very nature of the subject and I shall try to clarify why.
An EAL teacher is a professional specialising in working with learners for whom English is an additional language, such as refugees, asylum seekers or children of migrant families.
Encouraging learners to engage in the language classroom is a persistent challenge faced by many English language teachers. Despite careful planning and engaging activities, learners often remain silent or disengaged during speaking tasks, or make persistent errors. This can stem from a variety of factors, all of which are important for ESOL teachers to consider.
EAL learning should balance meaning‑focused output, form‑focused instruction, and fluency development to support communicative competence. As educators, we are naturally reflective creatures, habitually revisiting lessons in our minds to see if we could somehow improve. Could the outcomes have been better? Were the discussions rich and high in quality? Was the balance of activities right to get the best possible language learning progression? Here, we will explore how to get the right balance in lessons, as well as suggesting activities.
Last week I saw a film called 'Shadow in Baghdad', it was a film that pulled my heart strings. I was brought up in Manchester, both my parents spoke Arabic at home, both were from Baghdad. What struck me the most after I watched the film was how much I missed hearing that particular dialect of Arabic, the familiarity and warmth of the Middle Eastern people, the sense of security that came with it as well as a sense of longing and regret for a disappearing culture.
Studies have found that learning a skill yourself, and then applying it, not only brings immense personal satisfaction (among other valuable benefits), but also leads to greater achievement. It’s an important part of an enquiry-based curriculum.
Personal satisfaction can be achieved through learning that is personalised and by promoting a growth mindset. Carol Dweck, professor of psychology at Stanford University, explains simply how achievement and success can be perceived:
Being able to understand and use a range of adjectives can help learners to communicate successfully. Adjectives are essential for adding information or interest to their spoken or written language. They also enable learners to differentiate between items.
Dual coding, developed by Allan Pavio, is a teaching method that combines different types of stimuli to support students to learn and remember information. It is particularly beneficial for learners with special educational needs. An example might be combining words with pictures or audio with text.
Tip or Idea: Start with an image and ask students to explain in their own words what they mean or flip it around and provide students with a word and ask them to draw or create their own image.
The language show this year in Olympia made me even more aware of the gift of having more than one language. One of the stand's motto was 'monolingualism can be cured', another 'Speak to the Future' (www.speaktothefuture.org) campaigns to promote the teaching of languages in schools in the UK. Since this September all children in primary schools will be taught a language as the government finally realised that, in a mobile world, a second language is essential for a country's economic development.
The language of Maths is often considered a language of its own, and this can sometimes be a difficulty for EAL students when they are learning English. NALDIC explain that if EAL learners are not supported to develop mathematical English, they are less likely to be able to fully-participate in the lesson, which could lead to them not being able to make sufficient progress in the subject.
While it can be argued that EAL learners have an entitlement to experience a full and varied curriculum through complete class immersion and no withdrawal, some would argue that learners benefit from being withdrawn for time limited support to help them develop their English language in order to assist them in accessing the curriculum (NALDIC, FAQ Podcast, 2017).
If learners are unable to access the lesson content, they can feel frustrated and a sense of failure. Learners need to feel confident and successful.
As school teachers faced with EAL learners in our classrooms, we often push the teaching of phonics down the list, especially at secondary school level. Yet communication is dependent on comprehensive pronunciation when speaking, and on decoding graphemes when reading. Consider for a moment the impact mispronunciation can have on accurate communication. For example, if I ask for soap in a restaurant, I might be faced with a blank stare! This error is caused by confusing two very similar phonemes in soap/soup.
How can you take your EAL department forward to play a part in a whole school development strategy? Over the years, I have found that this can be a real challenge. A plan for a whole-school approach to EAL can have a significant impact, and not only benefits the EAL learners, but the whole school population.
Common themes
Blair and Bourne (1998) researched some successful schools and identified some common themes with regard to EAL:
It's now almost exactly a year since the UK education system went into lockdown. The ruling that schools must close to almost all pupils was a shock to teachers, pupils, parents and everyone involved in the education system - and the repercussions of the immediate crisis continue to ripple through our lives.
Effective teacher-parent collaboration has undoubtedly been found to be beneficial for a child’s wellbeing and academic performance with relevant research recently highlighting two distinct approaches to home-school partnerships associated with specific parent behaviours each (Epstein, 2001). Below we will attempt to shed light on the differences between ‘parent involvement’ and ‘parent engagement’ in an effort to help schools make more informed decisions on what really matters when it comes to promoting successful collaboration with parents.
As a Head of Early Years in an international school following the EYFS and IPC curriculums it has always been important to ensure that the teaching of the English language is done in the classroom without the help of specialist EAL support. Early years teachers are great physical, visual talkers!
One of the key principles of teaching in the Early Years is that bilingualism has an advantage and that as the first language it has a continuing and significant role in identity, learning and the acquisition of additional languages.
An EAL learner may be confident interacting with teachers and peers using everyday English, but the mathematics curriculum employs abstract academic vocabulary and, to access this, they need to be taught in a specific, intentional way. In addition, EAL students may already be highly proficient in mathematics and the English vocabulary in their maths problems may be a hurdle that can cause confusion, adding to their cognitive load and knocking their confidence. Consequently, there is a lot for an EAL teacher to consider.
Academia Británica Cuscatleca (ABC) in El Salvador joined the Learning Village in April 2015. However, they weren't fully active across Upper Primary until Communication Across Cultures came to their school in February this year to give an inset on EAL.
Since then, they have used the Learning Village to support learners with accessing some of the basics of English as well as the curriculum content needed to help them to be successful in their lessons.
The term 21st Century skills is becoming significantly part of the classroom learning environment, but what exactly does that mean? There are a few definitions, however, in essence, these are the skills that our learners need to prepare them for their future (Puchta & Williams, 2014), taking them from their studies, to their futures as adults.
The Four C's
Many researchers today acknowledge the 4C’s. They are known as: