Teaching English as an Additional Language (EAL) - View as single page

Original guide sponsored by the University of Winchester, this revision sponsored by The University of Reading and Hampshire EMTAS.

This guide has been co-authored by Naomi Flynn, an Associate Professor of Primary English Education at the University Of Reading Institute Of Education, working with Chris Pim and Sarah Coles who are specialist advisory teachers with Hampshire’s Ethnic Minority and Traveller Achievement Service (EMTAS). It was constructed with the support of teachers in primary and secondary schools in Hampshire, selected for their existing expertise in teaching EAL learners, who used the guidance for action research during the spring and summer of 2015. You are reading the updated and revised version published in 2019.  You can contact us through n.flynn@reading.ac.uk

We use the term EAL (English as an additional language) because this is in current use in the UK, but readers can assume that this refers to any child using a language other than English in the home. This might be a new arrival with no spoken English or a child fully proficient in English but using other languages outside school.

The guide is written principally to support teachers and learning support assistants working with English language learners in any educational setting and who are at any stage of proficiency in the learning of English. It will also support senior leaders in their strategic response to the EAL learners in their schools. As with all MESH guides it seeks to share knowledge with professionals in order to support the growth of evidence-informed practice that works in promoting the best in pupil outcomes.

This guide chiefly supports the teaching and learning of EAL learners in terms of their language and literacy development, because these skills allow them access to learning across the curriculum. There is deliberate and considerable overlap between the sections of the guide in acknowledgement of the interdependence of language and literacy development. Thus readers will find it helpful to read sections other than those that appear at first to match their interest. In particular it is important that the sections on the left hand side of the guide which present the foundations of second language acquisition theory and the stages of pupils’ proficiency are understood to underpin the practical suggestions presented in other sections.

The guide is of use to practitioners in primary (5 -11 years) and secondary schools (11 – 16 years). These English terms are used throughout but readers from other countries can assume an approximate match with school ages elsewhere. However, it is useful to note that in England the statutory age for pupils to start in full time education is 5 years, and thus there will be some age-related differences in expectation for language use and written outcomes in other countries. More useful for all readers is to consider pupils’ stage of English proficiency when reading the guide and to note where we make age-appropriate adaptations. The design of the guide was driven by the wishes expressed by teachers taking part in its construction We welcome feedback on how well the guide works for busy teachers seeking evidence-informed practical ideas to support development of their teaching for EAL learners.

The numbers of EAL learners and the range of languages spoken in UK schools have risen substantially in the past 15 – 20 years. In 2018 statistics from the UK’s Department for Education indicated that approximately 21% of primary school pupils have EAL and around 17% of secondary school pupils. While many of these children may live in towns and cities commonly associated with multilingual classrooms, it is increasingly common that teachers in any area will need to plan for EAL learner needs.

EAL learners in one school will have very different languages and heritages from those in another school. This means that schools and teachers need to be sensitive to differences beyond language differences and avoid the assumption that being an EAL learner of itself is the only aspect of a child’s identity that needs attention. There are some key areas of pedagogy that will support all EAL learners, but the most useful starting point, as with all pupils, is to understand something of the particular language, home background and previous education of your individual EAL learners. The chart below identifies the wide variety of experiences your EAL learners may have.

The Background and Experience of EAL Learners (Source: Pim, C (2010) How to Support Children Learning English as an Additional Language, Hyde: LDA) 

It is generally accepted among researchers that a first language is ‘developed’ while a second or subsequent language is ‘acquired’. This would be different for children who are raised by parents with two languages and who develop full bilingualism in two languages from birth. However, for the majority of practitioners using this guide we assume that the pupils with whom they are working are acquiring English while at school. There are a number of different theories related to second language acquisition, and we acknowledge that there is some disagreement in this field. For the purposes of this guide we have identified some which we feel are helpful for practitioners to consider.

How is additional language acquisition different from first language development?

Who are the key theorists in the field of additional language acquisition?

Jim Cummins’ work is useful for teachers in classrooms. Cummins' (1979) ‘iceberg’ theory of language interdependence proposed that there are common mental processes underlying both first and additional language learning. Cummins (1999) also identified the two types of language that pupils need to acquire in order to access learning across the curriculum:

Stephen Krashen may also be useful for teachers. Krashen (1981) distinguishes two processes within additional language learning: acquisition and learning. Both are needed for pupils to develop fluency in their new language.

Robert Gardner reported on a range of studies that identify the crucial role of motivation in additional language acquisition. Masgoret and Gardner (2003) summarised this work as showing that there are key dispositional features influencing success and these are: desire to integrate; attitude to the learning situation; motivation to learn the language; language anxiety; other individual differences.

For a comprehensive and highly regarded review of additional language theory and practice see Colin Baker’s Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism.

It is important to note that in planning for EAL learners, attention to their stage of language and literacy development is as important, if not more important, than relating their attainment to curriculum-led levels which are designed for monolingual learners.

Stages of additional language learning are not linear. The rate of progress and the order of language acquisition will vary between pupils according to influencing factors such as: the proximity of the child’s first language to the letters and sounds of English, the way in which the classroom environment scaffolds spoken language use, the attitude of the school to additional languages, the motivation of the child to learn English. However, in attempting to define a sequence for additional language acquisition the following is a useful benchmark:

• Continued use of the first language
• Silent phase (can last up to six months)
• Use of single words
• Use of phrases etc.
• Use of more complex English

There are no mandatory UK-based ways of naming children’s different levels of proficiency. There was, however, a framework for measuring proficiency in English introduced by the DfE (2016) and developed by the Bell Foundation that you can find here https://www.bell-foundation.org.uk/eal-programme/teaching-resources/eal-assessment-framework/

Different regions/countries and different local authorities may have their own developed frameworks.  For the purposes of this guide, we have selected three stages that best describe the broad levels of language and literacy development that teachers are likely to need to plan for when working with their EAL learners.

NEW TO ENGLISH LEARNERS

This describes a pupil who has just arrived in school, who may or may not have also just arrived in the UK, and who has had very limited or no exposure to English.

BEGINNER EAL LEARNERS

This describes a pupil who has been in school for a period of time and can use English to communicate anything from basic needs to a range of curriculum concepts. This pupil will still need support to gain full meaning from texts and to be able to express themselves academically in writing.

ADVANCED EAL LEARNERS

From around two years of continuous exposure to English, it is broadly accepted that children will have developed basic communication skills (BICS) and be on a journey to full academic proficiency (CALP). Towards the end of acquiring full competence EAL learners may well be out-performing their monolingual peers but under-attaining in terms of their true capabilities. They will still need support with academic language use in order that they maximise their potential. Research suggests that it can take up to 10 years to develop full academic proficiency, depending on circumstances, and for this reason pupils may need specific interventions and accelerated targets (Birmingham Advisory Support Service, 2003).

For more guidance on assessing where pupils are in their English language learning, and on how to set targets for development see the section on Planning and Assessment of EAL Learners.

There are a range of research studies identifying the potential benefits of operating in two or more languages. These have been reviewed and summarised in a systematic review by Adesope et al (2010).

Bear in mind that all findings need to be taken in the context of the EAL learners with whom you are working. Contextual factors such as social and emotional well-being and the quality of instruction in the classroom will affect learners’ capacity to develop these benefits.

1. EAL learners develop greater attentional control – they are better able to focus their attention when engaged in language-related non-verbal tasks than their monolingual peers. It is thought that this is because they have to concentrate on consciously selecting their additional language to work in.
2. EAL learners develop greater metalinguistic awareness – this meant that they have a detailed understanding of how language works because they are operating in more than one language. Reflection on how the languages they use are different gives them insight into the workings of grammar and syntax. For example, Cameron and Besser (2004) found that advanced EAL learners writing fiction for standardised assessment tasks in the UK aged 11 were better able to use metaphor and other parts of speech in their compositions than monolingual pupils. 
3. EAL learners have enhanced skills in creative and abstract thinking – studies have shown that EAL learners perform better than their monolingual peers in creative and divergent thinking and in abstract and symbolic reasoning. It is thought that EAL learners’ capacity for greater creativity may be as a result of switching between two languages and two different perspectives. Their superior abstract reasoning skills may derive from having a greater vocabulary across two or more languages that allows them to see relationships (in mathematics for example)
4. EAL learners have enhanced skills at problem solving – it is thought that because EAL learners are thinking across two or more languages that they have greater flexibility of thinking when solving problems.

For a fuller discussion of these advantages, and of limiting factors on these advantages, see:

Adesope,O., Lavin, T., Thompson, T., & Ungerleider, C. (2010). A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Cognitive Correlates of Bilingualism , Review of Educational Research, 80(2), 207 – 245

See also CILT (2006) Positively Plurilingual: The contribution of community languages to UK education and society,  London: CLIT

EAL learners face a triple challenge in their learning. They have to acquire both colloquial and academic English; they must develop the knowledge, skills and understanding of that curriculum; they must also overcome the culturally-bound aspect of schooling. EAL learners, particularly new arrivals, may struggle in these three areas for a while as they learn to catch up with their peers. (NALDIC, 2009)

Social and cultural challenges:

• New arrivals in particular can feel isolated and bewildered by school; particularly if they come from a country where they were too young to have started formal education or if their schooling has been patchy and interrupted. Kelleen Toohey’s (2003) three year study of EAL learners in Canada captures how schools provide communities of practice in fine detail.
• School starting age varies between countries, thus teachers cannot assume that a pupil arriving to start school in England has had the same number of years in schools as an English pupil the same age will have had.
• The classroom will have routines that are unfamiliar and potentially exclude a new to English learner if not made explicit. (See research by Cameron, Moon and Bygate 1996)
• Pupils new to English will have trouble making their basic needs known and this will exacerbate feelings of isolation. Play times outside can be particularly isolating.

Language and Learning related challenges:

• Research shows that some teachers perceive some groups of minority ethnic pupils as ‘model minorities’. For example, there is evidence that Indian and Chinese pupils are perceived as high achievers in the UK and USA and a suggestion that in the UK Polish pupils are perceived generically as highly motivated. This can lead to problems for pupils who do not conform to the stereotype. (See research by Li, 2005; Ng, Lee & Pak, 2007; Flynn, 2019)
• Conversely pupils from other minority ethnic groups might typically be perceived as under-performing and their progress affected by low teacher expectation. (See research by Gilborn and Mirza,2000; Strand, 2007)
• The teaching and learning approaches in the new school may differ substantially from those in the child’s home country. They may be more didactic and less talk-based for example so that activities requiring open-ended problem solving and discussion will be unfamiliar.
• The language of learning will be full of vocabulary and concepts that are specific to each curriculum area taught, and potentially unfamiliar to the EAL learner.
• EAL is sometimes considered in the same category as a special educational need and pupils are inappropriately grouped with low attaining pupils; most notably this restricts access to good role models for spoken English. This can mask true potential and lead to activities that are not appropriately cognitively engaging. (See section on Grouping Your EAL Learners)
• Languages that are alphabetic, like English, differ in the way that letters and sounds map on to each other: for example in Spanish the letter ‘b’ is pronounced more as an English ‘v’ would be spoken;  in Polish there are 32 letters including 9 vowels but Q, V and X are excluded. Some languages are logographic rather than alphabetic meaning that their symbols represent words themselves (e.g. Chinese languages). All of these differences represent a range of difficulties for new to English learners in accessing written English. (See also section on New to English Learners and Writing)

Adesope, O., Lavin, T., Thompson, T., & Ungerleider, C. (2010). A Systematic Review and MetaAnalysis of the Cognitive Correlates of Bilingualism. Review of Educational Research, 80(2), 207 - 245

August, D., & Shanahan, T. (2006) Developing literacy in second-language learners: Report of the National Literacy Panel on language-minority children and youth, Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum

Baker, C (2011) Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, Clevedon: Multilingual Matters Birmingham

Advice and Support Service (2003)(Authors Susan Rosamond, Imtiaz Bhatti, Marion Sharieff, Karen Wilson) Distinguishing the Difference: SEN or EAL?, Birmingham: BASS

Cameron (2003) Writing in English as an additional language at Key Stage 4 and post-16, HMI 1094, London: OFSTED

Cameron, L., & Besser, S. (2004). Writing in English as an additional language at Key Stage 2. London: DfES.

Cameron, L., Moon, J., & Bygate, M. (1996) Language Development of Bilingual Pupils in the Mainstream: How do Pupils and Teachers Use Language? Language and Education, 10 (4), 221-236.

CILT (2006) Positively Plurilingual: The contribution of community languages to UK education and society, London: CLIT

Cummins, J. (1979) Cognitive/academic language proficiency, linguistic interdependence, the optimum age question and some other matters. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 19, 121-129.

Cummins, J. (1999) BICS and CALP Explained, ERIC Clearing House Opinion Paper, US Dept of Education

Cummins, J. (2000) Language Power and Pedagogy: Bilingual Children in the Crossfire, Clevedon: Multilingual Matters

Cummins, J. (2001). Negotiating identities: Education for empowerment in a diverse society, 2nd Edition. Los Angeles: California Association for Bilingual Education

DCSF (2006) Teaching bilingual children in the primary years, Nottingham: DCSF

DCSF (2009) Ensuring the attainment of more advanced learners of English as an additional language (EAL), Nottingham:DCSF

DfES (2006) Excellence and Enjoyment:learning and teaching for bilingual children in the primary years. Unit 3 Creating an inclusive learning culture

Droop, M., & Verhoeven, L. (1998). Background Knowledge, Linguistic Complexity, and SecondLanguage Reading Comprehension. Journal of Literacy Research, 30(2), 253-27

Flynn, N. (2013) Encountering migration: English primary school teachers’ responses to Polish children. Pedagogies: An International Journal, 8(4), 336 – 351

Flynn, N. (2019). Teachers and Polish children: Capturing changes in the linguistic field. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 40 (1), 65-82

Flynn, N and Stainthorp, R (2006) The Learning and Teaching of Reading and Writing, Chichester: Wiley

Gibbons, P. (2002). Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning: Teaching Second Language Learners in the Mainstream Classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinmann

Gilborn, D., & Mirza, H. (2000) Educational Inequality: Mapping race, class and gender. London: OfSTED

Gregory, E. (2008). Learning to Read in a New Language. London: Sage

Kotler, A., Wegerif, R., & Le Voi, M. (2001). Oracy and the Educational Achievement of Pupils with English as an Additional Language: The Impact of Bringing 'Talking Partners' into Bradford Schools. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 4(6), 403-419

Krashen, S. (1976) Formal and Informal Linguistic Environments in Language Acquisition and Language Learning. TESOL Quarterly, 10(2), 157-168.

Krashen, S. (1981) Second Language Acquisition and Second Language Learning. Oxford: Pergamon Press

Long, S. (2002) Tuning in to teacher-talk: a second language learner struggles to comprehend. Reading, 36(3), 113-118

Li, G. (2005). Other People's Success: Impact of the 'Model Minority' Myth on Underachieving Asian Students in North America. KEDI Journal of Educational Policy, 2(1), 69 - 86.

Lucas, T., Villegas, A. M. & Freedson-Gonzalez, M (2008) “Linguistically Responsive Teacher Education: Preparing Classroom Teachers to Teach English Language Learners”, Journal of Teacher Education, 59 (4), 361 - 373

Masgoret, A.M., & Gardner, R. C. (2003) Attitudes, Motivation, and Second Language Learning: A Meta-Analysis of Studies Conducted by Gardner and Associates. Language Learning, 53 (S1), 167- 210.

Mawer, K and Stanley, G (2011) Digital Play: Computer games and language aims, Peaslake: DELTA Publishing.

NALDIC (2009) Teaching and learning of ICT to EAL learners in the primary phase, http://www.naldic.org.uk/Resources/NALDIC/Initial%20Teacher%20Education/Documents/EALandIC T.pdf

Ng, J. C., Lee, S. S., & Pak, Y. K. (2007). Contesting the Model Minority and Perpetual Foreigner Stereotypes: A Critical Review of Literature on Asian Americans in Education. Review of Research in Education, 31, 95-130

Parke, T., Drury, R., Kenner, C., & Robertson, L. H. (2002). Revealing invisible worlds: Connecting the mainstream with bilingual children's home and community learning. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 2(2), 195-220

Pim, C (2010) How to Support Children Learning English as an Additional Language, Hyde: LDA

Purdy, J (2008) “Inviting conversation: meaningful talk about texts for English language learners”, Literacy 42 (1), 44 - 51

Schmitt, N. (2008) Review article: Instructed second language vocabulary learning, Language Teaching Research, 12(3), 329-363 Strand, S. (2007) Minority Ethnic Pupils in the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England (LSYPE). Nottingham: DCSF

Swain, M. (2000) ‘The output hypothesis and beyond: Mediating acquisition through collaborative dialogue’, chapter 4 in J.P.Lantolf (ed), Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning, pp. 94 – 114, Oxford: Oxford University Press

Stuart, M. (2004). Getting Ready for Reading: A Follow-up Study of Inner City Second Language Learners at the End of Key Stage 1. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 74(1), 15 - 36

Toohey, K. (2003) Learning English At School: Identity, Social Relations and Classroom Practice. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters

White, K., Lewis, K., & Fletcher-Campbell, F. (2006). Raising the Achievement of Bilingual Learners in Primary Schools: Evaluation of the Pilot/Programme. Nottingham: DCSF

Consideration of the following key principles needed for successful EAL learning will support teachers in making informed choices in their teaching strategies. More detail about all of the principles can be found in other sections of this guide. The following lists are supported by a range of research with EAL learners which can be found summarised by Lucas, Villegas and Freedson-Gonzalez (2008).

Key Principles for EAL Learners

• A safe and welcoming language environment with minimal anxiety about performing in the new language is essential.
• Conversational fluency is fundamentally different from academic proficiency and it takes many more years to become confident in the latter.
• Additional language learners need access to activities that are just beyond their current language proficiency and opportunities to use language for meaningful purposes.
• Spoken interaction in which EAL learners participate can support both social and academic language.
• Maintenance of the first language is essential because strong native language skills are associated with greater success in acquiring a new language.
• Explicit instruction in the form and function of language (e.g. grammar) supports additional language learning, when pupils have sufficient fluency in English and literate in first language.
• As with all learners, teachers need to know as much as possible about the first language and previous experiences of learning that their pupils have had.
• Learning should activate prior knowledge.
• Learning should be collaborative and situated in a clear and meaningful context.

Key Teaching Strategies for EAL Learners

• Promoting social well-being for EAL learners through detailed induction documentation which supports teachers’ understanding of individual need, and through peer support using systematic approaches such as the Young Interpreters’ Scheme https://www.hants.gov.uk/educationandlearning/emtas/supportinglanguages/young-interpreters-guide
• Providing opportunities for talk-based activities and interaction wherever possible.
• Providing opportunities for non-verbal and non-written responses.
• Providing visual cues that support understanding of new vocabulary and concepts.
• Pre-teaching: the process of identifying the language demands of an area of new learning before it is taught and then pre-teaching vocabulary and concepts before the main classroom input.
• Providing opportunities for EAL learners to mix with good language role models.
• Allowing use of first language as a language for thinking, note taking and talk-based talks: pairing pupils who share the same first language may support this if their academic outcomes are similar and they are socially compatible.
• Making aspects of written and spoken English explicit: e.g. exploring the features of different written genres and focussing on grammar.
• Use of ICT (see sections on Interactive Activities  and  Hardware).

Lucas, T., Villegas, A. M. & Freedson-Gonzalez, M (2008) “Linguistically Responsive Teacher Education: Preparing Classroom Teachers to Teach English Language Learners”, Journal of Teacher Education, 59 (4), 361 - 373.

Guidance on planning learning opportunities for your EAL learners is given throughout other sections in the guide. Guidance for assessing your pupils starts with understanding the Stages of Additional Language Learning. In England currently there is no standardised system for assessing EAL learners, but you will find standardised systems in place in other countries.

Many learners of EAL will be working towards age related expectations for a significant proportion of their schooling and therefore the use of an EAL-specific assessment tool or framework is essential in establishing a baseline and for tracking progress over time.  If used consistently, it can ensure practitioners develop their understanding of what their learners of EAL can do in English, highlight what the next steps should be and make sure this informs planning and resourcing for mainstream teaching and learning activities across the curriculum. Tracking progress over time can provide practitioners with reassuring evidence that the progress of most of their learners of EAL is in line with expected trajectories and within normal parameters for EAL development.  For a much smaller percentage of their EAL cohorts, it can also indicate where there may be problems that merit further investigation eg potential special educational needs such as speech and language difficulties.   

The following are published frameworks for assessing your pupils and target setting next steps for language and literacy learning in English: The CLPE Stages of Language Acquisition (Hilary Hester, 1990) https://clpe.org.uk/library-and-resources/useful-resources/stages-english-learning; The NASSEA EAL assessment system is well regarded among EAL specialist practitioners in England and can be purchased from http://www.nassea.org.uk/eal-assessment-framework/; Marking Progress - Training materials for assessing EAL by QCA (2000) is a useful document for all aspects of additional language acquisition including identifying stages of learning  http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/5743/1/markingprogress.pdf; The Bell Foundation EAL Assessment framework first published in 2016 – has separate primary and secondary descriptors and is free to download.

In planning for EAL learners it is important to pre-identify the language demands of any task you are setting in relation to a given learning objective. This is the same for children at any level of English proficiency and might relate to specific vocabulary, to particular concepts or to unfamiliar expression (idiomatic or technical phrases). The difficulties might relate to the need to understand spoken or written language and to the need to use spoken or written language.

The starting place for planning will relate to your pupils’ level of proficiency in English. For further guidance on this see the section ‘Stages of Additional Language Learning’ in this guide.

The following is adapted from a National Strategies (2006) template for identifying language needs:

It is not practical for teachers to plan at this level for every activity, but the headings indicate where teachers might usefully target scaffolds within activities to support their EAL learners’ current proficiency in language use and develop their use of English for the curriculum.

Pauline Gibbons (2002, p.130) presents another way of thinking about curriculum-based language needs which uses the following three headings as planning tools:

• A. Student’s language development needs
• B. Language inventory (language demands of the topic)
• C. Activities that develop focus language

DCSF (2006) Teaching bilingual children in the primary years, Nottingham:

DCSF Gibbons, P. (2002). Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning: Teaching Second Language Learners in the Mainstream Classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinmann

EAL learners have an entitlement to experience a full and varied curriculum, irrespective of their current proficiency in English. The distinctive position of EAL teaching and learning is that pupils/students acquire academic English through the context of the curriculum and an approach that attempts to teach English in isolation, as a precursor to learning the wider curriculum, is not recommended. Bespoke provision that withdraws beginner EAL learners from the mainstream should be carefully thought through, particularly when it affects access to more creative or active subjects or those for which a learner may have a natural aptitude, such as languages.

Mainstream Versus Withdrawal

Most academic learning for EAL learners should take place through the context of a fully inclusive curriculum within the mainstream classroom. This is true whether learners be new to English, beginner or more advanced in their stage of learning English. Some reasons include:

• Meaning is made more comprehensible (Krashen) through the context of the curriculum and consequently acquisition of language and subject understanding is more likely.
• Learners will miss important work once out of the classroom. Decisions about which sessions/subjects to withdraw from can be problematic and staff should ensure a way for learners to catch up on work they have missed.
• The composition of intervention groups needs careful consideration, as they should include strong speakers of English so that everyone experiences authentic models of colloquial and, more importantly, academic interactions.
• Interventions are often delivered by Teaching Assistants trained to support learners with additional educational needs. However, interventions for EAL learners tend to be most successful when delivered by a trained professional who understands the distinctive nature of EAL.
• The class teacher is generally the most highly-trained practitioner and therefore time out of the classroom needs very careful planning.
• Learners need to feel integrated with their peers and significant classroom withdrawal can marginalise them.

How to group EAL learners 

As a general rule, learners of English as an additional language should be grouped according to cognitive and academic potential rather than their current proficiency in speaking, listening, reading and writing (Lucas, Villegas and Freedson-Gonzalez, 2008). There are a number of important reasons for this:

• An important element of language learning depends upon the opportunity to hear and see language being effectively modelled by practitioners and able peers. This is more likely to happen in higher ability groupings.
• Curriculum content will be more appropriate for the learner as they are less likely to experience subject learning that they have already covered through previous schooling.
• Academic tasks will be more suitably pitched to meet the cognitive needs of the learner and offer the opportunity to experience activities that promote higher order thinking.
• EAL learners, like all children and young people, know when they are surrounded by peers who are of a similar ability. Being grouped with less able learners may be de-motivating and is likely to limit a learner's long term achievement.
• Behaviour and engagement in some 'lower ability' groups can be problematic and this can be unhelpful for newly arrived learners who are already trying to adjust to the routines of a new learning environment.

Educating children out of year group

Teaching EAL learners out of year group, even for short-term ad-hoc sessions, can be counter-productive as it is unlikely to meet their social and emotional needs. Back-yearing is generally not recommended, except for late arrivals in upper secondary school years, where it is felt that the extra time may enable success in national exams and the student is not significantly older than their peers.

Where a pupil has come very late into the UK education system but has sufficient command of English to be able to access the curriculum, it may be beneficial for schools to tailor their offer. For example, for students coming into Year 11 it can help to double up on English and maths by giving access to both Year 10 and Year 11 lessons so the student can fill knowledge gaps. A student whose ambitions or interests are in the sciences may benefit from a similar approach. It should be noted that this will mean the student will be following a restricted number of GCSE courses so choices should be made carefully and in close liaison with the student and their parents/carers.

Late-arriving students with less well-developed skills in English may benefit from ‘shared provision’ whereby they spend part of the week in school and part in college, perhaps taking an ESOL qualification. This approach necessitates strong links and good communication between the school and the college with due regard paid to safeguarding but where it works out, it can be a successful way of meeting the social, emotional and academic needs of the student.

Practitioners may notice that pupils for whom English is an additional language may continue to make grammatical errors in their writing long after they have achieved conversational fluency in English.  Research into the writing of more advanced EAL learners at Key Stages 2 and 4 (Cameron, 2003; Cameron and Besser, 2004) resulted in the compilation of a comprehensive list of the aspects of writing that cause on-going problems for more advanced learners of English as an Additional Language.  This list, called “The Diagnostic Writing Tool”, was included in the National Strategies resource Ensuring the attainment of more advanced learners of English as an additional language, (DCSF, 2009) and may be a helpful reference point for practitioners.

Many of the grammatical errors a pupil makes relate to features of their first language.  For instance speakers of Chinese languages may experience on-going difficulties with tense because in Cantonese and Mandarin, tense is marked differently and the verbs are not inflected as they are in English; Turkish speakers may struggle with articles (‘a’, ‘an’ and ‘the’) which do not exist in Turkish; and speakers of Nepali may find prepositions problematic (‘in’, ‘on’, ‘at’) because in Nepali, the same particle is used for all three English words.  This phenomenon is sometimes referred to as “Language Transfer” and often is only noticed where the transfer of linguistic features from one language to another yields errors, for example a pupil whose first language is Nepali might say (and/or write) “I was born in 2nd April” or they may omit the preposition altogether as in “I stayed Brunei one year”.

Other errors may relate to a pupil’s difficulty with aurally distinguishing the presence of, for example, the ‘-ed’ ending on past tense verbs in English.  Features like this are unstressed in spoken English, thus it is difficult to hear them and in consequence use them in both speech and writing.  The grapheme-phoneme correspondence can also be problematic for pupils learning EAL who are literate in their first languages.  For example the ‘ee’ sound we say in English for the letter “e” would represent an “i” in Turkish.

The recommendation for EAL pupils generally is to avoid direct, decontextualized grammar teaching as this does not yield the results one might hope for in the pupil’s writing.  Instead, it is suggested that time is spent developing a proofreading grammar checklist with the pupil with a view to gradually increasing her/his ability to use it independently:

Developing a proofreading grammar checklist:

• Using a piece of the pupil’s own writing that includes the specific grammatical errors you want to address, spend time doing a proofreading exercise with a focus on that specific error.  Together, check each instance and discuss whether or not it is correct.  You might highlight the correct ones in green and underline the incorrect ones (so it may be preferable to use a photocopy of the piece of writing rather than marking the pupil’s actual piece of work).  Incorrect examples can be corrected together and written onto the sheet.  Do this as a model with the pupil taking part in the discussion.  A sympathetic Teaching Assistant might be tasked with this exercise.
• Generate a proofreading checklist with the steps clearly recorded – best if the pupil writes this as it will be a tool you will want them to use with increasing independence, so it will be more meaningful if they have done the recording themselves.  Include examples of correct and incorrect use of English drawn from the pupil’s own writing.
• Depending on the pupil, repeat the above as a supported exercise several times, each time encouraging the pupil to take more responsibility for finding and underlining the specific errors and correcting them.
• When you consider the pupil to be ready, ask them to try carrying out the error identification and correction unsupported and then bring their work to you to discuss together.
• When the pupil is able to do this with reasonable accuracy, tell them they should use their proof-reading checklist to check all their work before handing it in for marking.

It might be that there are particular words that are problematic, which we would suggest should form part of his proofreading checklist – so s/he might keep a list of the verbs under headings past – present – future to which s/he can refer when s/he proof-reads both supported and independently.  This list will be specific to them and will reflect their working vocabulary and their particular errors.

The original piece of annotated writing can be kept as a reference point for the pupil and for staff as this will enable the teacher to measure the impact of this work: one would anticipate that, over time, this approach will result in a reduction of errors in the pupil’s writing, though it should be expected that the errors they make will not be eradicated entirely and that the need to use the proofreading checklist will be on-going.  The most important thing is to steer clear of the direct grammar teaching using grammar drills (the sort of thing you might find numerous commercially-produced worksheets on); experience and research show that approaching aspects of grammar in this way does not make much difference to the incidence of errors in a pupil’s writing.

Recasting to correct spoken English errors

Alongside this, it is beneficial for practitioners to recast key statements a pupil has given verbally which contain specific errors you want the pupil to address.  In this way, you can provide a model of correct use of English in an unobtrusive way.  So if, for example, a pupil says “Source b is show how propaganda was use in a Second World War”, you might repeat back “Yes, source b shows how propaganda was used in the Second World War.”

‘The physical environment plays an important role in how valued children from diverse backgrounds feel in school. Children are more likely to feel valued and develop a sense of belonging when their ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic background is reflected positively in the displays in their classroom and around the school.’ DfES (2006) Excellence and Enjoyment: learning and teaching for bilingual children in the primary years.

Ideas for making the school and classroom environment more inclusive:

• Welcome posters with greetings in a multitude of languages
• Orientation signs in select languages - defined by the school context
• A map/display showing heritage countries and languages represented in the school community
• Positive displays of people from minority ethnic backgrounds
• A good selection of bilingual texts (books, magazines/newspapers) in the library and other reading areas around the school
• A fair representation of EAL learners’ work on display in and out of classrooms
• Imaginative role-play areas with culturally diverse imagery, clothing and props

It is also important for schools to try to infuse the curriculum with culturally relevant points of reference, avoiding negative stereotypes and tokenistic approaches - for example:

• stories from other cultures
• examining how languages borrow words from each other and how English has been particularly influenced by certain languages such as Latin and Greek
• drawing examples of famous scientists, artists etc. from a wide range of cultural backgrounds
• balanced and non-judgemental comparisons between cultures, such as traditional vs. alternative technologies

Within the classroom, EAL learners will benefit from:

• dual-language displays and keywords
• bilingual dictionaries - printed and/or electronic
• modelled texts large and clearly displayed on classroom walls
• working walls and role-play/enrichment areas that provide additional context and meaning for current curricula
• seating that allows for collaborative group work and positioning where learners have a clear view of the IWB and easy access to the class teacher
• access to ICTs such as oral recording devices, translation tools and supportive word processors with keyboards set up for different language input

The appropriate use of pupils’ first languages in the classroom can be beneficial to pupils’ attainment, even when they have been learning English for several years and have acquired fluency/proficiency in their use of “everyday” English.  Engagement with, and access to, the curriculum can be improved if a pupil’s first language is appropriately supported. Teachers need to be clear about when and why pupils are being asked to use their first languages to support their learning to ensure that the maximum benefit is derived from it.

Pupils should be encouraged to use their first language in lessons when:

• the cognitive challenge is likely to be high: problem solving and critical thinking are difficult in a second language, even when the target language has been learnt for several years;
• they are still developing proficiency in English: this can be particularly supportive when pupils try out ideas in their first language before writing in English;
• oral rehearsal will help reflection: for example, before responding to a text.

It may not be appropriate for pupils to use their first language when:

• pupils need to be encouraged to practise the target language to improve fluency;
• oral rehearsal needs to be conducted in the target language so that pupils are prepared for writing tasks;
• pupils are being encouraged to take risks in their spoken English in order to build confidence;
• pupils need to practise expressing themselves quickly in English, for examination preparation.

It is a good idea to conduct a first language assessment.  This should aim to establish the degree to which the pupil has developed L1 skills in listening, speaking, reading and writing.  If a pupil does not have first language literacy skills, for example, then it would be inappropriate to ask them to annotate or draft in first language, hence the L1 assessment is invaluable in informing how to make best use of it at school. 

A go-to tool people often think of first is the dual language translation dictionary, a relatively cheap and easy to procure resource.  Teachers should remember that the use of paper-based translation dictionaries is a skill in itself, and that it takes time and focus to use this resource.  For these reasons, it may be necessary to factor in time to train the pupil how to use their translation dictionary and to provide the words to be looked up before the lesson.  Done this way, the pupil can then focus on the input in class rather than be distracted by trying to look words up whilst the teacher is delivering the lesson.

A range of ICTs can be used to support first language listening and speaking and this can enable even young EAL learners who cannot read or write independently in L1 to use their first languages in school.  Dual language stories with an audio facility can be used in the classroom to enable such a pupil to share access to a particular text.  It can also provide an opportunity for the child’s peers to develop their understanding of the challenges faced daily by their friend, thereby enhancing empathy.  A good range of dual language stories and other audio-enabled materials is available from MantraLingua. 

The use of translation tools and apps can also be helpful.  SayHI, Google Translate and iTranslate (and other, similar tools) can be used to translate words and phrases on the go, and many of this type of app have an audio function so even where the pupil cannot read the word in first language for themselves, they can hear it being spoken.  This can be a good way of developing their vocabulary as well as increasing their understanding of curriculum content, thus boosting their confidence, their participation and their independence as learners. 

Parents are another useful source of first language support.  The best and most impactful way of eliciting their help and maximising on the benefits conferred by L1 use is to send home key words and phrases or a copy of a text that is going to be used in class in advance so that they can talk to their child in L1 at home, and perhaps translate those words and phrases into the first language (written translations for a child with L1 literacy; audio recordings for one without) or annotate the copy of a text in L1.  In these ways, the child’s L1 becomes a tool for learning and they gain opportunities to continue to develop their academic register in L1 as well.

To aid a newly arrived child for whom English is an additional language to feel welcomed from the start, peer buddying schemes can be a useful approach, especially those which actively promote pupils’ use of their other languages in school.  The Young Interpreter Scheme is one such, and more information about it can be found online here.  A trained buddy who shares a language with the newly-arrived pupil can help with orientation, showing the new pupil round school, explaining need-to-know rules and making sure they are not on their own at break and lunch time.

Before you read this section you will find it useful to read the sections Theories of Additional Language Learning and Stages of Additional Language Learning.  New to English learners are not a ‘blank slate’. They already hold understanding about language and how it works from the development of their first language (Cummins 1979; Baker, 2011).

Pupils who are new to English need the following:

• Opportunities to talk with peers who model good spoken English
• Opportunities to be silent and to listen (some learners may be silent for as long as 6 months)
• Opportunities to show their understanding in non-verbal ways
• Opportunities to use their first language as a language for thinking (Lucas, Vilegas & Freedson-Gonzalez, 2008); where possible this happens through the use of talk pairs of pupils using the same first language
• Understanding that if they are not yet fluent in their first language (under 7 years old approx.) then acquisition of their new language may take longer (Cummins, 1999)
• Explicit teaching of the sounds in the English language
• Visual aids that scaffold understanding of new language (Gibbons, 2002; Long, 2002)
• Use of closed questions may better support understanding and capacity to respond (Purdy,2008)

Where pupils arrive in school in year groups later than the normal school starting age they are subjected to a curriculum that requires them to read and write in English. Research identifies that where pupils have limited vocabulary in English they cannot make good progress in developing literacy in English (see Schmidt, 2008 for a review of research on the crucial place of vocabulary acquisition in learning a second language).

Spoken language activities for new to English learners

• Speaking frames that focus on developing language for interaction through sentence starters, or which develop language for the curriculum through guided speaking and listening activity. Speaking frames can be used to pre-teach vocabulary for new concepts.
• Talk-based activities with a very specific focus/ question. Comprehensible input from the teacher is more likely to support comprehensible output by the EAL learner (Lucas, Vilegas & Freedson-Gonzalez, 2008)
• Working with talk-partners who model good spoken English (Kotler, Wegerif and Le Voi, 2001)
• Drawing/ mind-mapping responses to tasks
• Role play to explore character, plot and settings in narrative
• Problem solving
• Oral story-telling and storytelling using apps for tablet (see section on Interactive Activities)
• Phonics games
• Using talking pens and talking books (see section on Hardware)
• Playing board games

The ESOL (EAL) site related to the New Zealand National Curriculum lists spoken language development activities at http://esolonline.tki.org.nz/ESOL-Online/Planning-for-my-students-needs/Resources-for-planning/ESOL-teaching-strategies/Oral-Language

Pupils with a developing fluency in spoken English are likely to be beginning to read and write in English, but a continuing focus on the development of spoken language remains crucial in order that explicit knowledge about the way that English works is introduced (Krashen, 1986; Swain 2000).

Teachers supporting beginner EAL learners need to know:

• How the structures and sounds in the pupil’s first language are different from those in English
• Continued teaching of phonics is necessary to build up pupils’ sensitivity to the English sound system which will support correct articulation of phonemes (and therefore support later spelling for writing)
• Pupils will need explicit grammar-related targets to accelerate correct language use

Beginner EAL learners’ spoken language use may have the following characteristics:

• Able to communicate with some confidence with peers and adults but makes grammatical errors and has some problems with word order
• Has limited control over tenses and often uses present tense
• Makes errors in using pronouns (he/she)
• May leave out determiners if these are not present in first language (the/a/an)
• Has limited vocabulary and may substitute known words/phrases in order to communicate meaning when vocabulary is unknown
• Able to retell a simple story using a structure and visual aids

Spoken language activities for beginner EAL learners:

• Speaking frames which focus on individual language needs e.g. development of correct use of past tense; understanding use of determiners
• Opportunities for meaningful interaction and collaborative dialogue with peers and adults within a clear learning context (Swain, 2000; Lucas, Villegas and Freedson-Gonzalez, 2008)
• Opportunities to speak about aspects of home and school that particularly interest them
• Use of picture books for oral story re-telling
• Word games that focus on specific aspects of language and literacy development (Cameron and Besser, 2004)
• Using talking pens and talking books (see section on Hardware)
• Pre-teaching of vocabulary to support new concept learning
• Role play that asks pupils to assume a particular character
• Playing board games

The following sites are useful for resources: http://www.racingtoenglish.co.uk/about.html

and https://ealresources.bell-foundation.org.uk/teachers/great-ideas-speaking-and-writing-frames

Pupils with advanced fluency in spoken English are often left without support because their conversational competence masks possible limited vocabulary for curriculum purposes. Pupils with advanced fluency in English still need support with widening their vocabulary and with understanding how to choose the best ways to express themselves (Cummins, 1999).

Teachers supporting advanced EAL learners need to know that:

• Pupils need continuing support in extending their vocabulary and language of expression for both their spoken language and consequently their capacity to express themselves in written English
• Pupils may have difficulty retaining multiple instructions for a task
• Pupils need layered targets relating to developing spoken language for curriculum access
• Pupils may be better able to respond to teachers’ decontextualized talk, but the use of visual cues and pre-teaching remain valuable support strategies

Advanced EAL learners’ spoken language may have the following characteristics:

• Expressive language has a wider range of functions e.g able to explain, debate, justify, express inferred meaning
• Vocabulary is wider and the pupil may exercise choice over vocabulary and register (tone/style)
• More confident grasp of grammar supports greater cohesion and capacity for greater fluency in using spoken Standard English
• Use of pronouns, prepositions and verb tenses is increasingly more accurate

Spoken language activities for advanced EAL learners (matched to findings from NfER,2006) :

• Speaking frames that focus on development of higher level English and the expansion of vocabulary and concepts for curriculum areas
• Retain use of first language as a language for thinking about new and more complex ideas
• Retain pre-teaching as a strategy to introduce new and complex vocabulary and concepts
• Opportunities to work with talk partners to develop ideas and expressive language
• Role play to support capacity for deduction and inference for reading, and to support understanding in other curriculum areas e.g. history
• Explicit introduction to the conventions of written English through modelling and discussion by the teacher

An OFSTED report on schools who do well by their advanced EAL learners can be found here: https://dera.ioe.ac.uk/5384/1/Couldtheydoevenbetter.pdf

You will find it useful to read the sections on Spoken English and on Challenges before this because of the crucial relationship between pupils’ spoken language acquisition and their development of reading in English. Secondary teachers will find these sections useful in addition to the section devoted to Reading at Secondary.

What teachers need to know about reading in a new language:

As with monolingual pupils, EAL learners need to be taught both word reading skills and comprehension in order to access written texts. However, there is evidence that:

• Some pupils may acquire phonic knowledge and be able to decode quickly, but their skills in comprehension take longer and need explicit attention (Stuart, 2004). • Reading comprehension is related to the pupils’ vocabulary knowledge, knowledge of text types, knowledge of and interest in the subject matter (Hutchinson, Whitely, Smith and Connors, 2003).
• Pupils’ access to reading is related directly to their current level of spoken English and breadth of vocabulary (Droop and Verhoeven, 1998).
• Pupils will have experience of reading in other languages and for different purposes (Parke, Drury, Kenner and Robinson, 2002)
• Text type and direction in pupils’ home written language may be significantly different from English
• Literacy proficiency in the first language affects literacy proficiency in the new language (August and Shanahan, 2006)

Characteristics of a new to English reader:

• Can tell a story from pictures (depending on stage of fluency)
• May be recognising some letters and sounds and some high frequency words in English
• May be developing one to one correspondence in words
• May understand print direction in English
• May already understand that print carries meaning from experience of reading in first language
• May bring understanding of text types or stories from reading/oral story telling in first language

Activities for new to English readers:

• Access to texts with repetitive language and rhyming words
• Oral story telling that draws on story types common to the pupils’ first languages and cultures
• Reading stories aloud in both English and the first language where practicable
• Story boxes and story sacks to support development of vocabulary around character and plot
• Use of picture books to support discussion
• Sequencing pictures and retelling stories
• Role play mapped to stories
• Activities that embed the teaching of phonics alongside reading for meaning
• Audio books in first languages and in English

Eve Gregory’s Learning to Read in a New Language explores, through a series of case studies, the need for teachers to take account of EAL learner’s home contexts when learning to read.

You will find it useful to read the sections on Spoken English and on Challenges before this because of the crucial relationship between pupils’ spoken language acquisition and their development of reading in English. Secondary teachers will find these sections useful in addition to the section devoted to Reading at Secondary.

What teachers need to know about reading in a new language:

As with monolingual pupils, EAL learners need to be taught both word reading skills and comprehension in order to access written texts. However, there is evidence that:

• Some pupils may acquire phonic knowledge and be able to decode quickly, but their skills in comprehension take longer and need explicit attention (Stuart, 2004).
• Reading comprehension is related to the pupils’ vocabulary knowledge, knowledge of text types, knowledge of and interest in the subject matter (Hutchinson, Whitely, Smith and Connors, 2003).
• Pupils’ access to reading is related directly to their current level of spoken English and breadth of vocabulary (Droop and Verhoeven, 1998).
• Pupils will have experience of reading in other languages and for different purposes (Parke, Drury, Kenner and Robinson, 2002)
• Text type and direction in pupils’ home written language may be significantly different from English
• Literacy in the first language affects literacy in the new language (August and Shanahan, 2006)

Characteristics of a Beginning English reader:

• Able to decode known words and some unknown words
• Able to read familiar words such as those introduced systematically in a reading scheme and those considered ‘high frequency’ within the current curriculum for English
• Developing understanding of meaning in simple texts
• Beginning to deduce implicit meaning in simple texts
• Will need help with idiomatic language and vocabulary related to concepts/events that are outside the pupil’s experiences

Activities for Beginning English readers:

• Access to texts with controlled vocabulary and explicit structure
• Access to texts that reflect the pupil’s existing experiences at home and at school
• Use of pictures to discuss implicit meaning, predict outcomes etc.
• Role play such as hot seating and freeze frame to develop understanding of character, plot and motive
• Introduction to the structure and features of different non-fiction text types
• Use of audio books in first language and in English
• Use of dual language texts matched the pupils’ interests and stages of fluency in their first language
• Use of talking books and talking pens (see section on Hardware) http://www.eal-teaching-strategies.com/reading-strategies.html

You will find it useful to read the sections on Spoken English and on Challenges before this because of the crucial relationship between pupils’ spoken language acquisition and their development of reading in English. Secondary school teachers will find these sections useful in addition to the section devoted to Reading at Secondary.

What teachers need to know about reading in a new language:

See section on Beginner EAL learners and reading for the research-related detail on reading development. In addition, for advanced EAL learners learning to read entails:

• Needing to decode and to understand vocabulary related to the curriculum
• Needing to infer meaning in more complex texts and to express this orally
• Relying on reading strategies for comprehension that are more text-related than picture-related

Characteristics of advanced EAL readers:

• Show understanding when reading in a range of difference text types, fiction and non-fiction
• Able to draw on a range of strategies beyond picture in order to make meaning: grapho-phonic, syntactic and contextual
• Understands features of non-fiction texts and how to use them in order to extract meaning
• Beginning to use inference and deduction in discussion of fiction
• Beginning to scan ahead as word reading becomes automated

Activities for advanced EAL readers:

• Explicit introduction to reading different text types for different purposes
• Explicit introduction to the structures and features of different text types
• Explicit teaching of grammar and syntax to support access to complex text
• Activities that pre-teach and develop specific curriculum knowledge prior to reading tests related to the subject
• Role play in order to access inferred meaning and character development in fiction
• Continued reading in the first language to maintain love of reading and allow proficiency in first language reading to support development in reading English (August and Shanahan, 2006)

Some older EAL learners have strong literacy in first language, whilst others will have limited proficiency or may never have learned to read. There is a strong and direct correlation between the degree to which you can read your first language and how quickly you will acquire reading fluency in English (Cummins, 1979). Some learners will know phonics from their first language, whilst for others the concept may be new. In fact many older EAL learners educated abroad may be able to decode quite well yet may have very little comprehension of what they have 'read'.

However, whether students are or are not literate in their first language, most older learners will have a wider experience of the printed environment and knowledge of the world than younger learners. This will enable them to transfer knowledge and skills across to the process of reading in a new language.

Points to Consider:

• Texts presented to EAL learners need to reflect their maturity level first and foremost
• Well-illustrated texts help to support meaning and will enable learners to be relatively more successful in, for example, predicting unfamiliar vocabulary
• Some themes and topics may be culturally bound, perhaps beyond the student's experience - choosing more familiar examples may help activate prior knowledge and help to keep a student motivated (Cummins, 2001, 'identity texts')
• Discrete phonics teaching may be less successful than reinforcing phonemic awareness through the context of, for example, repetitive stories with strong narratives

This resource aimed at strategies for supporting writing is also relevant to reading development: 

http://www.naldic.org.uk/Resources/NALDIC/docs/GlossarypagesfromEdexcelGCSEEnglishCoreTeacherGuide.pdf

Graphic texts

Graphic texts tend to be popular with many young people and often lie within their direct personal experience. They are generally well illustrated and present bite-sized chunks of language and short sentences that present less of a barrier to comprehension for beginner EAL learners. Difficult topics and more esoteric texts can benefit from being presented in this way.

Graphic Shakespeare – various publishers

Raintree - http://www.raintree.co.uk/

Supporting reading with real audio

Some reading schemes are accompanied by an audio CD so that a learner can listen to an authentic reading. They can listen without reading, read along with the audio, or use the audio whenever they get stuck.

Pointing devices like TalkingPEN enable a learner to access audio versions by touching specially prepared hotspots on associated books and learning charts (See section on Hardware).

Oxford Bookworms - https://elt.oup.com/teachers/bookworms/?cc=gb&selLanguage=en

Mantra Lingua's TalkingPEN - http://uk.mantralingua.com/product-type/Talking%20Devices

Text to speech synthesis

Text to speech can be useful for EAL learners whose English oral skills are currently more advanced than their ability to decode and comprehend text. Text to speech is a technology-driven support for reading aloud electronic texts to a learner. Whilst being synthesised audio, most modern implementations allow for male and female voices, changing the speed of the 'reading' and even providing for international or regional accents.

Text to speech software can be installed in computers as a standalone as well as being integrated into applications like word processors or via screen readers in web browsers. Additionally, most tablet devices feature integrated text to speech within e-book readers e.g. iBooks and Kindle.

Some software is able to sample text and output it as an audio file for later playback, enabling learners to hear texts read aloud as many times as needed at their own pace.

Digital texts

Not only can digital texts be read aloud from the screen, but utilities can also provide instant access to dictionaries, thesauri and translation services. The immediacy of electronic reading tools ensures that a learner's train of thought is interrupted less frequently than when using more traditional printed versions.  

http://dictionary.reference.com/

Online reading

Reading texts sourced from the Internet can be problematic for some learners, such as late beginners or early advanced EAL learners. This is because online texts are usually not written for an EAL audience and often feature highly academic vocabulary, idiomatic and colloquial language as well as an unhelpful quantity of clauses.

Sometimes using alternative versions of websites can be a useful tactic, such as the Simple English version of Wikipedia. This presents similar articles to the main Wikipedia site but expresses the content through, for example, shorter sentences and less clauses.

Simple English Wikipedia - http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

Open searching can present learners with texts that are beyond them, so using tools to filter the search returns can help. E.g using Google advanced search to return webpages of a particular reading level.

Google advanced search - http://www.google.com/advanced_search

Kidrex search engine - https://www.alarms.org/kidrex/

In conjunction with this section, you will find it helpful to read the sections on both Spoken English development and Reading because the development of each of these areas is crucial to successful writing in English for EAL learners.

New-to-English learners come into classrooms with differing experiences of literacy in their first language.  Very young children may not have any experience of writing in their first language(s) whereas some 6 and 7 year olds may have begun to develop their first language literacy skills and be able to write at an age-appropriate level. Pupils in later phases may well be fully literate in their first language and therefore ready for more accelerated learning targets in English.  The support needs of pupils will differ according to their prior knowledge and experience of literacy, and of writing in particular, so it is important that teachers familiarise themselves with the background information about each pupil’s first language skills in order to best utilise these to support their on-going learning.

Some pupils in Key Stages 1 and 2 may be familiar with a script that differs markedly in appearance from English and with differences in punctuation marks.  Arabic and Urdu are both written right to left and use a different script; Chinese languages are not alphabet-based and instead use a system based on characters; languages like Hindi and Nepali hang from the line rather than sit on it.  Phonological differences exist between English and many other languages that can cause problems to the new-to-English learner who may struggle to distinguish and to reproduce (orally and in writing)  the sounds of English, whilst syntactic differences can cause problems with word order, prepositions, tense and articles, to name but a few.  Often, such difficulties relate to the features of the first language so having a basic understanding of a child’s first language can be helpful in identifying the root cause of issues such as these.

When children are in the early stages of acquiring writing skills in English, it helps if tasks are rooted in concrete experience and are supported by visuals.  This makes writing tasks more meaningful and enables pupil participation and success.  Where possible, tasks should link with whatever the rest of the class is doing.  In this way, peers will be able to support and to see that the pupil is participating in the same curriculum as them.  Where possible, bilingual support from a Teaching Assistant who shares the same language as the child can be invaluable as a means of giving the child greater access to the lesson through the use of first language as well as the freedom to express themselves in first language.

The following table sets out activities that will support primary aged pupils but is likely also to support pupils in secondary schools. See links to English curriculum documentation supporting EAL writing activity for primary and secondary pupils after the following table.

Guiding principles when planning support for children who are:

• Writing support sessions for EAL learners in primary schools can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/learning-and-teaching-for-bilingual-children-in-the-primary-years-guided-sessions-to-support-writing-english-as-an-additional-language
• A wide range of EAL language and literacy activities can be found at http://www.naldic.org.uk/Resources/NALDIC/docs/GlossarypagesfromEdexcelGCSEEnglishCoreTeacherGuide.pdf
• Grammar related activities for older New to and Beginner English learners can be found at https://dera.ioe.ac.uk/4882/7/nls_gfw010702intro_Redacted.pdf

WRITING IN ENGLISH FOR BEGINNER EAL LEARNERS IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS

As pupils develop stamina as writers, writing frames and sentence starters can be helpful additions to the strategies outlined for new-to-English learners, gradually extending the amount of writing a pupil produces and building confidence. For pupils with greater fluency in their first languages, discussing, planning and drafting in first language remain supportive activities, enabling pupils to organise their thoughts and express their ideas more freely and fluently prior to writing in English. This can help with engagement and motivation and it can be a productive way of engaging parents in their child’s learning if set as an alternative homework task.

Clarity about the meaning of new language (phrases as well as words) is important, particularly where idiomatic language is used or where there are subtleties in terms of shades of meaning. A focus on defining new vocabulary is important alongside providing opportunities for children to orally rehearse new structures. Explicit modelling which draws attention to specific features of the genre being explored provides opportunities for children to listen to contextualised examples of the target language whilst talk prompts and speaking frames are useful ways of preparing children for using the same target language in their own writing.

After sufficient oral rehearsal and modelling, collaborative writing tasks where the EAL learner is an active participant in group discussions around the drafting and editing process can be very supportive, providing peer support for writing rooted in meaningful contexts. Alongside this, explicit identification about the features of a good piece of writing in the target genre can help all pupils develop the skills to constructively evaluate their own and each other’s writing, identifying strengths as well as areas for development.

WRITING IN ENGLISH FOR BEGINNER EAL LEARNERS IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

When pupils are in the early stages of acquiring writing skills in English, it helps if tasks are rooted in concrete experience, are prefaced by plenty of opportunities to orally rehearse the target language and are supported by visuals. This makes writing tasks more meaningful and enables pupil participation and success. Tasks should link with whatever the rest of the class is doing. In this way, peers will be able to support and to see that the pupil is participating in the same curriculum as them. Drafting and note-taking can be usefully carried out in first language. This helps pupils maintain their focus for longer as well as giving them something they can independently refer to later. Where available, bilingual support from a Teaching Assistant who shares the same language as the pupil can be invaluable as a means of giving the pupil greater access to the lesson through the use of first language as well as the freedom and confidence to express themselves more fully in first language.

As pupils develop stamina as writers, writing frames and sentence starters can be helpful additions to the strategies outlined above, gradually extending the amount of writing a pupil produces and building confidence. For pupils with greater fluency in their first languages, discussing, planning and drafting in first language remain supportive activities, enabling pupils to organise their thoughts and express their ideas more freely and fluently prior to writing in English. This can help with engagement and motivation and it can be a productive way of engaging parents in their child’s learning if set as an alternative homework task.

A wide range of EAL language and literacy activities can be found at http://www.naldic.org.uk/Resources/NALDIC/docs/GlossarypagesfromEdexcelG...

In conjunction with this section, you will find it helpful to read the sections on both Spoken English development and Reading because the development of each of these areas is crucial to successful writing in English for EAL learners. Also see the section on Integrated Literacy Activities which highlights tasks for developing writing through speaking and reading related activities. The tables presented in the Writing for New to English Learners section are a useful reference for learners’ writing activities at all stages of fluency.

WRITING IN ENGLISH FOR MORE ADVANCED LEARNERS OF ENGLISH AS AN ADDITIONAL LANGUAGE IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS

Cameron and Besser (2004) carried out research into the writing of more advanced learners of English as an additional language i.e. pupils who had been in UK schools for at least five years. They identified a number of key features of language that pupils learning English as an additional language appear to handle less confidently than their monolingual, English-only peers. These included the use of formulaic phrases, prepositions, modal verbs, use of genres, under-development of narrative components, particularly endings and the use of tense.

In order to ensure more advanced EAL learners achieve the quality they are capable of in their writing, teachers need to identify the specific features of the target genre  so that they can take account of these in their lesson planning and delivery.

Pupils need:

• Access to good models of writing across a range of genres
• A reason to write (motivation, purpose) and something to say (ideas, viewpoint)
• An understanding of the audience for whom they are writing
• Exposure to a range of ideas
• Plenty of opportunities to rehearse the target language orally prior to writing
• An explicit focus on the particular features of language that are problematic. For lowerachieving EAL writers, modal verbs, adverbials and prepositional phrases seem especially important (Cameron and Besser, 2004).
• Activities which extend pupils’ working vocabularies, giving them a rich choice of words to draw on in their own writing. When teaching formulaic phrases, it is helpful to focus on the phrase as a unit rather than on the individual words
• Explicit modelling of the writing process
• Opportunities to engage in collaborative writing activities
• Scaffolding activities such as Dictogloss (See Integrated Literacy Activities)
• Clarity about the success criteria for each target genre
• Opportunities for peer-review

WRITING IN ENGLISH FOR MORE ADVANCED LEARNERS OF ENGLISH AS AN ADDITIONAL LANGUAGE IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

When pupils are in the early stages of acquiring writing skills in English, it helps if tasks are rooted in concrete experience, are prefaced by plenty of opportunities to orally rehearse the target language and are supported by visuals. This makes writing tasks more meaningful and facilitates pupil participation and success. Tasks should link with whatever the rest of the class is doing. In this way, peers will be able to support and to see that the pupil is participating in the same curriculum as them. Drafting and note-taking can be usefully carried out in first language. This helps pupils maintain their focus for longer as well as giving them something they can independently refer to later. Where available, bilingual support from a Teaching Assistant who shares the same language as the pupil can be invaluable as a means of giving the pupil greater access to the lesson through the use of first language as well as the freedom and confidence to express themselves more fully in first language.

As pupils develop stamina as writers, writing frames and sentence starters can be helpful additions to the strategies outlined above, gradually extending the amount of writing a pupil produces and building confidence. For pupils with greater fluency in their first languages, discussing, planning and drafting in first language remain supportive activities, enabling pupils to organise their thoughts and express their ideas more freely and fluently prior to writing in English. This can help with engagement and motivation and it can be a productive way of engaging parents in their child’s learning if set as an alternative homework task.

As a group, teachers may be misled by the oral fluency demonstrated by more advanced learners of EAL into underestimating their need for specific targeted teaching in order to develop their writing. It is also important to understand that writing cannot be considered in isolation, because it is inextricably linked with reading and thinking skills (OfSTED, 2003).

Building on OfSTED research into the writing of more advanced learners of English as an Additional Language at Key Stage 4 (2003), the National Strategies resource “Ensuring the attainment of more advanced bilingual learners” (2009) includes guidance on a range of teaching and learning strategies to support accelerated progress in writing across the curriculum. Key messages include the importance of oracy as a precursor to writing, giving pupils opportunities to hear and rehearse some of the language they will later need when they start writing. Purposeful talk enables pupils to:

• develop, exchange and revise ideas
• communicate face to face with an audience
• rehearse ideas before writing
• rehearse language structures before writing.

The use of talk prompts, or think-talk phrases, can support pupils to develop a more formal register through their talk prior to writing.

Also needed are:

• explicit teaching of the conventions of the target genres
• activities to develop pupils’ working vocabularies
• engagement with a range of reading material
• questioning techniques which promote the development of higher order thinking skills (Bloom’s revised taxonomy)
• modelling
• scaffolding pupils’ writing e.g. through collaborative and guided activities.

Careful planning with a clear focus on the target language (not just the vocabulary) can develop pupils’ experience and knowledge of a range of genres, build confidence and skills and enable progression towards independence in writing.

Certain activities will enable EAL learners to be more productively involved with their peers, ensuring curriculum–related language is made comprehensible (Krashen, 1981) and providing meaningful contexts for language and literacy development (Gibbons, 2002; Schmidt, 2008). See also the section on Interactive Activities for additional resources that support integrated literacy activities.

Integrated activities help language and literacy development for EAL learners in a variety of different ways:

• activating pupils' prior knowledge by relating learning to pupils' background or experience
• utilising pupils' unique bilingual skills
• naturally uniting speaking, listening, reading and writing
• taking multi-modal approaches to teaching and learning
• facilitating collaborative learning
• making learning across the curriculum more explicit
• providing different modes of output for learners at different stages in their acquisition of English. 

A wide range of EAL-related language and literacy activities can be found at https://ealresources.bell-foundation.org.uk/teachers/great-ideas-pages Here are a few examples:

Dictogloss

Pupils hear formal language used repeatedly in context and work collaboratively to construct a similar text. This enables the pupils to adopt the “voice” of the writer. Dictogloss integrates speaking, listening, reading and writing. However, this activity relies upon the learners never seeing the original text (except perhaps at the end of the activity). This activity can be used with texts in any curriculum area.

The 5 stages of Dictogloss

1. The teacher reads a short piece of text aloud at normal speed and the pupils listen without taking notes.
2. The teacher reads the text aloud a second time and the pupils make notes in a grid provided. At this point you might direct pupils to listen for particular types of words or phrases depending on the grammar/ vocabulary you are looking to introduce/reinforce.
3. The teacher reads the text aloud for the third time and the pupils add to their notes.
4. The children spend 10-15 minutes in small groups constructing a meaningful, cohesive text that might contain a number of features of the original.
5. The teacher leads a discussion based on the text written by one or more of the groups. This discussion might focus on concepts, meaning, cohesion, text type, register, key phrases, technical vocabulary or any combination of those.

Bilingual storytelling

Storytelling is relatively cross-cultural and provides numerous opportunities for pupils to develop colloquial and more academic forms of oracy alongside reading and writing (Gregory, 2008). Bilingual pupils can utilise proficiency in first and other languages and there is also the opportunity to draw upon pupils' background experience through the use of stories from other cultures (Flynn and Stainthorp, 2006). This is also an effective way to involve parents.

Traditional stories, which often have equivalents in many cultures, offer a good starting point for storytelling. They can be retold in English and/or other languages, providing numerous opportunities for adapting them for different purposes and audiences. Narratives that explore the notion of dual or multiple identities (Cummins, 2001) have also been shown to be particularly motivating for EAL learners. Finally, pupils can produce their own stories ready for performance to peers or other audiences.

Whilst writing and telling stories can be a private and individual experience, EAL learners will benefit particularly from communities of learning where pupils think and talk together in exploratory ways. Storytelling inevitably requires pupils to think and talk more formally in terms of story boarding and developing purposeful use of language to suit different audiences. Pupils must prepare a script, rehearse it and then formally deliver it, integrating speaking, reading and writing.

Digital Games-based Learning (DGbL)

Games, in general, are an effective way to develop oral language as playing them requires collaboration and the repetitive use of vocabulary and phrases. They often require users to interact with texts as well, which can support the development of reading. When rooted in the curriculum they also support the acquisition of subject knowledge.

Digital games have a particular resonance for 21st century learners, even those recently arrived from abroad, as most learners will have had some experience of them. Well-designed computer games are multi-modal, engaging and offer numerous opportunities for developing skills alongside language learning. As the plot proceeds, pupils need to watch, listen and often read text, making decisions that affect the gameplay.

Some publishers have attempted to create digital games that specifically teach English, but it has been argued that these may not be the most useful as, in the worst cases, they tend to be no more than thinly disguised tests (Mawer & Stanley, 2011). Instead, engaging, immersive games with strong narratives, interesting settings and memorable characters tend to be more effective. Games that require pupils to collaborate together to move the game forwards are particularly appropriate. With the right choice of digital game, there is the potential for creating language learning opportunities around speaking, listening, reading and writing e.g.

• using text-based game walk-throughs to help pupils learn to follow instructions
• writing game walk-throughs to teach instructions and explanations
• descriptive writing around settings and characters and developing new plot lines
• analysing persuasive devices used in game advertising and learning the conventions for producing game trailers or written adverts

Link to research report

https://ealresources.bell-foundation.org.uk/eal-specialists/eal-and-immersive-games

Collaborative Learning, a fundamental principle of EAL pedagogy, has been informed by more than thirty years of research and commentary by key figures such as Vygotsky, Cummins, Krashen and Gibbons.

A type of group work, collaborative learning recognises the significance of peer-to-peer support and pitching learning that lies just beyond the reach of an unsupported individual. Collaborative Learning breaks learning down into manageable chunks, encouraging thinking and talking through concrete, visual and tactile curriculum-based activities. Collaborative Learning Project 

Barrier Games

'Particularly useful for children and young people at the early stages of learning English, barrier games focus on developing speaking and listening skills. When rooted within the curriculum, ‘barrier games can also help to develop instructional language, question starters, use of present tense, positional vocabulary, comparative terms, descriptive terminology and subject specific language’ (Pim, 2012)

Typically learners sit either side of a physical barrier so that they cannot see what the other is doing and convey information to each other through oral interaction only. Here are a couple of examples:

1. One participant gives a detailed description of a ‘resource’ and the other participant must recreate it as accurately as possible – this could be a drawing or a physical object
2. By asking and answering questions both participants complete identical versions of a similar version that each possesses. Pim C. (2012) ‘100 ideas for supporting learners with EAL’, Continuum.

Directed Activities Related to Texts (DARTs)

Attributed to work done in the 1970s and 80s by Gardner and Lunzer, DARTs encourage learners to engage with texts using active reading strategies. DARTs are usually kinaesthetic in nature, requiring pupils to collaborate and cooperate to solve problems. Such activities require learners to move beyond the literal meaning of texts, asking them to manipulate and sometimes repurpose text into new formats. They can be employed right across the curriculum.

DARTs enable learners to variously consider the structure of a text, how to extract information and how to repurpose it in new ways. Some examples include sequencing, cloze procedures, demarcation. dictogloss, synthesising or repurposing text using graphic organisers, text marking, card sorts, jigsaw activities, KWL grids, opinion lines etc.

https://ealresources.bell-foundation.org.uk/teachers/great-ideas-pages

https://ealresources.bell-foundation.org.uk/teachers/great-ideas-darts

Vocabulary development

Academic vocabulary building is a recurring theme for pupils/students, particularly late beginners and more advanced EAL learners. Introducing and rehearsing 'chunks of language', both words and typical phrases, will support reading and help learners to apply them in their oral and written contributions. An explicit focus on vocabulary development, especially where words are taught in context, will help pupils to ‘secure the command of language that they require for high achievement, particularly at upper primary and secondary school’ Washbourne (2013)

There are many types of collaborative vocabulary games that can be played both orally and as kinaesthetic activities e.g. card games like Taboo, track games like dominoes and follow-me, Jenga vocabulary, Bingo, Call My Bluff, word jigsaws etc.

Formulator Tarsia

Osric’s Bingo card generator 

Storytelling with tablets

There are several apps for tablets that can support story telling with EAL learners. They allow pupils to start the story from pictures of their own making/choosing so that the story narrative is built up through discussion. They are also flexible in that the story can be as complex or as simple as the pupil’s current level of fluency can allow for. See also Comic Touch, Book Creater, Comic Life and Puppetpals HD which have lite versions free to download in some instances of costed apps for full versions. A popular app is iMovie which allows pupils to make digital presentations and movies. Link here to a report on use of technology with advanced EAL learners from Astrid Gouwy and Chris Pim of Hampshire EMTAS http://documents.hants.gov.uk/ABLNALDICArticle2014-04-25.pdf

There are many other references to web - based materials within other sections of the guide. Those below are a selection of sites that have a range of resource materials and research-informed advice.

Local Authorities and other associations

The Bell Foundation https://www.bell-foundation.org.uk/

Bracknell Forest EAL and Diversity - http://www.bfinclusion.org.uk

Collaborative Learning project - http://www.collaborativelearning.org

EAL Nexus (British Council) - https://ealresources.bell-foundation.org.uk/

EMTAS (Hampshire) -  https://www.hants.gov.uk/educationandlearning/emtas

EAL in National Strategies - https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110816013625/http://nsonline.org.uk/search/inclusion/results/nav%3A46394%20facets%3A33801

EAL Highland - http://ealhighland.org.uk/

Insted - http://www.insted.co.uk/

Mantra Lingua - http://uk.mantralingua.com/

Multiverse: a former government sponsored website whose resources are now available from https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20101019090225/http://www.multiverse.ac.uk/

NALDIC - http://www.naldic.org.uk

REAL - Realising Equality and Achievement for Learners – http://www.realproject.org.uk

Scottish Association for EAL SATEAL - http://www.sateal.org.uk

TES (search for ‘EAL’) - https://www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resources

Curriculum Materials

http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/ (English National Curriculum materials written for EAL learners before 2010 can be found archived at dera.ioe.ac.uk)

http://esolonline.tki.org.nz/

Mantra Lingua’s TalkingPEN technology (PENpal) http://uk.mantralingua.com/penpal-eal

PENpal is a portable digital audio player and recording device. It can support learning through teacher guided activities as well as small group collaborative tasks. As an audio player the device interfaces with published bilingual materials such as books, learning charts and dictionaries. As an audio recorder the device enables audio recordings to be made onto Mantra’s catalogue of bilingual materials as well as sticky labels that can be affixed to any surface.

Portable audio recording devices

Devices such as Talking Pegs, Tins and Cards are perfect for supporting development of oral language for new to English and beginner EAL learners. These devices record clearly and enable learners to playback their contributions in a non-threatening environment. Through playback they can more easily spot mistakes and improve their pronunciation.

Pupils/students can also use them to rehearse vocabulary and chunks of language in preparation for more presentational types of oral activity. Talking Photo Albums include the additional functionality of linking oral recordings with a visual dimension and are particularly useful for supporting talk for writing. Talking Products - http://www.talkingproducts.com TTS-Group - http://www.tts-group.co.uk

Tablet devices

Tablet devices (iPads, Android and Windows-based) have tremendous potential for supporting EAL learners because they promote multi-modal learning through clearly rendered text, high quality audovisual elements and kinaesthetic, gesture-based interactivity (see also Interactive Activities for story telling apps). Their gesture-based mode of operation may be supportive of learners who are unfamiliar with the use of complicated operating systems, keyboards and mice.

Text-to speech synthesis bring texts alive for learners who are yet to acquire fluency in reading. The ability to render text from speech through the in-built microphone is also natively incorporated into modern apps. Keyboards can also be adjusted for the use of languages other than English. Front and rear facing cameras also enable learners to incorporate a range of external media into cross-curricular projects and facilitate EAL learners producing outcomes beyond a purely mono-modal written output. Contextualised support for writing can be provided within apps such as spelling and grammar checks, word prediction, translation and even vocabulary support via topic-based word banks

Useful Apps: Clicker Docs (Cricksoft), Read&Write (Texthelp)

Scanning Pens

Scanning pens, such as C-Pen, can support access to printed text.  A user scans the relevant text with the pen which provides an audio rendition via text-to-speech as well as offering dictionary definitions (primary and secondary phase options available) and in-built translation. There are currently 3 different versions of C-Pen: Exam Reader, ReaderPen and DictionaryPen.

https://cpen.com/

Electronic dictionaries/thesauri

This type of technology has resonance for supporting students across the curriculum - particularly older, more advanced EAL learners. Electronic dictionaries/thesauri provide support for spelling, word meanings and vocabulary development. For students to make the most of dictionaries/thesauri they will need sufficiently well-developed English to make sense of the suggestions returned by the software, otherwise they may be overwhelmed by the multitude of choices presented to them.

Dictionary.com – www.dictionary.com

Translation tools

Hardware such as portable digital translators can be genuinely useful for older learners, as they can provide instant translation for keywords and common phrases, so long as the user can make sensible decisions about which translations make the most sense contextually.

Portable digital translators - http://www.ectaco.co.uk

Online translation tools/apps are potentially much more powerful as they do not rely upon predictable in-built translations but can work on completely free text. Those that render text on screen will only be useful for those with well-developed reading proficiency in L1 in order to make sense of the translation. Modern apps can utilise oral input/output for two-way language translation – the app ‘listens’ for oral input in one language, translates it on screen, and then uses text-to-speech to read it out in high quality synthesised voice in the second language.

Useful apps: SayHi, iTranslate, Google Translate

In designing this MESHGuide for EAL the authors drew on the thinking and feedback of teachers and learning support assistants (LSAs) in schools where numbers of EAL pupils were relatively low but where practice for EAL was recognised as well-informed by Hampshire EMTAS. The process of design involved the teachers in trialling aspects of the guide as part of the their active practice with their EAL learners; the resulting action research projects form the case studies in this section. The project outline form was adapted from The TACTICS Framework for teacher action-research which was developed by Professor James O’Meara of National Louis University, Chicago, USA.

The authors give very grateful thanks to the following schools and their staff:

Harrison Primary School, Fareham, Hampshire

Henry Beaufort Secondary School, Winchester, Hampshire

Ranvilles Infants School, Fareham, Hampshire

St Bernadette’s RC Primary, Farnborough. Hampshire

St. Michaels CE Infants School,  Aldershot, Hampshire

Over time it is hoped that more case studies exemplifying good practice will be added to this column and school practitioners are invited to make contact with the lead author (Naomi Flynn n.flynn@reading.ac.uk)

TEACHER’S NAME:   SARAH-JANE JACKSON, St Michael’s CE Infant School, Aldershot        

YEAR GROUP OF PUPILS:   Y2 (6 - 7 Years)

TOPIC OF ENQUIRY

Reading comprehension with one Y2 able EAL learner

Exploring writing activities with Y2 EAL learners

TARGETTING (what specifically are you seeking as outcomes?)

Improving reading comprehension

Improving specific aspects of writing

ANALYSING BEST PRACTICE (summary of research supporting your practice in this area)

Cameron and Besser (2004) identify the need for explicit teaching of the conventions (grammar, genre, tone, style etc.) of written English for EAL learners.

Pupils with a developing fluency in spoken English are likely to be beginning to read and write in English, but a continuing focus on the development of spoken language remains crucial in order that explicit knowledge about the way that English works is introduced (Krashen, 1986; Swain 2000).

Some pupils may acquire phonic knowledge and be able to decode quickly, but their skills in comprehension take longer and need explicit attention (Stuart, 2004).

Reading comprehension is related to the pupils’ vocabulary knowledge, knowledge of text types, knowledge of and interest in the subject matter (Hutchinson, Whitely, Smith and Connors, 2003).

Pupils’ access to reading is related directly to their current level of spoken English and breadth of vocabulary (Droop and Verhoeven, 1998).

Sections of the MESH guide that you may be useful: see sections on Spoken English as well as on Writing for Beginner/Advanced  EAL Learners; see Reading for all levels of learners; see Planning Activities Related to Language Needs; see Key Principles for EAL Learners.

CLARIFYING (What is the context for your research? How many pupils? Related class and school targets? Your own existing strengths?)

I have been less confident in supporting my more able EAL learners and want to know more about supporting children who are more fluent. I am more confident with activities to support beginner and new to English learners.

I have a role supporting writing across the year group, which includes supporting vulnerable learners.

TRANSLATING BEST PRACTICE (what will you do? How many times? How long?)

Working for the 6 week period between half term and Easter 2015.

We will trial some of the suggested activities and advice in the MESH guide in order to explore our teaching of writing with EAL learners. We may try spoken English activities such as pre-teaching of specific grammar/ vocab using speaking frames, and games that focus on tenses and conjunctions.

INTERPRETING RESULTS (what happened ?– outcomes may be numerical or described in words)

I focussed more on reading comprehension than on writing. As I completed the Year 2 SATS reading comprehension practice I realised that my more able EAL child was expected to reach Level 3 reading but missed the mark by 4. Although he reads fluently, he sometimes doesn't understand the meaning of the text or the question being asked. I found the guide most useful for this issue. I clicked on 'Reading for Advanced Learners'  to confirm the characteristics for the child and used the NADILC  link which suggests sequencing stories to show understanding of meaning. I then read about the jigsaw technique then to the British Council EAL Nexus site, which explained about the way it worked. I could see that when the group were reading a report about elephants, each child could then be the expert on their particular paragraph and tell me what they had read/understood. I found this VERY useful in the reading group to help me see if the EAL learner understood what he actually read. Also the highlighting of the text whereby the children highlight with a colour the answer located in the text. This enabled me to see whether the EAL learner could scan/locate and skim and helped him to answer the questions.

My pupil got 5 more marks on the actual SAT paper than on the practice following the intervention and so attained level 3 in reading comprehension for his Year 2 SAT. He is also a 2a writer. He had lost some time in the Autumn term of Year 2 with an extended trip home to India, and so we are very pleased with these outcomes which exceed what might have been expected of him.

COMMENTING ON TRANSFORMATIONS (what might this mean for your practice and for the pupils as learners?)

Although I focussed on reading comprehension I also set out to use this guide to help improve writing in my class with EAL children. I used the writing advice and looked up the table in the Writing for New to English Learners which suggested thinking about the types of language the children may need for the specific writing/genre. I found this by clicking 'integrated literacy activities' and then the website link for NALDIC, then the link to 'glossary of EAL teaching and learning'. This was very useful when thinking about and planning a topic. We would put an extra EAL box on our topic planning with anything needed to be taught, eg. before beginning report writing, it made us think about which devices EAL children may need.  I have worked with another Year 2 teacher on targeted intervention of our EAL learners for specific aspects of writing – namely use of generalisers and quantifiers in report writing.

I feel more advanced in my knowledge for EAL planning – particularly for teaching reading for meaning. I realise that this able learner’s fluency at word recognition was masking his comprehension.

SELECTING NEXT STEPS ( what might you do next? More of the same? Try a different approach?)

I feel more advanced in my knowledge for EAL planning – particularly for teaching reading for meaning. I have passed the ideas used on to the Year 2 teaching team who will be using the reading activities in their Guided Reading sessions. It has made us think before planning about targeted interventions for children for their writing. We found the section on integrated literacy activities particularly useful in terms of thinking about the types of language children might need to focus on really helpful. (This NALDIC link is aimed at GCSE English but the activities were still applicable to KS 1 and especially helpful for reading http://www.naldic.org.uk/Resources/NALDIC/docs/GlossarypagesfromEdexcelGCSEEnglishCoreTeacherGuide.pdf)

TEACHER’S  NAME:         SAM DAVIES, Harrison Primary School, Fareham               

YEAR GROUP OF PUPILS:   Y1 (5 – 6 YEARS)

TOPIC OF ENQUIRY

Using monolingual role models to support EAL children with phonic knowledge for reading.

TARGETTING (what specifically are you seeking as outcomes?)

Developing the phonic knowledge of three EAL learners with different home languages.

Support towards the Y1 phonics screening check summer 2015.

ANALYSING BEST PRACTICE (summary of research supporting your practice in this area)

Krashen (1986) and Swain (2000) identify that EAL learners need explicit introduction to the way that English works (in this case to the sound system for English).

Literacy proficiency in first language affects literacy proficiency in second language (August and Shanhan, 2006); thus it will be useful for me to know if they are learning to reading and writing in their home language; how their home languages are different from English; if they received any formal education in their home countries.

I need to bear in mind that phonic knowledge does not necessarily support comprehension and that this intervention is supporting only one aspect of the reading process. Stuart (2004) found that EAL learners may quickly develop phonic knowledge but without vocabulary learning their comprehension doesn’t keep pace with word reading.

Interactive talk-based activities support second language development (Lucas, Villegas and Freedson-Gonzalez, 2008)

MESH guide sections most related to this project: Theories of Additional Language Learning; Spoken English for New to English and Beginner English Learners; Reading for New to English and Beginner English Learners.

CLARIFYING (What is the context for your research? How many pupils? Related class and school targets? Your own existing strengths?)

I have a number of EAL learners in my class and there are EAL learners in the other Y1 classes. As senior teacher it is my role to trial pedagogy that the other teachers may find useful, thus I will work with EAL learners from two classes.

The research will be with a mixed monolingual/bilingual group. The EAL learners are children from Portugal, France and Greece and are at varying stages of fluency but all need support with learning the main sounds of English. They will work with two monolingual children who are attaining relatively well and who will benefit from having to articulate their phonic knowledge to the EAL learners.

The Portuguese child is at Phase 2 of Letters and Sounds

The French child is at Phase 4

The Greek child is working between Phase 1 and 2.

TRANSLATING BEST PRACTICE (what will you do? How many times? How long?)

6 week period up to Easter 2015

I will make an initial assessment of each child before the project begins in terms of their level of phonic knowledge.

I will work once a week with the group as described above using interactive game-based activities that support phonic knowledge.

INTERPRETING RESULTS (what happened ?– outcomes may be numerical or described in words)

Children really keen to come and work with me on a weekly basis

Initially the monolingual children and French speaking child were the more dominant in the session with the Portuguese and Greek child taking a more backseat position.  However as time as progressed, the other two girls became much more involved and confident in their answers, in fact when I suggested that we would stop these sessions, I was met with a resounding ‘No’ from all girls involved!

I have found this very useful for the children as it has allowed me to be very focused in my delivery of the session.   We have trialled a range of activities and certain activities have proven more successful than others.

It has also allowed me to address the children more as individuals and I have identified some other issues that I hadn’t been aware of previously, which then allowed me to adjust my class practise where appropriate for these children.

COMMENTING ON TRANSFORMATIONS (what might this mean for your practice and for the pupils as learners?)

The Portuguese and Greek child have become  much more confident and involved in sessions as time has progressed, keen to participate

Continue with weekly sessions till end of summer term – assess children during next couple of weeks so that I can target specific sounds, need to move onto digraphs / trigraphs.

SELECTING NEXT STEPS ( what might you do next? More of the same? Try a different approach?)

·         Continue these sessions – at children’s request.

·         Focus on digraphs / trigraphs – targeted sounds as result of phonics assessment.

TEACHER’S NAME:          ROB BAKER-GALL, Harrison Primary, Fareham         

YEAR GROUP OF PUPILS: Y5 (9 - 10 years)

TOPIC OF ENQUIRY

Developing language for writing

TARGETING (what specifically are you seeking as outcomes?)

Growth in breath of vocabulary and in understanding of the grammatical structure of written English.

Exploring the possible impact of child having opportunities to think in first language.

ANALYSING BEST PRACTICE (summary of research supporting your practice in this area)

Cummins (1999) identified the need for explicit teaching of academic vocabulary to support EAL learners’ conceptual understanding and use of academic language in speaking and writing English.

Krashen (1981) and Cameron and Besser (2004) identify the need for EAL learners to be taught the conventions of written English explicitly.

Lucas, Villegas and Freedson Gonzalez (2008) summarise research identifying the need for EAL learners to have a language for thinking.

MESH guide sections most relevant to this project: Theories of Language Additional Language Learning; Spoken English for New to English and Beginner English Learners; Writing for New to English and Beginner English Learners; Planning and Assessment for EAL lessons.

CLARIFYING (What is the context for your research? How many pupils? Related class and school targets? Your own existing strengths?)

Working with one EAL learner from Mexico who arrived in Year 5 in September 2014. He is literate in his first language (Spanish) and has had some opportunity to work in Spanish with our SENCO who is Spanish speaking. He has support from EMTAS one afternoon a week. I am already using pre-teaching of vocabulary with him and I plan together with the SENCO who is currently focussing on grammar with him.

The child attended a dual-language school shortly before leaving Mexico and has a good understanding of conversational English. When assessed, shortly after arrival, he was writing at a 2C national curriculum level. Issues identified at this time included:

·         Variety in sentence structures

·         Accurate demarcation of sentences

·         Maintaining consistent tense

·         Maintaining consistent ‘person’ – 1st, 2nd or 3rd

When speaking, the child struggles with the irregularities between the two languages, such as possession (In Spanish, one would say “The car of my mother,” rather than “my mother’s car”) and structure of past tense sentences. He also struggles with homonyms/homophones.

His complete level breakdown:

TEACHER’S/LSA’s NAMES: PAUL LEGGATT AND RUTH ECKETT, Henry Beaufort School (11 – 16), Winchester                

YEAR GROUP OF PUPILS:   7 & 9 ( 11-12 & 13 -1 4 years)

TOPIC OF ENQUIRY

Exploring reading activities to support  beginner English learners

TARGETING (what specifically are you seeking as outcomes?)

Improved reading in terms of both word recognition and comprehension for pupils. Also looking to influence motivation to read in one pupil. This may involve working with enhancing spelling and with spoken English activities as well as reading-based activities.

ANALYSING BEST PRACTICE (summary of research supporting your practice in this area)

Droop and Verhoeven (1998) identify that EAL learners’ spoken English fluency affects their capacity to read in English. Hutchinson, Whitely, Smith and Connors (2003) explain that EAL learners’ capacity for reading comprehension is affected by their vocabulary knowledge, their knowledge of different text types and their interest in the subject matter of the texts.

Sections of the MESHGuide that may be useful: Reading at secondary level plus the other sections on reading; the sections on spoken English for new to English and beginner EAL learners; interactive literacy activities; sections on challenges and on key teaching principles for EAL learners.

CLARIFYING (What is the context for your research? How many pupils? Related class and school targets? Your own existing strengths?)

3 pupils who are all identified as requiring support on the school register of EAL learners. 1 x female from Thailand (y9) and 2 x male (brothers) from Poland (y7 &9).

All pupils currently receive support from the LSA with specialist knowledge of EAL and from the EAL co-ordinator.

The boy in Y7 is reluctant to read with adults and anxious not to appear less able/ receiving support; this causes some problems with motivation to read, in addition to limitations on his word recognition skills.

TRANSLATING BEST PRACTICE (what will you do? How many times? How long?)

Working for the 6 week period between half term and Easter 2015.

We will trial some of the suggested activities and advice in the MESH EAL guide related to the teaching of reading.

We may work with activities that support phonic knowledge for spelling and also vocabulary for spoken English in order to support word recognition and comprehension in reading.

We may work with audio books and graphic novels.

INTERPRETING RESULTS (what happened ?– outcomes may be numerical or described in words)

We worked with the three identified pupils using MESHGuide advice mostly from the section on Reading for Secondary Age Pupils.

Thai female pupil (Y9) – mother tongue literacy was age appropriate whereas English literacy was at a beginner level. As advised by MESHGuide we started with something that was age appropriate and which was similar to the Cambridge Readers scheme suggested in MESHGuide. This worked well with her – she chose one herself – and this was more accessible than a text she might have picked that would have matched her Thai reading fluency. We tried graphic novels but she was not inspired to read these. We had the Cambridge Readers in the library already as a resource so it was useful that the MESHGuide confirmed our choice of resources. We would have liked to use a graphic novel such as a play by Shakespeare but this resource was currently in use by teachers in the English department.

Polish male pupil (Y9) – came to England in upper primary school years. Spoken English has some fluency. Aimed for an age-appropriate novel and chose Charlie Higson’s Young Bond book Silver Fin. We used an audio CD while reading the book in line with MESHGuide advice. This worked well because this pupil has some difficulty translating written in to spoken word. It made a significant difference in terms of his understanding of a paragraph and allowed him to move at a faster pace through the narrative. He might re-read paragraphs that he had heard in order to consolidate his understanding and he found this very helpful. He also liked the ‘gadget’ nature of what he was doing – sitting in the library with a pair of headphones in his ears was fun because pupils are not allowed headphones in school.  We did this activity at lunchtime with him in allocated tutor time set aside for literacy skills once a week. It was useful that we had an existing timetabled structure that accommodated the activity which is a focussed 20 minute session. MESHGuide advice on text to speech synthesis was very much in evidence in this pupil; he enjoyed listening to sections before reading them and this very much improved his ability to read and understand compared to sections read ‘straight off’.

Polish male pupil (Y7) – this pupil was a very reluctant reader, and appeared very self-conscious about not being able to access the same texts as his peers. We tried graphic novels but, although these were accessible to him, he did not enjoy reading them. This was probably because he felt too old to be reading anything with pictures in it even if the subject matter was age appropriate. More successful was one to one reading with David Walliams’ Billionaire Boy because this was age appropriate but had some subtle illustration. This demonstrated for us that the MESHGuide advice to use illustrations worked well for this boy, although it was important that they didn’t appear child-like. Repetition of vocab in this book was also useful for comprehension and to support progression.

We also tried some reading aloud with all three pupils in order to give us some insight in to where the pupils needed help with letter-sound correspondence. The MESHGuide indicates that some discrete phonics teaching might be useful and so we were exploring the practicality of this in a secondary environment. This activity has been particularly useful with the Polish boy in Y7 who lacks motivation.

We also looked at spelling support alongside their reading sessions and sampled using Simple English Wikipedia

COMMENTING ON TRANSFORMATIONS (what might this mean for your practice and for the pupils as learners?)

We were able to identify for the Thai pupil that comprehension problems were based mainly in vocabulary and occasionally with mistakes in pronunciation. Some sections were read aloud to her to maintain pace and to assist with comprehension through accurate pronunciation. With both Polish boys we were able to identify the types of texts that motivated each to read. The interventions were personalised to each pupil and each intervention worked for each pupil once we had worked out which text-types would suit them. EAL learners are as individual in their needs as our monolingual pupils.

SELECTING NEXT STEPS ( what might you do next? More of the same? Try a different approach?)

Some discussion needed around sharing resources between departments in a secondary school (e.g. graphic novels).

We see this EAL MESHGuide as a useful support for CPD with staff and will share our experiences with the wider team.

This work is based on empirical findings from research in the UK context, in the US context and from other nations where English is not the first language. It also draws on teacher-oriented resources from a number of different nations; resources are referred to only where there is a recognised empirical base to the teacher guidance given. To find out more about the research project which led to the writing of this EAL MESHGuide read  Flynn, N. (2019). ‘Facilitating evidence-informed practice’. Teacher Development, 23  (1), 64-82. (Contact the author for a draft of this if you do not have journal access: n.flynn@reading.ac.uk)

The advice in much of this guide is transferable to other contexts in which English is the main language but is being learned as an additional language; with the caveat that curriculum references to English curriculum guidance may not be relevant.  The guide is also relevant to some extent to contexts where teachers are working with children learning any new language that is the language of the host nation; particularly the sections that deal broadly with new language acquisition and new literacy development. Furthermore it has some applicability to contexts – such as in some African countries – where English is the medium of instruction. However, in contexts where English is the medium of instruction teachers will want to take account of:

1.  Working where they can with pupil’s home languages to ensure that the subject content of lessons is understood conceptually.

2.  Where possible introduce vocabulary in English that is already familiar to the pupils in terms of their experiences and home contexts.

3.  Take care to note that, where references are made in the EAL MESHGuide to terms and curriculum documents that are English, these may not be relevant for your contexts (please contact the authors if you want help with this).

There is some transferability to contexts where English is being learned as a foreign language but there are some differences that readers will want to take account of. These are, in summary:

1.  English learned as a foreign language is unlikely to be given the same amount of lesson contact time as learners working in an English-only context. This may mean that the learning contexts presented in the EAL MESHGuide are not readily replicable and will need some adaptation for your context.

2.  Where possible introduce vocabulary in English that is already familiar to the pupils in terms of their experiences and home contexts.

It is widely recognised that many aspects of EAL teaching and learning are under-researched in the UK; including the shape of effective CPD for EAL. With this in mind we are interested in hearing from schools, teachers and fellow academics who want to pursue practice-oriented research that examines effective pedagogy for EAL through any subject area; and who are interested in looking at ways of developing teachers’ pedagogy for EAL through CPD.

Naomi Flynn is currently working with schools using an approach to teaching pupils with EAL in the UK that has been tried and tested with measureable success in the US. She is interested in hearing from any schools and teachers who want to know more, with a view to taking part in practitioner-researcher partnerships with her.

Teachers in many countries can expect to have pupils in their classes for whom English is not their first language. This guide is essential reading for teachers in this position.

BLOGS

EAL Bilingual – NALDIC’s online forum https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/eal-bilingual

EAL in the daylight  https://ealdaylight.com/blog/

Hampshire EMTAS Blog  https://emtas.hias.hants.gov.uk/blog/

Kamil Trzebiatowski’s Blog  http://valuediversity-teacher.co.uk/

SUBJECT ASSOCIATION

NALDIC https://naldic.org.uk/ is the national organisation for EAL. It is a community of academics and practitioners which acts as the voice for EAL in the UK. Membership includes a termly journal with practical research-informed ideas for the classroom and membership-only access to many resources on the NALDIC website

NALDIC Blog  https://ealjournal.org/

Anyone is welcome at a NALDIC Regional Interest Group; termly meetings for teachers and anyone else interested in EAL. You don’t have to be a NALDIC member to attend. Contact enquiries@naldic.org.uk to find out if there is one in your area or to enquire about starting one up yourself.