1. Present a taught lesson, complete with lesson plan, classroom
resources and a rationale for your teaching and learning methodology.
Reflect on the lesson's success, relating pedagogical approaches to a
hypothesis for pupil learning and progress.
EAL PEDAGOGY
EAL pedagogy is designed to meet the requirements of the Teachers'
Standards which expect from the teaching to be adapted "to the strengths and
needs of all pupils" (p11). It is understood as a set of systematic teaching
approaches and it aims to meet the learning as well as the language needs of
pupils for whom English is an additional language. This includes the use of a
wide range of different teaching strategies allowing teachers to teach in
accordance with EAL guidelines. The EAL guidelines on teaching in an EAL way,
can be found in NALDIC documents regarding planning, EAL scaffolding and
distinctiveness of EAL pedagogy.
To make sure that the lessons are delivered in an EAL way I have included,
where possible, teaching approaches which from many pedagogical
perspectives appear to be the most effective while working with bilingual
learners. These include: assessment to plan future progression, scaffolding to
support second language learning, following scheme of work for Spelling
Punctuation and Grammar (SPAG) for students lacking grammatical skills, to
improve their grammatical competence and using planning frameworks to
meet all students' needs. As the current SOW for SPAG needed adjustments
due to limited contextual links, I have also adapted it to make these links to
the studied novella.
PEDAGOGICAL PERSPECTIVES
In her book, Learning to learn in a Second Language, Pauline Gibbons indicates
that EAL teaching should be characterised by language-rich provision
integrated with the mainstream teaching. This theory suggests that the best
2. opportunity for L2 learning is when it is relevant to curriculum learning.
Grammar, in similarity to phonics or spellings, should be embedded within an
integrated meaning-focus approach.
A similar point of view is represented by Hymes, Canale and Swain (reference
needed) who explained that children learn to communicate through spoken
language and in order to do so effectively, they first have to develop a
language knowledge, vocabulary and grammar, used in the right context. In
this view students should be able to find the grammatical rules useful and
meaningful and apply them appropriately. In accordance with Krashen's theory
of comprehensible input, teaching of grammar can result in great
understanding of L2, when the target language, eg. using 'there is/ are'
sentences, is used a a medium of instruction. (references)
Although Marton attacks some of the anti-pedagogical aspects of Krashen's
theory on second language acquisition, which come from the fact that “Krashen
assigns only a minimal role to language pedagogy in the process of language
acquisition” (1990, p. 95), he would agree with the idea mentioned in the
previous paragraph as it suggest that grammar is an important part of
language acquisition when used for the right purpose.
According to authors above, communicative competence includes grammatical
competence, the use of “knowledge of lexical terms and of rules of
morphology, syntax, sentence-grammar semantics and phonology” (1980a:
29). This type of knowledge and skills allow the language learner to make use
of language resources to understand and create meanings.
In both my lessons, these principles were adapted, grammar was used in
conjunction with the reading book, by exploring grammatical rules through the
context of certain words and sentences from the book. Specific sentences were
selected from the book, in which students had to recognise verbs in the past
tense and state whether they are regular or irregular, in the past or in the
present tense. The writing exercise focused on students' understanding of
3. vocabulary from the book where singular and plural forms of nouns were made
explicit.
The novella was chosen by the English department to meet students' needs.
The Twits is studied in KS1, but because students in 7F mostly represent level
2 in English and they lack of reading comprehension skills, which was proved
by the completed assessments, the school ordered books which are
appropriate to their reading abilities.
ASSESSMENT
Both English lessons were delivered to students in class 7F who are all EAL
learners. Six of them are new EAL arrivals, five - recent arrivals of whom one
shows SEN needs. This student has not been yet recognised as SEN by the
school's SENCO due to unknown medical history of this student. The students
in this class were carefully selected in order to be able to adapt SOWs in many
subjects to their specific needs.
Understanding of basic English vocabulary by new arrivals is secure due to
learning EFL in their home countries for a period of two to three years and EAL
immersion in which learning functional English is targeted. Functional English is
understood as the ability to use basic vocabulary in everyday situations, being
able to follow instructions and form basic phrases/ sentences in real-life
situations.
Recent arrivals coming from Lithuania and Latvia, whose first language is
Russian and who are not fully literate in their home language, appear to have
gaps in learning, both in L1 and L2, and make slower progress in National
Curriculum subjects. Although they appear to be more confident in speaking,
they lack of basic reading and writing skills to access higher level work.
Initial EAL assessment of these students allows the teacher to recognise what
are their specific L2 learning needs based on EAL-specific descriptors taken
from the Language in Common. For example, understanding of vocabulary,
4. ability to write at length, to listen in different contexts, to use punctuation
marks like full stops and capital letters, to use different reading strategies to
establish meaning at sentence level, etc.
FLA (First Language Assessments) contributed to gathering more information
about L1 skills, diagnosis of specific speech or language disorders as well as
assessment of the pupil’s language development patterns and extent of
vocabulary knowledge. The ability to communicate, read and write with fluency
in their home languages was shown by five out of six new arrivals. The one,
who was unable to show literacy skills in his home language, comes from
Gambia, an African country, where English is an official language and all
lessons are being taught in English. As his home language - Wolof does not
follow English language rules and patterns, this student appears to have
insecure grammatical knowledge and thus constantly fails in his writing
assessments.
Some new arrivals appeared to be more fluent in their L1 than the others,
where spelling or word order mistakes were rare, and they were able to work
at a faster pace. This proves that these students will be able to learn the
English language much faster in comparison to some other peers in the same
class.
Below is the example of the short EAL assessment and First Language
Assessment (FLA) summary for one of the new arrivals which were carried out
in November '15. These levels however, are not up-to-date as this student
since then has made good progress in L2 overall, was recently moved to a
higher ability group, due to a contextual grammar approach in teaching and
supporting through translations into L1.
EAL:
Speaking: S2; can use simple words and phrases
Listening: S2; can understand simple conversations, if there are clear contextual clues and can follow
some instructions
Reading: 1b; knows how to spell HFWs and can establish meaning at sentence level
Writing: 1b; can write simple sentences, uses capital letters and full stops
FLA:
Communication: able to answer questions in longer sentences and talk about himself
5. Reading: reads fluently in his first language and is able to find specific information in a text very quickly
Writing: can write at a fast pace, uses punctuation marks, capital letters, commas and full stops
Literacy reading and writing assessments for KS1 carried out by their teachers
of English, proved that there is a high demand for language focused teaching
and learning, and additional lessons on grammar are necessary to improve
students' confidence when applying their writing skills and understanding of
specific language patterns. These assessments helped me with planning my
lessons and to recognise students' specific needs. Common mistakes made by
these students were as follows: omission of the verb 'to be' in sentences,
difficulty in writing using the past tense, word order and subject-verb
agreement mistakes.
From the English department perspective, lessons delivered to 7F should be
delivered in a language-rich way, where EAL concepts, like scaffolding, should
be consulted with the EAL specialist in the school, especially that these
students are not timetabled for additional EAL provision. According to the
proposed solution immersing students in mainstream lessons, without taking
into consideration language and content, cannot provide optimal learning
opportunities (Mohan, 2001). This has to be done by co-planning involving
both the EAL specialist and subject teacher. Although my lessons were not
planned directly with the teacher, who is an NQT, they were consulted with the
Literacy Coordinator and the Head of English department in our school.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
As mentioned previously, the topic of the lesson was taken from SOW for
SPAG in which the students have to be familiar with grammatical terms like
adjectives, nouns and verbs, as well as being able to use syntax, plural and
singular nouns to support spellings. It was designed for 7F students by their
English teachers with consultation with the EAL specialist in the school, to
target and improve students' linguistic and communicative confidence, abilities
and knowledge in relation to language and its use in context.
6. The learning intentions/ objectives:
1. Recognising basic parts of speech by referring to word-translations, visual
clues, examples and definitions
By referring to translations in their home languages, new arrivals were able to
give examples of different parts of speech in their home languages and then in
English. Visual clues and key visuals were used throughout both lessons to
support understanding of new words and grammatical rules, thus most
students succeeded in completing their tasks without further explanations.
2. Using the irregular verbs list to classify a verb
By referring to the irregular verbs list, students were able to find specific
irregular verbs. The conclusion given by one student was that 'this list does not
have regular verbs' and this is how we can find out if a verb is regular or
irregular.
3. Explaining and remembering rules for forming regular verbs and nouns
Many visual clues, pictures from the book and cross-curricular links were used
to improve students' understanding of new vocabulary, e.g. >1 (P), 1 (S).
They helped students with recognising which nouns are regular and irregular
and that there is a rule for forming regular nouns. One student said that
regular nouns have '-s' in plural and irregular nouns have no '-s'.
4. Applying reading strategies, like syntax, to understand a text. These reading
strategies were taken from Language in Common and EAL descriptors
suggested by OFSTED.
By referring to the word irregular, students noticed that the prefix 'ir' means
'not', in similarity to 'in' in the word 'incorrect', 'un' in the word 'uneven' and 'a'
in 'asymmetrical. The cross-curricular links when the students had to find
7. regular and irregular 2D shapes and name them, aimed to consolidate
students' knowledge gained in their recent Maths lesson.
5. Using success-criteria as a self-assessment measure
At the end of the second lesson, students had to look at the success criteria
and reflect on their learning. Eight students managed to recognise what they
learnt in both lessons and what they found difficult. It appeared that the
majority of students struggled with syntax, especially suffixes like '-less' and '-
full', which they were not familiar with yet. Using graphics, phonics and context
as reading strategies helped with completing some parts of the reading
comprehension tasks successfully. In addition, most students used subject-
verb agreement correctly as they remembered that 'there is' suggests using
one thing or person (singular), and 'there are' suggests using more than one
(plural).
PLANNING FRAMEWORKS
The lesson was planned to meet students' specific needs and to raise
awareness of grammatical terminology and rules among students, which were
then reinforced in other subjects, for example history and science when then
they were expected to write in the past and present tenses. The scaffolding
techniques, which are commonly used in MFL lessons, were used to support L2
acquisition and improve students' understanding.
The planning framework suggested by Pauline Gibbons, helped to integrate the
curriculum content with the language learning needs of pupils with EAL. The
first two columns relate to the content taught. The next three, focus mainly on
the language which is relevant to the levels of the students, and which relates
to the chosen topic.
TOPIC ACTIVITIES LANGUAGE
FUNCTIONS
LANGUAGE
STRUCTURES
VOCABULARY
Regular and Using the irregular clarifying (Repetitive (Taken from the
8. irregular verbs verbs list and
cross-curricular
links as a tool to
decide whether a
verb is regular or
irregular.
comparing
explaining
questions in the
present simple to
support consistency
in using tenses)
What do the
following words
mean?
What does the
word 'irregular'
mean?
How can you define
the words below?
reading passage)
Irregular verbs:
go – went
sit – sat
be - was
Regular verbs:
pull - pulled
look – looked
point – pointed
tie-tied
gasp-gasped
Plural and singular
nouns
Using a writing
frame and cross-
curricular links to
support L2
learning.
clarifying
comparing
explaining
(Language used for
writing stories)
There is...
There are...
(Use of
prepositional
language)
on top, in the
middle, on the
bottom
(Taken from the
book)
Regular, singular
and plural nouns:
monkey- monkeys
trick – tricks
window – windows
Irregular, singular
and plural nouns:
woman – women
foot – feet
Gravelle's (2000) simple but powerful matrix (See below) supported the
planning to meet the need of all EAL students, including the recent arrival who
appears to have SEN needs. The left hand column reflects the cognitive
abilities and the demands of the curriculum. The middle one reflects the need
to consider and activate the child's previous experience and skills. The third
one indicates that some additional support to bridge any gaps in learning may
be needed.
What does the learner
bring to the task?
What does the task
demand of the
learner?
What support needs to
be planned for?
Linguistic There are several things
which two main groups of
students have in common
and this should be reflected
during lessons;
New Arrivals: literate in their
home languages, know
grammatical concepts to
some extent, willing to
improve their L2 skills
through grammar due to
previous educational
experience.
Recent arrivals: lack of
systematic grammatical
knowledge, not literate in
their home languages which
is reflected by slower
progress, gaps in curriculum
To be able to work
systematically and apply
certain language
patterns in
communication, reading
and writing.
Scaffolding , additional
teacher to support the
class, translations to
support L2 learning
based on the knowledge
of L1 (Cummins), using
repetitions and simplified
language to explain
meanings of unfamiliar
words, etc.
9. and vocabulary.
LESSON ORGANISATION AND SCAFFOLDING
Scaffolding means providing temporary support for a newly or recently
arrived student in order to help them to complete a task successfully or acquire
a specific skill. It is important for EAL learners as it enables them to move from
dependent to independent learning. In consequence, it reduces the freedom in
carrying out tasks in order to concentrate on the process of L2 learning
(Bruner, 1978)
To ensure that scaffolding was present in both lessons, the following
scaffolding techniques were used:
• Modelling and demonstrating language orally or in writing to the student
• Adjusting language to develop the learner's language and extend
vocabulary by rephrasing questions
• Making the verbal curriculum more visual by using pictures and key
visuals as well as writing frames
• Using cross-curricular links; maths: 2D shapes, more than one (>1), one
(1), science: comparing a verb stem with a flower stem
• Providing opportunities for practice by completing tasks on the
interactive white board, completing certain tasks independently (irregular
verbs test 1)
• Ensuring home languages are valued and used by incorporating
collaborative L1 work into lessons as well as translations of keywords
The last scaffolding technique was taken from Cummins (1981) theory of CUP
(Common Underlying Proficiency), which indicates that one of the important
aspects of effective teaching of EAL learners is the need to support and
develop the child's competence in the mother tongue alongside the learning of
English by encouraging and supporting students through communication in
mother tongue or translations into L1.
In both lessons students were paired up according to their preferences, gender
and the same language to improve L2 development and to promote verbal
10. interaction between them. New arrivals were mixed with recent arrivals to
foster language development, improve social skills and motivation.
SUMMARY
Incorporating EAL provision into mainstream teaching is of high importance as
it supports L2 acquisition. Development of language is strictly associated with
development of grammatical competence and confidence in students and it has
been proved by many great language educators, including Berlitz, Sweet,
Parmel or Marton. Natural acquisition process which is offered by Krashen or
Chomsky “can completely fail to lead to any development of L2 competence,
leaving the learner with the rather chaotic conglomeration of various ill-
absorbed bits and pieces of the target language which may be not sufficient
even for performing the simplest receptive or productive tasks” (Marton, 1990:
99). Thus looking at language through certain linguistic patterns, remembering
them by contextualisation and meaningfulness, brings success and the pride of
achievement in students, which were reached in both analysed above lessons.
REFERENCES
Brandt, G. L. (1986), The realisation of Anti-Racist Teaching, New York: The
Falmer Press
BRITISH COUNCIL (2014), Great idea: Scaffolding, Available at:
https://eal.britishcouncil.org (Accessed: 5 December 2015)
BRITISH COUNCIL (2014), Effective teaching of EAL learners, Available at:
https://eal.britishcouncil.org (Accessed: 3 December 2015)
Bruner, J. S. (1978). The role of dialogue in language acquisition, New York:
Springer-Verlag
Canale, M. and Swain, M. (1980a) Theoretical bases of communicative
11. approaches to second language teaching and testing, Applied linguistics, 1 (1):
1-47
Cummins, J (1981) Bilingualism and minority language children. Ontario;
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.
DEPARTMENT FOR EDUCATION (2011), Teachers’ Standards Guidance for
school leaders, school staff and governing bodies, Available at:
https://www.gov.uk (Accessed: 28 November 2015)
Evans, M., Jones, N., Leung, C. and Yongcan, L. (2015) EAL Assessment and
Evaluation Framework, ?
Gibbons, P. (2002) Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning, Portsmouth
NH: Heinneman.
Gravelle, M. (ed.) (2000) Planning for Bilingual Learners: an inclusive
curriculum, Stoke on Trent: Trentham Books
Krashen, Stephen D. Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition. Prentice-Hall International, 1987.
Krashen, Stephen D. Second Language Acquisition and Second Language Learning. Prentice-Hall
International, 1988.
Leung, C. and Creese, A (Editors) (2010) English as an Additional Language:
Approaches To Teaching Linguistic Minority Students, London: NALDIC
Mohan, B. (2001), The second language as a medium of learning, Harlow,
Essex: Pearson Education
NALDIC (2015), Planning, Available at: http://www.naldic.org.uk
(Accessed: 20 December 2015)
12. NALDIC (2000), A language in common: Assessing English as an additional
language, Available at: http://www.naldic.org.uk
(Accessed: 13 November 2015)
South, H. (ed) (1999) The Distinctiveness of English as an Additional
Language: a cross-curricular discipline. Watford: NALDIC
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