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27th April 2022
The Early Career Framework was made compulsory in the UK in September 2021. It replaces the year-long NQT period. It is a two-year programme of support […]
27th March 2022
Studying mathematics in an English-medium school presents learners of English as an Additional Language (EAL) with a double cognitive whammy as they grapple with learning English […]
23rd February 2022
The traditional way to start a lesson with Secondary school learners is with a ‘do now!’ activity. It works. You get a focused start to the […]
23rd January 2022
If Katerina spoke in Russian again in the classroom, the teacher warned her, her name would be put on the board and she would miss out […]
27th November 2021
Everyone recognizes the importance of staying safe online – but it’s not always straightforward. For many of us, computing – including social media, information technology and […]
26th September 2021
Barry and Matthew Carpenter’s ‘Recovery Curriculum’ has many applications for EAL pupils. Their ‘Recovery Curriculum’ was created during the 2021-21 pandemic, over concerns about how learners […]
16th August 2021
You’re the EAL lead in your school – or a teacher with responsibility for EAL. You’re a class teacher who’s been asked to look into EAL […]
10th July 2021
In March 2020 International Primary School Almere, along with all other schools here in the Netherlands, went into lockdown for three weeks. Three weeks, we thought? […]
5th June 2021
When learning new languages, a lot of information simply needs to be remembered, and we often have to combine new information with what we already know, […]
17th May 2021
As school teachers faced with EAL learners in our classrooms, we often push the teaching of phonics down the list, especially at secondary school level. Yet […]
26th April 2021
What is a cloze procedure? Cloze procedures are tasks where learners fill in the blanks in a text from which entire words have been omitted. Learners […]
17th March 2021
It’s now almost exactly a year since the UK education system went into lockdown. The ruling that schools must close to almost all pupils was a […]
3rd March 2021
Lockdown engagement: In January, we commenced another lockdown in the UK and put our recovery curriculum on hold. The question on most of our minds was […]
3rd February 2021
Author: Catherine Brennan, Director, Better Bilingual CIC To mute or unmute? To reply to one or everyone? To use gallery or speaker view? Like it or […]
4th January 2021
Author: Breda Matthews, EAL Specialist Teaching in a way that is responsive to the diversity in our classrooms has a huge impact on the learning outcomes […]
13th December 2020
Author: Miranda Howell, EAL Specialist For those of us who are EAL teachers in school, selecting our language learning outcomes is only one consideration in our […]
8th November 2020
Author: Eli Briasco Think about the last lesson you taught to English language learners. I’m sure you did some form of planning beforehand. I imagine you […]
7th October 2020
Author: Breda Matthews, EAL Specialist Assessment in an EAL context takes many forms. It can be formal (e.g. tests and examinations), informal (e.g. teacher observations) or […]
18th August 2020
Author: Isabelle Bridger, EAL Specialist As educators, we are naturally reflective creatures, habitually revisiting lessons in our minds to see if we could somehow improve. Could […]
30th June 2020
Author: Caroline Scott Transitioning successfully between extended home and school learning has been the struggle of every affected school, across the globe, since the onset of […]
4th June 2020
Author: Isabelle Bridger-Eames, EAL Specialist This article constitutes a discussion on key approaches to AfL, which schools, such as the British School of Kuala Lumpur, have […]
3rd June 2020
Author: Catherine Brennan, Better Bilingual As I write this, it is Mental Health Awareness Week 2020 (18-24 May) in the UK, hosted by the Mental Health […]
12th May 2020
Calling home – working with a bilingual support partner (or bilingual teaching assistant or teacher)
Author: Caroline Scott If you have the opportunity to use a bilingual support partner to help families who have learners working from home, it may be […]
21st April 2020
Author: Caroline Scott We are all faced with very different learning situations at the moment and home learning has become the current norm. The challenges it […]
4th March 2020
Author: Lois Francis, Ethnic Minority Achievement Adviser, Integra Schools, South Gloucestershire Council It is often easier for learners who are new to English to cope with […]
28th January 2020
Author: Sarah Jones International Mother Language Day (IMLD) is a worldwide observance celebrated annually on 21st February. It promotes awareness of cultural and linguistic diversity and […]
7th January 2020
Author: Yzanne Mackay New Year is a time to take stock – and often to think about making changes. One of the most common New Year’s […]
10th December 2019
Author: Dr. Anne Margaret Smith There are many similarities between music and language, in the way they are organised, processed and produced. Music therefore has enormous […]
19th November 2019
Author: Sarah Jones In September 2015, Lea Forest Academy took on an additional class of 16 Year 2 newly arrived EAL children. Eight of these children […]
25th September 2019
Author: Yzanne Mackay “Parental involvement is invaluable for any new arrival in transition. The learner’s family may be the only group of people who truly understand […]
3rd September 2019
Authors: Caroline Scott, Yzanne Mackay “Scaffolding is the process a teacher uses to model or demonstrate how to solve a problem (in the case of language […]
4th July 2019
Author: Anita Bamberger When considering the Chinese language, the Chinese proverb ‘a picture paints a thousand words’ is apposite. Chinese is a complex language of symbols, […]
5th June 2019
Author: Sarah Jones, EAL Co-ordinator Picking up where we left off! The Sentence Analyser was piloted by the children and staff in the EAL Hub […]
13th May 2019
Author: Yasmin Malik, Senior Education Consultant Maths is often a subject that is not given the same priority as others when it comes to the teaching […]
21st March 2019
Author: Stuart Scott This ‘Introduce Me’ activity is a fun and rewarding way to introduce a new topic, while developing language skills. It’s ideally suited to […]
28th February 2019
Author: Caroline Scott In cases where you have an absolute beginner to English, an induction-to-English is supportive. Yes, we need to be differentiating for the curriculum content […]
22nd January 2019
Author: Sarah Jones Introduction Lea Forest, my school in Birmingham, has been using the Learning Village for over three years. It has proved a highly effective learning […]
12th December 2018
Authors: Caroline Scott, Heather Day, Ragini Patel Three years ago, Heather Day, an EAL consultant, contacted us about piloting the Learning Village in an inner London […]
27th November 2018
Author: Caroline Scott The National Learning and Work Institute (2018) completed a randomised controlled trial of a Community-Based English Language intervention aimed at people with very […]
3rd October 2018
Author: Sarah Jones, EAL Coordinator How do I pilot a new resource? There is a plethora of things to consider when piloting a new learning resource or […]
5th September 2018
How can you take your EAL department forward to play a part in a whole-school development strategy? Over the years, I have found that this can […]
13th July 2018
Download resource Author: Emma Mijailovic, EAL Teacher Many researchers agree that note-taking is an important skill, as it facilitates learning from text (Kobayashi 2006, Rahmani and […]
19th June 2018
Author: Gemma Fanning EAL Specialist Teacher Marking and feedback is a crucial part of any teacher’s workload, and is essential for EAL learners. The importance of […]
19th May 2018
Studies have found that learning a skill yourself, and then applying it, not only brings immense personal satisfaction (among other valuable benefits), but also leads to […]
15th April 2018
Author: Anita Bamberger The popularity of bilingual schools is increasing. This can be seen, for example, in the growing number of French schools in London, where […]
6th March 2018
Author: Gemma Fanning, EAL Specialist The term 21st Century skills is becoming significantly part of the classroom learning environment, but what exactly does that mean? There […]
3rd January 2018
Author: Sarah Jones, EAL Coordinator, Lea Forest Academy “One look is worth a thousand words.” Barnard (1921), Chinese proverb. Images are powerful as they can usually […]
7th December 2017
Dr Anne Margaret Smith Truly inclusive practice extends beyond adapting materials or managing the classroom so that everybody can access the course content. It is about […]
2nd November 2017
In my experience, teachers often have quite strong feelings about the use of a pupil’s L1 (first language) in the classroom – it is either encouraged […]
9th October 2017
Author: Gemma Fanning, EAL Specialist While it can be argued that EAL learners have an entitlement to experience a full and varied curriculum through complete class […]
23rd November 2013
//lifehacker.com/five-best-language-learning-tools-1448103513?utm_s…
23rd November 2013
//boingboing.net/2013/11/14/animated-history-of-the-englis.html Video:
24th November 2013
//boingboing.net/2013/11/21/the-noun-project-interview-wi.html
14th December 2013
If you have EAL new arrivals in your school with limited English, you need a scheme of work that supports them with language learning, alongside the […]
14th December 2013
Coming in the New Year… a series of articles with free downloadable teaching tools and resources! They will be written and produced by Jessica Tweedie. Jessica […]
20th December 2013
Coreen Sears gives us an insight into her thoughts… ‘The story of my life is who I am’ When Caroline asked me to write something about […]
21st December 2013
As a Head of Early Years in an international school following the EYFS and IPC curriculums it has always been important to ensure that the teaching […]
21st December 2013
Supporting the learning of the new language is by no means the only aspect of helping a new arrival to feel ‘at home’ in their new […]
21st December 2013
We’d love to hear from you! Where are they from? What langauge do they speak? Do you feel prepared!? Have a look at these videos of new arrivals and how […]
21st December 2013
This EAL Assessment booklet is produced by NASSEA (National Association of Support Services and Equality & Achievement) and provides a detailed scale which aligns to the National Curriculum: //nassea.org.uk/assessments/ An alternative […]
21st December 2013
Progression in Language Structures is a great document for identfying how content learning can be built on language structures. Language structures are presented in sentence starters […]
29th December 2013
Scenario: Imagine that you were told you were going to move to a new country (pick a country that has a different written script, such as China, […]