Innovations in English language teaching for migrants and refugees

to generate an interest in words and provide a collaborative learning environment
which encourages risk taking by EAL pupils.
Valuing home languages – Clare Wardman, Judith Bell and Emma Sharp
Clare and collegues describe the journey taken by Judith and Emma, two
monolingual class-teachers in north-west England, over 18 months as they complete
a postgraduate-level accredited teacher training course and reflect on the changes
it has brought to their classroom practices. In particular the chapter looks at what
Judith and Emma implemented in the school as a result: a ‘language-buddies’ scheme
and a ‘Pashto club’. They describe how this professional development activity
has significantly raised the confidence of the EAL workforce through increasing
understanding of second language acquisition and associated strategies for working
in heritage languages alongside English.
Secondary
Teaching and learning in diverse school contexts: the journeys
of three newly-arrived students – Dimitrina Kaneva
In this chapter we meet Dalmar, Toni and Rafael, three recently arrived migrant
children at an inner-city secondary school in the north-west of England catering
for over 900 students aged 11 to 16. EAL pupils comprise nearly 80 per cent of the
school population. Through a detailed account of their stories Dimitrina describes
the multiple models of support used by the school to meet the needs and learning
styles of students with EAL and discusses the impact of extreme diversity on the
organisation of teaching and learning resources at the school.
In search of the highest level of learner engagement: autobiographical
approaches with children and adults – Dina Mehmedbegović
Dina describes her efforts, as a teacher new to working with migrant and refugee
children, to develop an approach which could engage children at different levels of
English proficiency, and with different levels of literacy skills in any of the languages
they use. Although it is widely accepted that good teaching takes as its starting
point that children and adults in any classroom are the most valuable resources,
they are often overlooked and underutilised in teaching and learning processes.
All too often curriculum and teaching appear disconnected and irrelevant to
children’s lives. Dina explores the use of personal narratives with a Year 7 class
in a secondary school and encourages others to look for ways which will enable
them to exploit autobiographical approaches for the benefits of enhanced
participation, achievement and intercultural competencies.
Curriculum innovations for students learning EAL in mainstream state
secondary schools: a cross-curricular EAL pedagogy for teacher
development – Sara Green
Sara focuses on the professional development needs of teachers in secondary
schools through an exploration of content-language integration, defined as teaching
and learning subject content and English language at the same time. She describes
content-language integration in practice through the development of a range of
content-language integrated EAL courses and curriculum options and argues that
Introduction | 7