Good practice checklist
How to support EAL pupils and plan for language development in a classroom environment
When planning for language development for children with EAL you need to ask yourself:
- What are the language difficulties in this unit?
- What can this unit do to develop language skills?
All classrooms should have the following:
- Examples of first or dual language materials — classroom labels and signs in English and other languages appropriate to your class.
- Guidelines for talk, or version of display to support listening and speaking objectives and activities.
- Vocabulary boards in zones — maths, science and literacy.
- In zones — examples of sentence starters and language structures.
- A 'spotlight on' board for specifically focussed language or vocabulary. For example, topic based, idioms, similies, metaphors etc.
- EAL strategies for supporting pupils (see above).
- World map showing where children in class are from and languages spoken.
- School rules in other languages, if possible.
- Reading materials and dictionaries in other languages, as appropriate.
- Displayed materials to reflect cultures in