Induction for Pupils with EAL
A well-planned, welcoming induction is essential for pupils with EAL and their families.
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The resources in this section provide ideas for this, including induction packs from different authorities.
Some of these are quite dated but still provide valuable advice, information and resources.
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Here is an extract from Virginia’s book, which might be a useful starting point for staff meetings - getting the conversation going around support for new arrivals:
Establishing a welcoming ethos
New arrivals with EAL into your school and classroom need an effective welcome and induction which allows them to feel safe, secure and, ultimately, able to participate in the learning.
This ethos needs to be adopted by everybody in the school – it is not enough for one or two teachers to embrace it.
Rather than seeing children with EAL as a problem to deal with, think of the positive contributions they can make to your classroom in terms of language, culture, experience, different perspectives, geographical knowledge and so forth.
Innovative ways to provide initial support for newcomers needs to extend into everyday whole school practices; in this way a truly multicultural, multilingual environment can emerge.
Enabling children to both learn a new language and learn to learn in that language needs to be rationalised far beyond the imposed necessity of children making acceptable ‘levels’ of progress – the linear nature of which is neither useful nor equitable and will likely mean that any opportunities for cultural and linguistic interchange will be missed.
Instead, learning for children with EAL needs to be more focused on equipping them with the tools to fit into an alien landscape where they can feel safe to observe, question, socialise, play and – therefore – learn.
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Extract from Bower, V. (2017) Supporting Pupils with EAL in the Primary Classroom Maidenhead: Open University Press
These induction packs might be useful to support with developing your own induction materials, relevant to your setting:
These 2 documents contain a wide range of useful ideas, many of which might form the basis for staff meetings or development sessions with colleagues:
It is useful to have a checklist for new arrivals, as well as a form to complete, providing basic information. The document below is a good starting point:
A powerful way of ensuring new arrivals feel they belong to the school is by providing a welcome box. Here are some ideas of what you might include in the welcome box:
