EAL

At Linthorpe Community Primary School we are proud to be a school that welcomes and celebrates diversity. We currently have 40% of pupils who are regarded as having English as an Additional Language (EAL). A pupil’s first language is not English when the pupil has been brought up using a language other than English during early development, and continues to be exposed to this language in the home or in the community. There are actually over 25 different languages spoken by the families in our school. It is for this reason that developing our pupils’ English vocabulary is a strong focus across school.

EAL pupils are seen to benefit from the ability to live and learn in more than one language. We strive to recognise, welcome and celebrate linguistic and cultural diversity and have a high expectation of all pupils regardless of ethnic, cultural or linguistic heritage. We aim to include all pupils and parents/carers in our school by respecting that diversity and reflecting it in our school environment, curriculum, learning resources and partnership with parents/carers.

We have a whole school approach to supporting our EAL pupils. The curriculum has been created to ensure all children are given the opportunity to acquire the skills needed to be successful. Our staff are equipped with the knowledge and expertise to support children to learn, develop and apply new vocabulary and develop sentence structures.

We view first languages as an asset and we encourage pupils to remain proud of their languages whilst they are learning English.

Linthorpe Community Primary School uses the NASSEA framework to assess its EAL learners.