EAL
English Addition Language (EAL) Learners are a diverse group. The Department of Education and Training defines a student as EAL if they are:
- beginning school with minimal or no exposure to English, born overseas or in Australia
- entering school with little or no exposure to English, but with schooling equivalent to that received by their chronological peers in English
- entering school with little or no exposure to English, but with little or no previous formal schooling
- entering school with some exposure to English, spoken and/or written
Hartwell Primary school is a wonderful Multicultural Learning Environment and is committed to building a strong partnership with families. We appreciate that there are cultural differences to embrace and variances in education systems around the world. We have structures in place to welcome and involve new families into our community.
Our English Additional Language Coordinator and LOTE teachers support classroom teachers to cater for English learners in their mainstream classroom. We use a variety of teaching strategies, resources and task differentiation to ensure students can access tasks and develop their English skills. Small group sessions are also offered where appropriate to assist students in refining their linguistic abilities in a small supportive group with a language teacher.
We view language learning as a journey where students need to be exposed to high quality oral and written language where both informal and formal English communication can be learned and practiced. Where appropriate, students learning English will be reported on using the EAL standards to ensure that the effort and progression of their learning can be clearly demonstrated.
We offer a WeChat group for Mandarin speaking families to access our translated newsletters. This ensures a platform for some non-English speaking parents and carers to access school communication and develop a sense of belonging to our school. We continue to assess our demographic and are responsive in creating opportunities for all cultures as needs arise.
