The importance of integrating a whole school approach to EAL inclusion, beyond the scope of the EAL coordinator.

This is a common phrase I hear when communicating with schools and discussing their existing EAL provision, and it's a difficult one to respond to, because in my opinion, this attitude is problematic.

Yes, an EAL coordinator is a fantastic start, but asking one person to transform the whole school culture and subject-wide practice is, if I’m really honest, beyond the pay scale of an EAL coordinator

Having been an EAL coordinator for a number of years, I found myself during this time working day in, day out, striving to support the students within my care to access the learning across the curriculum and thrive at our school. I offered weekly drop-ins for staff to swing by my office for support on differentiating for specific learners; I ran breakfast intervention in the dining hall; I ran parent workshops and whole school CPD, whilst also doing everything that I could to ensure that the mainstream English curriculum was as robust as possible in terms of teaching students how to read, writing and communicate in English.

Looking at the cohort of students that I was working with, I’d rack my brains thinking, “there must be something else I can do”, another piece to the puzzle that I was missing. Perhaps something that could be learnt in another training day or by reading another OFSTED good practice model.

Finding the missing piece, fortunately, came from my headteacher at the time who said, “it’s got to be a whole school approach”: in order to see the results that we want to see, we have to get everybody on board with planning and creating a curriculum that enables all students to thrive, regardless of the level of their English language proficiency.

Relief.

Whilst I was playing an important part within this whole school picture, it wasn’t just down to me, not just my responsibility, a perspective that changed my entire viewpoint on what it means to be a successful EAL coordinator.

So yes, as an EAL coordinator and head of English, it was my responsibility to:

• model inclusive practice in the mainstream;
• develop an English curriculum that established the foundations of reading, writing and communicating in English;
• share examples of how I had supported EAL students in my lessons;
• plan intervention lessons that ensured excellent progress was made there;
• share strategies with parents to help them support their child at home; and
• monitor and conduct timely intervention with students who weren’t making progress.

But there was a lot of work to be done in the whole school that I’d need (at least) another pair of hands with, such as:

• shifting the mindset of all teachers about it being everybody’s responsibility to deliver an inclusive curriculum;
• rewriting long and medium term schemes of work to ensure all teachers provide adaptive teaching across the curriculum;
• explicitly and effectively developing comprehension of the core academic language across the curriculum;
• providing subject-specific scaffolds for daily lesson use to ensure all students achieve their potential academically across the curriculum;
• and everything else that comes with evaluating, planning, creating and embedding a whole school approach to inclusion and language for learning.

So yes, a well-trained, experienced and knowledgeable EAL coordinator with a vision for improvement and excellent relationships with students and staff is important, crucial in your whole school EAL development plan. But expecting the EAL coordinator to affect and maintain change to the whole school culture and practice is too big an ask for just one person.

So what can schools do when they already have a fantastic EAL coordinator in place?

• Identify a team of staff: senior and middle leaders as well as teachers from different subjects who can work alongside your EAL coordinator on your whole school approach.
• Conduct an in-depth evaluation of your existing provision to ensure you’re celebrating the strengths and identifying the correct target areas. And make this evaluation as interactive as possible - through learning walks; student, parent and staff voice; looking at student work; as well as looking at progress data across the curriculum.
• Evaluate your existing whole school plans - long, medium and short term planning and what this looks like day-to-day, as well as how it is adapted across different lessons to ensure all students gain the knowledge and skills they have come there to learn.
• Don’t just get an generic “EAL CPD” day booked in - use your evaluation findings to find someone with the appropriate hands-on experience to create a programme of professional learning that meets your school’s needs, rather than getting all staff to sit through an “off the shelf” training day that simply goes back over the basics of differentiation.
• Make it a two or three year plan - Rome wasn’t built in a day and your outstanding whole-school approach to EAL won’t be created or established in one term, or even one academic year. This is an investment that, if implemented correctly, will enable you to make a profound impact on the progress and English language development of the learners in your care for many years to come.

If you need support with this, I’d love to be able to help.

I’m now conducting in-person EAL evaluations, coaching and training, taking some of the load from busy EAL coordinators and SLT who have been trying to do this solo.

If you’re not sure if this is the right time or idea for your school, send me an email or book a free consultation slot via my website and we’ll talk about the tangible steps that you can make this year to start making a difference.