Ein Wegweiser für Schulen zur Förderung der Schulsprache(n)

So as to help migrant students access the curriculum in every subject, all teachers need to guide the students in relation to the most important items of vocabulary they need to learn for each topic in each subject. These keywords should be identified by the teacher for each new topic being presented and should be displayed on the IWB, whiteboard, poster or flipchart for the duration of each lesson. Keywords should be succinctly explained using sample sentences as well as definitions. Once the words are identified, they should be USED and recycled by both the teacher (to model how to use them correctly) and students (in pairwork/groupwork activities) throughout the lesson. By being explicit about the language of their subject, teachers are supporting the language and literacy development of all students. See video link below to see how this iniative is being implemented.

Tools and resources necessary to implement the idea:
Text books/devices, IWB, posters

Added value:
Easy to implement across all subjects. Supports ALL students equally – especially those native speakers who have low levels of literacy. This initiative represents good teaching practice.

TIPS to better implement the promising practice:
When planning lessons, teachers should routinely screen subject materials for language which students need to know and steer them around language they don’t need to know to ensure migrant students’ efforts in vocabulary learning are focussed and maximised.

Policy or theoretical background:
All teachers are language teachers.

Link: www.elsp.ie (subject-specific language development worksheets to support migrant students who do not have much English. Resources developed by Trinity College, Dublin)

Link: 5 minute video explaining concept and implementation in a school

Students are led to produce texts (written, spoken, visual, musical, or combinations in multimodal form) in which their identity is reflected in a positive light. Students invest their identities in these texts, and when they share the texts with multiple audiences (peers, teachers, sister classes etc) they are likely to receive positive feedback and develop their self-confidence when interacting with these audiences. This approach can be implemented in the Language of schooling / Students’ first language, mother tongue, second language, third language.

Tools and resources necessary to implement the idea:
Paper, scissors, crayons

Added value:
Easy to implement across all subjects. Parents and local media can be involved in the project.

TIPS to better implement the promising practice:
When planning lessons, teachers should routinely screen subject materials for language which students need to know and steer them around language they don’t need to know to ensure migrant students’ efforts in vocabulary learning are focussed and maximised.

Link: www.luc.edu (Cohen-Identity Texts)

This activity enables students to work in groups in order to solve a puzzle together. They will need to hypthesise, come up with a major solution, a minor solution and a conclusion. The groups discuss the findings and write minutes. This activity requires argumentation and will make students resort to a constructed dialogue thus developing their higher cognitive functions.

Tools and resources necessary to implement the idea:
copy from the textbook, crayons

Added value:
support all students equally.

TIPS to better implement the promising practice:
cf. longer description

Policy or theoretical background:
Projekt ‘Förderung der Unterrichtssprachen’ Pädagogische Hochschule St. Gallen (PHSG)

These training modules are set up in schools and are based on co-observation between teachers. The objective is to enable teachers to: - understand the challenges of the language of schooling; - develop in students the ability to mobilise a varied semiotic repertoire - help students develop the same varied semiotic repertoire in reception, mediation and production .

Added value:
Develops teacher collaboration and their understanding of the importance of the language dimension in each subject.

TIPS to better implement the promising practice:
First step :Alternate between co-observation and analysis of professional practice Second step :set up training modules with theorical background.Make sure everybody has a clear understanding of the observation grid. Feel free to adapt the grid to your needs.

Policy or theoretical background:
The language dimension in all subjects - A handbook for curriculum development and teacher training (2016) Jean-Claude Beacco, Mike Fleming, Francis Goullier, Eike Thürmann, Helmut Vollmer, with contributions by Joseph Sheils

This promising practice is extracted from the following ECML project:
Learning environments where modern languages flourish (2016-2019)

Here are some examples of ways to implement the ideas expressed by Toshinobu Nagamine (2014) in his article entitled “Emotionality and language learning: Forging bonds by sharing emotions”. Nagamine states that a new focus by teachers on emotions is necessary to strengthen bonds in the classroom to improve foreign language learning. At the International School of Bergen (Norway), students are allowed to use their own native languages in the first learning phases in order to build their confidence and to scaffold their learning.

Added value:
Classroom application of a theoretical article

Policy or theoretical background:
Nagamine, T. (2014). Emotionality and language learning: Forging bonds by sharing emotions. ELTWorldOnline.com, Special Issue on Bonding, 1-10.

Link: www.bbc.com (The best age to learn a foreign language)

Students produce texts (written, spoken, visual, musical, or combinations in multimodal form) in which students’ identity is reflected in a positive light. Students invest their identities in these texts, and when they share texts with multiple audiences (peers, teachers, sister classes etc) they are likely to receive positive feedback and affirmation of their own self iwhen interacting with these audiences.

Link: www.luc.edu (Cohen-Identity Texts)

Link: www.curriculum.org (ELL identity Texts)

The aim of this programme is to aid newly arrived children to participate as quickly as possible in all aspects of state secondary general schooling and enhance their knowledge and skills in the language of schooling. To do so, children with a migrant background are placed in general classes and attend lessons 19 periods per week, according to the timetable of their grade. At the same time, these children attend intensive lessons on the language of schooling, 14 periods per week. Extra 5 teaching periods are also provided for support in Mathematics and Natural Sciences, especially in relation to terminology and core knowledge.

Teachers with students who have a first language which is different from the language(s) of schooling will get further insight into how the language of schooling is taught. Students will be a part of this session to give a more concrete picture of their own experiences of studying the language of schooling, which for many is their mother-tongue. This session will focus on the importance of mother tongue tuition for further language development of language(s) of schooling. This will be a starting point for initiating further cooperation with teachers from various schools that teach students with a first language which is different from the language(s) of schooling

Teachers will arrange the Day of Foreign Cultures / The Tower of Babel Day when newcomer families will have a chance to present their culture in an informal atmosphere. Students will pick up new words, taste foreign food. The workshops will be extended to other foreign guests available at that time even though their languages are not represented currently at school.

Added value:
Helps set up a positive and open-minded atmoshere in the school

Link: 26-September - Celebrate the European Day of Languages with us

Every week students who are native speakers of the school language meet with new students who need to improve their skills in the language of schooling in informal ways under the leadership of the school/local librarians. In these meetings they play different kinds of language games, talk about fiction (books, literature, movies), topics of the day and discuss all types of language issues that new students encounter in daily and school life. The meetings are voluntary for all people involved and are organised at the school of the students to make them easily accessible. These meetings are named ‘Language Pub’ to stress the informal, free character of these meetings.

Tools and resources necessary to implement the idea:
Digital and non-digital language games, internet connection, free access/ membership to library, students’ own lesson materials

Added value:
Newcomer students build a network within the native speakers community; Newcomer students get easy access to the library; Native speaker students achieve a better understanding of newcomer students to improve integration; Native speaker students develop their skills in communication, language and good citizenship; Librarians get in contact with important target group (students, but indirectly also their family members and friends).