English Is An Additional Language Research Articles

Social work students with English as an additional language: examining written assessment feedback

ABSTRACT Little is known about what academics focus on when providing assessment feedback to international students for whom English is an additional language (EAL). This study examines written assessment feedback provided to 11 EAL-speaking international students throughout a two-year Master of Social Work programme and investigates their perspectives of this. Content analysis of written feedback revealed considerable variations in the volume, format and focus of feedback; this was also reflected in data provided by participants in interviews. Feedback was mainly content-focused, with a low chance of wider transferability, while language and academic skills had a limited focus. Participants’ attitude toward feedback and their reported engagement with it is in alignment with the process view of feedback. This study concludes with suggestions to further facilitate student engagement with feedback and improve consistency across the Social Work programme.

Creating Contexts in Engineering Research Writing Using a Problem-Solution-Based Writing Model: Experience of Ph.D. Students

Background: The ability to create a context is essential in writing the introduction of a research article (RA). This study explores the experience of engineering Ph.D. students in Australia, for whom English is an Additional Language (EAL), in using a problem-solution-based writing model to develop context-creating skills in writing RA introductions. Research question: What is the experience of engineering Ph.D. students in creating contexts through explicit learning of a problem-solution-based model for writing RA introductions? Literature review: Genre-based teaching is a common approach in the second language classroom. Recently, a genre-based approach for writing the introduction of engineering RAs has been proposed. The descriptive values of the model, PSP-CaRS, have been shown in corpus studies of published engineering RAs. However, its applicability has not been explored pedagogically. Methodology: Twenty-nine Ph.D. students were asked to respond to a questionnaire nine months after learning the model and reflect on their experience using it. The findings were then corroborated with data obtained from interviews, researcher observation, and writing samples. Results: The findings showed that the participants perceived PSP-CaRS to be useful and they continued using it after nine months despite some difficulties encountered in the writing process. Participants' responses showed that explicit teaching of PSP-CaRS formed the foundation upon which more competent skills to create contexts were developed through practice and integration of subject knowledge. Discussion: Explicit teaching using a model can impart the basics of genre awareness to students. Once students gained an in-depth understanding of the model by working through their difficulties, they developed better genre awareness, and used the model adaptively to visualize and write their RA introductions. Conclusion: The results confirm the usefulness of the proposed model and reveal how a continuing process of learning and practicing using the model helps students develop their skills to create contexts and enhance their genre awareness.

The assessment of individuals for whom English is an additional language (EAL) and/or where there is a complex linguistic history – new SASC Guidance (2019)

The assessment of individuals for whom English is an additional language (EAL) and/or where there is a complex linguistic history – new SASC Guidance (2019)

Towards School Leadership Development: The Essence of Working with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Newcomer Families in Saskatchewan

The article is based on a study whose purpose was to examine the lived experience of school leaders in Saskatoon with newcomers to whom English is an additional Language (EAL). Phenomenology as a methodological approach was used to gather and analyze data from leaders representing two school divisions. What was common in their accounts was synthesized to establish the essence of the leaders’ experience with EAL newcomers. Findings revealed that the nature of the experience manifests as a celebration, a learning opportunity and as a challenge. Its essence requires school leaders to have knowledge, skills and dispositions for acknowledging and responding appropriately to difference and the associated stereotypes, cultural diversity with its infinite variations, relations between dominant and minority cultures, the role of parents, communities and inter-organizational partnerships in school leaders-newcomer relationship. The essence also calls for school leaders to have self-knowledge, to be more reflective, and to embrace cognitive dissonance as learning opportunities.

Found in translation: How brokering practices support international students' learning

Research on international students for whom English is an additional language (EAL) tend to focus on their lack of language proficiency and active participation in the classroom. However, examining their informal learning practices such as brokering provides an opportunity to understand how international EAL students respond to academic demands on their own terms. This article reports on first-year international university students’ informal help-seeking interactions with brokers, many of whom who were able to bridge both language and knowledge gaps. Language brokering, literacy brokering, and resource brokering are highlighted as different types of brokering which deal with different aspects of academic learning. Among the range of brokering practices, peer brokering stands out as an important form of academic support. Thus, educators and administrators alike should consider enhancing opportunities for international students to build social connections with potential brokers .

Navigating scholarly writing and international publishing: Individual agency of Taiwanese EAL doctoral students

Although previous research has examined the academic writing and publishing endeavors of scholars whose English is an additional language (EAL), very few studies have focused on the role of agency in international publishing among multilingual doctoral students. This study addressed this gap by exploring how novice EAL doctoral scholars exercise agency to negotiate for fuller participation in their learning to write for publication and how they tackle exigencies arising from the writing-for-publication processes. The participants were nineteen EAL doctoral students and four professors in the hard sciences from different institutions in Taiwan and the US. Findings showed that most participants as active agents managed to overcome the exigencies by resorting to various strategies, such as seeking mutual engagement in manuscript drafting and taking initiative to negotiate with advisors regarding different directions of revision before and after submission. Many students were found to maneuver different submission strategies to fulfill the international publishing requirements, specified by their respective institutions. Several participants also successfully coped with difficulties in scholarly publishing when only limited advisory guidance was available. The conclusion outlines implications for academic advisors and EAP professionals. Suggestions for future research are also discussed.

Becoming an applied linguist

The need to establish an authorial identity in academic discourse has been considered to be critical for all doctoral students by academic writing teachers and researchers for some time. For students for whom English is an additional language (EAL) in particular, the challenges are not only how to communicate this identity effectively in English, but also how to develop from a writer who simply ventriloquizes the voices of scholarly others to an author who writes with authority and discipline-specific rhetorical knowledge. In the current project, we explored how three EAL students constructed authorial voices through the use of personal and impersonal forms of self-representation and evaluative stance in the Introduction sections of their written PhD Confirmation Reports. Our findings indicate that students combined a complex range of linguistic and rhetorical resources, such as integral and non-integral attribution of sources and attitudinal markers of stance, in their quest to project credible authorial identities as Applied Linguists. We also discovered the effect of these resources on readers to be cumulative. We recommend further research, including interviews with students, supervisors and examiners from across the disciplines, to explore and extend the scope of the present study.

Expert opinion: Assessing cochlear implant candidacy and progress for people with English as an additional language

Special considerations relating to cochlear implants (CIs) are necessary for deaf people for whom English is an additional language (EAL). The audiological and pre-linguistic skills criteria for CI candidacy are the same for children with EAL as for children from English-speaking families. However, thorough assessment is not straightforward, for example, requiring employment of experienced interpreters. To ensure family engagement and thus appropriate support in the home, clear understanding of the family's social and cultural framework and of their needs and requirements is essential. Equally, the family must be enabled to understand the implications of CI. Additional training of staff in CI teams may be needed. This article will address these and other issues for children and also consider the situation for adults.

Supporting EAL children in the early years setting

Bianca Bailey discusses how a positive attitude towards linguistic diversity can make a big difference in your work with children for whom English is an Additional Language (EAL).

Supporting the Language and Learning Development of EAL Students in Australian Higher Education

The role of learning advising in improving the educational outcomes of students for whom English is an additional language (EAL) in Australian universities has received significant attention in recent years. A combination of research findings, governmental pressure and media scrutiny has provided renewed impetus for universities to address issues of language proficiency and academic literacy amongst the growing population of onshore international students for whom English is an additional language (EAL). In this paper, I discuss the role of academic language and learning advising in the Australian university context, including how this practice is influenced by a range of political, pedagogical and practical factors. In doing so, I draw on Carson and Mynard’s (2012) analysis of the aims, practices, skills, locations and discourses of advising in language learning to explore how the two fields might inform each other.

Factors influencing the performance of English as an Additional Language nursing students: instructors’ perspectives

The increasing number of immigrants in Canada has led to more nursing students for whom English is an additional language (EAL). Limited language skills, cultural differences, and a lack of support can pose special challenges for these students and the instructors who teach them. Using a qualitative research methodology, in-depth interviews with fourteen EAL nursing students and two focus group interviews with nine instructors were conducted. In this paper, the instructors' perspectives are presented. Data acquired from the instructors suggest that the challenges experienced by EAL students and instructors reside in a lack of awareness and support at the institutional and structural levels rather than solely on capacities of individual EAL students or instructors. From this study, identification of supportive activities for nurse educators and education sector decision makers emerged.

Using the Barnes Language Assessment with older ethnic minority groups

There are many issues concerning the assessment of older people from ethnic minority groups, the most significant being the language barrier experienced by those whose English is an additional language (EAL). This study aimed to test the hypothesis that EAL participants would score less well than those with English as a first language (EFL) on the sub-tests of the Barnes Language Assessment (BLA), elucidate the reasons for any such differences and discuss the implications. The Barnes Language Assessment (BLA) is an accurate tool providing information about expected patterns of language in different dementia syndromes. This study compares the performance of EAL participants with EFL participants. The BLA was administered to 144 participants, divided into sub-groups with respect to age, gender and educational background, none of whom had a working diagnosis of dementia. Results suggest that EAL speakers performed less well compared to EFL speakers when other variables were matched. Significantly better BLA scores, at the one percent level, were found in both EAL and EFL groups with higher educational achievement for eight of the 15 sub-tests. Differences were found in performance on the BLA between EAL and EFL participants. The degree of difference between EAL and EFL speakers decreased as educational achievement rose. The consequences of these findings for service delivery and the problems of recruitment of older EAL participants are discussed.

Interactions between a deaf child for whom English is an additional language and his specialist teacher in the first year at school: Combining words and gestures

This paper provides a description of the interactions between a nursery‐aged prelingually deaf child and his specialist teacher recorded at four consecutive time points during the first year at school. The child comes from a hearing, Somali‐speaking family where English is an additional language (EAL). Using Conversation Analysis procedures, findings show how, with the teacher's support, the deaf child accomplishes ‘multi‐element’ turns (that is, turns in which semantic referents are combined using words and gestures—‘elements’) within and across time points. Gestures remain an essential feature of the child's communication at all times. The teacher's prior and next turns create and support language learning opportunities for the child, and this support is continually adjusted in response to the child's turns. It is suggested that these sequences of talk are an important mechanism driving the child's learning of spoken English.

Good practice for pupils learning English as an additional language: Lessons from effective literacy teachers in inner-city primary schools

This article presents observations and discussion of the successful teaching of English to pupils, in English primary schools, for whom English is an additional language (EAL). It draws on research in Year 2 (6—7-year old) classes in three inner-city primary schools carried out in 2003 and 2005. Three recognized, effective teachers of literacy were selected for case study; all worked in successful schools where results for literacy, measured by national tests, were in line with or better than national averages. Following analyses of lesson observations and interviews with the teachers, their head teachers and the EAL coordinators in the schools, a number of common elements in their practice emerged. Discussion centres on how these pedagogical features supported effective learning environments for the early literacy development of bilingual children, and on the implications for the practice of teaching English to all pupils.

Mum and Dad prefer me to speak Bengali at home: code switching and parallel speech in a primary school setting

AbstractAlthough it contains a statutory inclusion statement, England's National Curriculum “hardly acknowledges the learning practices of different minority groups” (Gregory and Williams, 2003, p. 103). Through observation and interview, this study examines the repertoire of languages that six children for whom English is an additional language (EAL) choose to use at home and in their primary school settings in the West of England. The study bears out and extends previous research, which indicates that children from various ethnic backgrounds are involved in a struggle where they construct and reconstruct their identities according to the social situations they find themselves in. In addition to code switching between languages, the study reports on children using ‘bilingual parallel speech’, an unresearched practice. It shows that there may be a tension between schools' efforts to build upon the children's use of the home language and the children's reluctance to use it in a school setting, where the dominant institutional language is English, and where they would prefer to appear ‘like everyone else’. Social capital would appear to be an important factor affecting children's use of language and this may make them reluctant to maintain and develop their home language. Schools may need to consider strategies that value bilingual children's commonality with the school culture.

Does educational integrity mean teaching students NOT to 'use their own words'?

In the face of increasing evidence of plagiarism in higher education the maintenance of educational integrity relies on the capacity of universities to strengthen their systems for consistent detection of and penalties for deliberate
 plagiarism, cheating and other fraudulent practices. However, there is a danger that the resolve to do so may be weakened if these systems become overloaded by the detection of a high incidence of unintentional plagiarism. The focus of
 this paper is on international students for whom English is an additional language (EAL) and whose plagiarism is most easily recognised, as many set out on their degree courses with no experience in a Western academic environment, an unsteady command of English grammar and a relatively limited range of
 vocabulary. The advice to 'use their own words' in order to avoid accidental plagiarism may be more confusing than helpful for them. This paper proposes that far from trapping students in their existing repertoire of words, the teaching,
 assessment and feedback advice provided within university courses should explicitly support their students' development of the formal language that is valued in academic writing. It is suggested that the basis for doing so is an understanding of the essential differences between informal, spoken language
 and the more formal style required in written assignments. An educational approach that successfully removes innocent plagiarists from the disciplinary system could become a means for assuring a university's educational integrity.
 Keywords: plagiarism, 'own words', spoken and written language, re-usable language, international students, English as an Additional Language (EAL).

Implementing an inclusion policy in a primary school: findings and recommendations from a case study approach®

This article is based on a case study carried out in a small inner-city primary school in the English south midlands. The key determinant of the research was to examine the factors affecting the progress of children in the school, assess the school's response and to make recommendations that would enhance good practice and undertake responsibilities under the Race Relations Act (2000). The focal point was children for whom English is an additional language (EAL). This article considers the relevance of such a study in gathering the views of EAL and minority ethnic parents, carers and professionals and how far it could be utilized by any school as part of a regular check to determine how well it is providing for their children.