As noted by Bowes and Grace (2009, p.

152) Refugees in Australia come from many

different regions of the world, hold different cultural beliefs, speak many different languages
and observe different religions. Some are highly educated, some non-literate in any
language. This was also true of the children in my class. Having spent much of my time
working with the three EAL children on my placement days, I feel I have gained a great
insight into the diversity of the classroom. Working with these three Students forced me to
reflect and re-evaluate my practice consistently. This was challenging but also allowed me to
extend myself beyond what I might have otherwise learned through research and discussion
with my associate teacher about strategies and standards. The main trap I found working with
these children was that in the beginning I lowered my expectations of what they could
achieve. Upon reflection I realised that they were capable of the things their class mates were
doing, and it was my own explanations and vocabulary that were hindering their progress.
These teaching strategies provide a range of practical ways of supporting the English learning
of EAL students. Each of the listed strategies identifies the dimension/s on which it is focused
(Speaking and Listening, Reading, Writing), the EAL stages for which it is most useful, its purpose, the
steps involved in using it, and how it is particularly helpful for EAL students. DEECD
DEECD suggested Strategies for working with EAL students attempted

to try

Student backgrounds:
C. (Thai) 9

P. (Malaysian) 9

N. (Thai) 10

S. (French) 9

Immigrant 1 yr

Immigrant 1 yr

Immigrant 3 yrs

immigrant 18mnths

Listening

Listening

Reading

Reading

Pronunciation

Spelling

Listening

Grammar

Grammar

Literacy Strengths:
Grammar

Literacy Weaknesses:
Spelling

Grammar

Spelling

Listening

Pronunciation

Spelling

Reading

Pronunciation

Pronunciation
Reading

Strategy
Listening cloze

Test
ed

Opinion
Students have a text with some words deleted
as in a regular cloze activity. Need to fill in

missing words Activity worked well with

students (P., C., & N.) all student were
able to tell/find appropriate words to fill
in the blank spaces. Activity was read to
P. and N. to assist them with the reading
aspect of the task, making successful
completion more attainable.

Reaching a
consensus

In all these above scenarios, students initially

will come up with their own individual list or
decision, usually in writing. Then they join with
a partner to come up with an agreed list, then
join another pair and negotiate to consensus
for the whole group of four.

Barrier games

Students work in pairs. One student has a

complete map, drawing, table or graph, and
the other has just the outline with some
information filled in. The student with the
complete map tells the other student where to
place things on his or her map. The student
with the incomplete map can ask questions to
help place things as precisely as possible.
Students played a modified version of
this game with all students participating,
EAL or not. The more frequently we used
this strategy the better the students
became at getting their message across
as they became more specific about
directions. Students improved on their
listening skills from the EAL/ESL group.

Dictogloss

Dictogloss promotes output that is focused on

form. It encourages both bottom up and top
down processing strategies. making
predictions making inferences identifying
the topic of the text identifying the text type
identifying various sorts of semantic
relationships in the text. Students worked
on with this strategy several times a
week with readings such as patch parker
or eliza bird. Students made progress in
identifying the text type and making
prediction about the text (using pictures).

Running
dictation

This activity is often used to inject some fun

into the learning, or to enliven a tired class. It
can also be useful for introducing a new theme
or topic or to focus on a particular grammatical
point. -

Pair dictation

For the speaker, it encourages better

pronunciation. For the hearer, it is good for
listening practice as it really forces students to
pay attention to what they are hearing. - In this
activity, students work in pairs to complete a
list or a text.

Language
experience

Language experience is a strategy that is best

used with lower primary students and older
students who are beginning to develop their
literacy skills. Involve students in activities to
generate talk about the event, for example,
take photos for students to talk about, have
students draw about the experience, ask
guiding questions about the experience.
Students responded well with this
activity developing speaking, listening,
speaking and writing skills over my time
with this group. Particularly
pronunciation improved by reading out
loud to partners and small groups.

Role Play

In a role play, students do not play themselves;

they are assigned a role to play as if they were
that person students worked with varying
versions of this technique with varying
results. Was more effective when
students were working with values and
personalities/ personal traits, rather than
the use in SOSE/HSIE lessons.

Picture stories

For students in upper primary and lower

secondary, this can be a good task to use for
revision of concepts in history or science. The
activity is also helpful in getting students to
think logically, and to think about the idea of
sequence and the need for time markers

Surveys

Questionnaires are useful for scaffolding oral

language, as they give both the questioner and

the respondent something meaningful to say.

Some questionnaires will also enable repetitive
patterns to be practised in a meaningful
context

Tell me

Tell me is a booktalk strategy which involves

individuals thinking about fictional texts,
sharing their ideas with a group, and listening
and responding to what others think. - helps
students to make text to self, text to text and
text to world connections.

Scaffolding
writing

The building knowledge of the field stage

helps them to either develop new concepts, or
else map already acquired concepts on to their
new language, English. The extra scaffolding
suggested will help students without literacy in
English to move forward in their quest to
acquire these skills.

Deconstruction

Text deconstruction explores the social

contexts in which texts are written, the social
purpose of texts (e.g. to inform, to persuade)
and involves explicit teaching about the
structural organisation and linguistic features
of text types. - exposes students to the text
types which are part of the school curriculum
develops the students metalanguage, that is,
a language to talk about language

Joint
construction

Joint construction involves the teacher and

students working together to collaboratively
construct a text. The teacher scaffolds the
students through questions, thinking aloud,
explanations etc, as they write the text
together.

Shared reading

Shared reading can be used with small groups

or a whole class group. It provides a nonthreatening context in which the reading
process can be modelled and the use of
effective reading strategies can be
encouraged. - This worked well with the
students in that they were able to
scaffold each other and allowed them to
feel comfortable in our small group of

learners each day. Students responded

particularly well when prompted with
questions and I wonder scenarios.

Guided reading

Guided reading is a small group activity where

the teacher helps students to practise
strategies to read a text independently. Texts
chosen for guided reading need to be at an
appropriate level that will provide the
necessary supports and challenges for the
students as they read the text. The topics of
the texts should also be familiar and of interest
to the students. This worked well with the
students feeling comfortable in small
groups of learners working on skills to
improve reading, spelling and speaking
each day. Students responded
particularly well when allowed to use
their own favourite strategy.

Reciprocal
teaching

Reciprocal teaching involves four roles, which

need to be modelled for the students over a
number of teaching sessions before the
students can be expected to adopt the roles.
The four roles are Questioner, Clarifier,
Predictor and Summariser. As the students
enact these roles, they are practising the
comprehension strategies of questioning,
clarifying, predicting and summarising as they
engage in a structured dialogue about the
selected text.

Reading to

Reading aloud to ESL students provides them

with a strong and purposeful model of what
reading aloud in English sounds like. It also
promotes reading as a pleasurable activity. A
variety of text types can be used for the
teacher to read aloud to promote an
understanding of the similarities and
differences between how different texts types
can be read. This was useful with EAL/ESL
students as it gave them an opportunity
to hear their own pronunciation of the
reading and pick up their own mistakes.

This was also highly effective with nonEAL students in improving reading and
pronunciation of the text