Esl

[Guest]

hi! I have a child starting in my Reception class this September who only speaks Italian. If anyone has any ideas how I can help her settle, pick up English quickly I would really appreciate it. Is she entitled to any outside support - interpreter??

Many thanks,

 

Angie

[Guest]

Hi Angie

We had a German girl start with us two years ago. She had no English at all and was very upset when she first started with us but no more than some of the English speaking children we have had. One of our staff had very basic German and used this to gain her confidence. Over the two years she was with us her English came on in leaps and bounds-we didn't do anything just talked to her and she picked it up very quickly.

Ask her parents to give you some basic words to use with her-hello, goodbye, toilets, how are you? etc. I doubt you will be able to access any extra help for her. But I think you will be amazed how quickly she adapts and learns English.

Linda

[mundia]

I agree with Linda there Angie, children pick up lanaguegs reamarkably quickly when they are immersed in it. Our daughter was brought up and schooled in a foriegn language from the age of 4, but was fluent in her frist Afrikan languge within 6 months simply becuase none of her friends spoke English.

 

Use gestures and symbols to begin with as you need to, but once she makes some friends, her english should improve very quickly. I dont think you wil get additional support for her unless there are any obvious special needs. It may help for oyu to find out from parenst what her Italian is like? We usually find that our childre (we are 100% EAL) learn English quickly if their home language is very good.

[Guest]

Thank you for your responses! Feeling more confident now.

 

Kind regards

 

Angie

[Inge]

we often have children who have little or no english. we are lucky enough to have an ethinic minority support group who work in this area and give guidelines and help with both children and parents. We find they quickly lear the second language, particularly those who speak fluently and well in thier mother tongue.

 

Ask parents for key words, use pictures and signs or symbols in conjuction with the english words, a little as you would with a child who speaks very little. we ahve also been advised to ensure we let them know we value thier language as much as english, we have often taught songs in the appropriate language to all children, head shouldrers knees and toes usually works well and has actions which are very easy to follow. Must admit sounded very odd singing it but all the chidren really enjoyed the experience.

 

we also included some numbers in both languages, we made number books with the children in dual languages, amazing how much the children learnt. Our current problem is with the number of languages, 4 different ones, but all progressed well.

 

To help we labelled areas in both languages, table, chair, window, door, toilet etc. (helped as help notes for staff when dealing with the child too), again difficult with more than one language.

 

Inge