At Round Hill we are incredibly proud of and take every opportunity to celebrate our multicultural and diverse community. At the time of writing, 34% of our pupil population are pupils who have English as an Additional Language (EAL). This is higher compared to the national average of 21% of pupils. 

My name is Flo Bond and I am very passionate about and love my role as EAL coordinator. I have held this role at Round Hill for 5 years. During this time, I have worked with a vast variety of wonderful EAL learners with varying language proficiency needs. I have really enjoyed collaborating with other colleagues and schools. I am also incredibly proud to lead the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Champions club every Friday with 50 children from Year 1-6. I have received training from the Achievement and Equality Team , part of which has involved participating in the termly EAL coordinator network meetings to: receive updates on national guidance, discuss evidence-based teaching and learning strategies to improve outcomes, sharing of good practise between schools and share effective whole school strategies to improve attainment. 

At Round Hill we aim:

• To give all pupils the opportunity to overcome any barrier to learning.
• To welcome and value the cultural, linguistic and educational experiences that pupils with EAL bring to the school whenever possible.
• To implement appropriate strategies to ensure that EAL pupils are supported in accessing the full curriculum.
• To help EAL pupils to become confident and fluent in speaking and listening, reading and writing in English in order to be able to fulfil their potential.
• To encourage children to practise and extend their use of English.
• To encourage and enable parental support in improving children’s language skills.
• To maintain pupils’ self-esteem and confidence by acknowledging and giving status to their skills in their own languages.
• To be able to assess the skills and needs of pupils with EAL and to give appropriate provision throughout the school.
• To equip teachers with the knowledge, skills and resources to be able to support and monitor pupils with EAL.
• To monitor pupils’ progress regularly with a particular focus on the termly data input and pupil progress meetings.
• To use in school monitoring and data  to make decisions about classroom management, curriculum planning and appropriate interventions.

Ofsted (2018) feedback recommended that Round Hill continued “to adapt the support that they provide for pupils who have recently arrived at the school who speak English as an additional language, so that these pupils make rapid progress, particularly in developing their language skills.”

At Round Hill we have used this feedback and worked hard to use an assessment system to support staff with developing the children’s English language acquisition. Teachers use the assessment system for children who are working below age related expectations or whose language is a concern. Teachers are provided with time during staff training sessions to assess the children at three assessment points in each term of the school year. The assessment system we use at Round Hill is the EAL assessment framework for primary schools created by the Nottinghamshire County Council Achievement and Equality team. 

We celebrate multilingualism at Round Hill through the roles of both our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Champions club and our parent interpreter scheme. We also have a wealth of books and resources that we have collated over the years and are ready to be enjoyed by the staff and children in our school library. This also includes many bilingual texts to support pupils who are new to English. 

Please see more information in the EAL policy below. There is also more information in the Equality Policy and the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion objectives below too.