From Stuck to Started: Scaffolding Language, Tasks and Assessment for EAL Students

Mainstream secondary teachers with no specialist EAL training You have EAL students in your class and you want to help them, but where do you even begin? You’re not an EAL specialist, you have a full class to manage, and you can’t redesign everything from scratch. Here is something most mainstream teachers don’t realise: when an EAL student can’t complete a task, it is often the language that is the problem, not the thinking. Scaffolding is the art of temporarily removing that language barrier so students can show you what they know, and in this workshop you will learn to use it as a practical, everyday strategy rather than a specialist skill. Designed for mainstream secondary teachers with no EAL background, this hands-on workshop covers three areas where scaffolding makes the biggest difference: the language in your materials, the tasks you set, and the way you assess. You will explore how to make your existing texts and materials more accessible, how to design tasks that let EAL students show what they actually know, and how to ensure your assessment is measuring subject knowledge rather than English proficiency. At each stage, you will spend time adapting your own classroom materials, and you will come away with concrete strategies you can use immediately, whatever subject you teach. Rowena Bata has been a Languages teacher for 25 years and she has worked at schools in Victoria as well as in France, Papua New Guinea and Malaysia. She has held various positions of leadership and has taught students of all ages, from Prep to adult. Rowena holds a Master’s degree in Linguistics and she is a Microsoft Innovative Educator Trainer. She is interested in bridging the gap between second language acquisition theory and what happens in a classroom, and she has a particular focus on the role that technology can play in the language learning process. Rowena has a wealth of experience that she brings to her presentations and her workshops are always practical and full of ideas for teachers to take away and use in their class immediately. The best P.D. I have attended in living memory!” I loved every minute of this engaging, interesting and informative PD. And I have been teaching for 40+ years! Passionate & Authentic Speakers – Meaningful Strategies This session was one of the most empowering workshops that I have ever done and I leave the session with extremely useful and relevant tools to use going forward. Thanks so much to Sally for leading us in the session so positively. Absolutely brilliant information, empowering us with many tools and skills to takeaway and work on. My colleague and I leave full of positive energy about how to approach the challenges of our admin roles. “Strategies to Thrive as a Year Level Co-ordinator by Sally Learey” Sally was insightful and helped me to make clear connections to every day behaviours / emotions that I will need to recognise in my position. It really reiterated why I applied for this position in the f