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We compared two tools that have been used to capture the linguistic heterogeneity and achievement of students in England: the exposure-based distinction between English as an additional language (EAL) and monolingual learners, and the 2017–2018 five level teacher rating of proficiency in English (from ‘New to English’ to ‘Fluent’). Based on a nationally representative sample of 140,000 students aged 5 to 16 years, we assessed the explanatory power of the proficiency in English rating in relation to educational achievement and compared it directly to EAL status. Our results demonstrate that proficiency in English is a significantly better predictor of student achievement than EAL status and that it accounts for up to six times more variance than other student background variables (ethnicity, gender and socio-economic disadvantage) combined. Proficiency in English was particularly (but certainly not solely) predictive for student performance in subjects such as English and reading vis-à-vis mathematics. Our findings are clear in demonstrating the value of a proficiency in English rating for assessing linguistic heterogeneity and student achievement, in contrast to the exposure-based EAL measure. We recommend the (re)introduction of proficiency in English ratings to monitor and support student progress and discuss the value of classroom-based language assessments.
Current scholarship advocating the role of pre-service and in-service teacher development for counteracting the multiple levels of South African 'school dysfunction' (Bergman & Bergman 2011) has said relatively little about the substantial role of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the multiple layers of reform at play in literacy education - and even less has been said about the role of NGOs in developing teacher-leaders, or in our case, 'literacy coaches', for engaging grass-roots in-service teacher change. In this article, we theorise findings from a participatory, qualitative needs analysis examining a South African NGO's development of literacy coaches as part of a broader Gauteng Province Literacy and Maths Strategy (GPLMS). Embedded in sociocultural conceptions of 'thoughtfully adaptive teaching' (Fairbanks et al. 2010), our findings suggest that although coaches were confident in their ability to interact as coaches for the curriculum generated by the GPLMS reforms, they were less confident in their abilities to engage their teacher colleagues in the horizontal relationship horizontal collaboration within a community of collaborative professionals. We provide specific recommendations for the GPLMS initiative with broader implications for similar participatory teacher learning efforts for enacting education as change.
