The Findings
There was a diverse range of findings across numerous key dimensions.
Finding 1: Teachers’ increased EAL awareness and pedagogical capabilities led to shifts in pedagogy and curriculum including changes in classroom organisation, inclusion of content related to students’ backgrounds and cultures, a focus on translation and vocabulary building, and increased awareness of the importance of providing specific written feedback.
Finding 2: Focusing on students’ home languages and cultural practices for curriculum and pedagogy purposes led to greater engagement with migrant families. This had important implications for students’ school outcomes and parents’ involvement with the school.
Finding 3: The introduction of students’ home languages and cultures into curriculum and teaching saw increased contributions in class by EAL students and engagement with this new knowledge by non-EAL students, extending their understandings of the world beyond the rural community.
Finding 4: The increased contributions of the EAL students to class discussions about curriculum topics led to a greater sense of legitimacy and authority on the part of the EAL students with recorded accounts of improved classroom behaviour and engagement.
Finding 5: When students’ languages were valued in the school and students were encouraged to engage their parents in their schoolwork, the students’ proficiency levels in the home language increased thanks to greater lexification and communicative competence.
Finding 6: The introduction of home language and culture saw greater involvement of migrant parents in their children’s secondary schooling, with parents upskilled in ways to support their children’s understanding of topics using the home language and to contribute insights from their experiences of Australia and the home country.
Finding 7: The foregrounding of home language and the involvement of parents in knowledge-building through homework and assessment tasks led to closer relationships between EAL students and their parents, with new-found respect by students of their parents’ hither-to hidden knowledge and expertise.