In this section:
Portsmouth has always had excellent results in the country in terms of progress and attainment outcomes for pupils with English as an additional language (EAL). In part, this is due to the work of Portsmouth City Council’s Ethnic Minority Achievement Service (EMAS) which offers both school and pupil level support.
At school level, EMAS advisers work closely with senior leaders to identify the needs of Minority Ethnic (ME) pupils and those with EAL. They offer a comprehensive range of CPD and support for staff, centrally and in schools, and train in excess of 300 teachers, TAs and ITT students each year.
EMAS produces extensive guidance for schools on relevant themes, including a citywide assessment framework for pupils with EAL, and keeps staff up to date with current issues and resources through their monthly bulletin. Advisers also offer individual mentoring opportunities to staff and whole school improvement support through learning walks, data analysis, work scrutiny, lesson observations, curriculum audits and development planning.
Advisers also support the achievement of minority ethnic groups in the city, such as our work with Gypsy, Roma and Traveller (GRT) communities and EMAS staff act as a Third Party Reporting Centre to support families who have experienced racism or other forms of prejudice in the community.
At pupil level, EMAS employs a large team of Bilingual Learning Assistants (BLAs) who support the more than twenty languages of the pupils most in need in the city. Focusing strongly on improving outcomes, over 450 pupils are supported each week in schools and nurseries. The BLAs also work as interpreters for families in a range of formal and informal meetings and are sometimes called upon to contribute their expertise when considering provision.
In addition, KS4 students are helped to gain a community language GCSE, with the BLAs carrying out the oral component of the exam for schools – more than 50 pupils were supported last year. Countless KS1 and 2 pupils also receive help to access their SATs tests. For more information regarding bilingual support, please contact Ruth Nabholz-Duncan, who manages and deploys our bilingual staff.
Advisers also support at pupil level with assessments and specialist identification of additional needs in pupils with EAL and work directly with unaccompanied refugees and asylum seekers in conjunction with the Virtual School for Looked After Children. Our team also support families seeking asylum when they first arrive in the city, especially with school admissions, access to education services etc.
Further pupil support is available through the creation of bilingual resources for use in class and display materials which focus on religious, national and cultural themes. All resources are continually added to and updated and sent to schools in the autumn term each year. EMAS also has a library of dictionaries, bilingual books, clothes, artefacts and teacher resources for classroom use or study and holds the city’s SACRE resources.
Meet the team
Team members
Ethnic Minority Achievement Manager and Lead Adviser – Karen Thomas
Advisers – Becca Reeve, Marie Allen
BLA Manager – Ruth Nabholz Duncan
Bilingual Learning Assistants (BLAs):
- Albanian – Ntiana Katsi
- Arabic – Ayat Osman
- Arabic – Asmaa Mohammed
- Bengali – Misba Islam
- Bengali – Nahida Choudhury
- Bengali – Rubi Alam
- Bengali – Husnara Uddin
- Bulgarian – Tsvetelina Shavlyova
- Chinese – Cantonese & Mandarin – Louisa Tsang
- Chinese – Cantonese & Mandarin – William Chan
- Dari – Mursal Khan
- Farsi – Shahnaz Zahed
- French – Jordane Faye
- Greek – Ntiana Katsi
- Kurdish-Sorani – Choman Agha
- Kurdish-Sorani – Kaniaw Tozi
- Malayalam – Shahnaz Hanif
- Pashto – Mursal Khan
- Polish – Magdalena Smith
- Polish – Magdalena Miller
- Portuguese – Maria Segura
- Romanian – Sanda Loghin
- Romanian – Oxana Matthews
- Romanian – Andra-Laura Pieptea
- Russian – Halyna Haiduk
- Spanish – vacant
- Tamil – vacant
- Turkish – Sibel Cavusoglu
- Ukrainian – vacant
- Ukrainian – Halyna Haiduk
- Urdu – Haseeb Rehan
School Support Officer – Jordane Faye
Adviser Support Officer – Oxana Matthews
BLA Support Officer – Nahida Choudhury
Senior Admin Assistant – Rubi Giles
EMAS Strategic Lead – Debbie Anderson
EMAS training
Our MOSAIC training offer for 2024-25:
Face-to-face training
A whole afternoon of in-depth training on the must-not-miss aspects of EAL pedagogy, delivered in person in the EMAS Training Room at the Civic Offices.
Teaching and supporting ‘New Arrivals’ and pupils new-to-English
Wednesday 25 September 2024 | 1:00 – 3:30pm
Welcoming new arrivals to your school; progress for new arrivals; monitoring, assessment and target-setting; teaching strategies and resources; accessing support from EMAS.
Teaching and supporting ‘Advanced Learners’ of EAL
Wednesday 20 November 2024 | 1:00 – 3:30 pm
Understanding the needs of advanced learners (those pupils who have been here for at least a year), identifying the language demands of different lessons and the associated teaching strategies to develop academic English; activities and resources to use.
Is it SEN or EAL?
Wednesday 26 February 2025 | 1:00 – 3:30pm
Is a pupil’s lack of progress due to EAL? Issues in the school or community? Or is there an additional need? Support for identification, consideration of intersectionality and strategies to teach and support pupils who have both EAL and SEN.
Safeguarding pupils who are BME or who have EAL
Wednesday 14 May 2025 | 1:00 – 3:30pm
Is there an increased safeguarding risk if you are BME? What are the risk factors for culture and faith; having English as an additional language; being a new arrival or an asylum-seeker? How can EMAS support?
These face-to-face sessions can be booked via the Traded Services website (probably with the support of your office/finance team, who already have access to this platform). If you are experiencing difficulty booking, you can also email EMAS’ Rubi Giles who will be able to help you: [email protected]
Numbers for face-to-face sessions will be limited to room capacity, on a first-come, first-served basis.
For any queries, please contact [email protected].
Webinars
A wide selection of shorter webinars focused on key topics and regular support for school EMA Co-ordinators, teachers and other school staff.
Teaching and supporting pupils with EAL in the Early Years
Audience: Reception staff
Wednesday 23 October 2024 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
Preparing for Community Languages GCSEs
Audience: EMA Co-ordinators and MFL staff
Date: Wednesday 11 December 2024 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
Using Assistive Technology to support pupils with EAL
Audience: Teachers, TAs, EMA Co-ordinators
Date: Wednesday 8 January 2025 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
Teaching and Supporting refugees and asylum-seekers
Audience: All staff working in school
Date: Wednesday 19 March 2025 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
Teaching and Supporting pupils who are Gypsy, Roma or Travellers
Audience: All staff working in school
Date: Wednesday 30 April 2025 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
Looking at expected progress for pupils with EAL
Audience: Teachers and EMA Co-ordinators
Date: Wednesday 11 June 2025 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
NALDIC Regional Interest Group session
Date: Wednesday 2 July 2025 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
These shorter webinars can be booked via the Traded Services website (probably with the support of your office/finance team who already have access to this platform). If you are experiencing difficulty booking, you can also email EMAS’ Rubi Giles who will be able to help you: [email protected]
The sessions will take place on Microsoft Teams and there is no limit on places.
For any queries, please contact [email protected].
Termly EMA co-ordinator network meetings
We offer all EMA Co-ordinators (both new in role and ‘old hands’!) a termly opportunity to meet and discuss the issues you’re facing in schools, receive specialist support for your role from the advisory team and have an opportunity to share best practice and learn from each other too.
Autumn term meeting – welcoming new pupils and planning for the year ahead
Wednesday 9 October 2024 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
Spring term meeting – maths and pupils with EAL
Wednesday 29 January 2025| 3:30 – 4:30pm
Summer term meeting – developing a multilingual school
Wednesday 4 June 2025 | 3:30 – 4:30pm
These Network Meetings are held via Teams. There’s no need to book and the link is below (it’s the same link as the weekly ‘drop-in’, below, to make things easier!)
Weekly drop-ins for school staff and other education professionals
Every Wednesday afternoon – if there is no other training planned – from 3:30-4:30pm, members of the advisory and central office team will always be available online to answer any questions or queries from any member of the school or from other professionals working with your teams.
No need to book – just pop in and ask away!
For these, there is the same link each week:
Bespoke school INSET and staff meetings
A rich offer of bespoke school INSET and staff meetings on a huge variety of subjects – all with our mantra ‘Good for EAL, Good for ALL’. These sessions can range from a brief 30-minute input to a whole INSET day.
They can be delivered to your entire staff, or separately to teachers, TAs, SLT, ECTs, governors, office staff and/or lunchtime supervisors. We can deliver to your whole school staff together or to individual year groups, key stages or secondary departments, the latter with subject-specific input.
Each training session is individually created to suit your focus, audience and the time available.
ECT support
Are we booked in on your school’s annual programme of support for Early Career Teachers? You can use us to support ITT students in school too or even more experienced staff who are new to working with EAL pupils.
Our most popular input is our session on all things EAL – from new arrivals to advanced learners, full of support strategies and suggested resources, all underpinned by the most up-to-date EAL pedagogy.
Anti-racism training
We also offer anti-racism training, delivering alongside Sarah Christopher.
The training introduces the anti-racism toolkit developed by the PEP and considers what racism looks like in 2024; how to talk about racism in class – both in planned input and in ‘unplanned’ reactions to incidents, comments etc. The session gives school staff time to discuss and explore the issues in a meaningful way.
Other INSET opportunities
Other topics that can be delivered directly to your school staff – for INSET days or at staff meetings, before, during or after the school day – include any session that we offer centrally (see our offer on the previous pages) plus the following (but do contact us for anything that’s not on the list!):
- A general introduction to all things EAL
- Spelling, punctuation and grammar
- Developing oracy
- Developing vocabulary
- Developing literacy in Maths
- Developing literacy in Science
- Departmental input for all secondary subjects
- Communicating with parents who are EAL
- Assessing pupils with EAL and measuring progress
- Pastoral support for pupils with EAL
- Data collection for BME/EAL pupils
- The importance of first language
- Intervention and support programmes for pupils with EAL
To discuss and arrange any bespoke INSET, please contact [email protected].
Self-guided training
‘Self-guided’ training to work through at your own pace – suitable for individuals or whole teams.
These sessions include some of our most popular courses, presented as a commentary to follow and linked handouts with information, tasks and opportunities for self-reflection built in.
Let us ‘hold your hand’ as we guide you through your learning, section by section, with a walk through of reading, reflection and activities.
Ideal for working through at your own pace, when you have the time and opportunity, and really useful to have on hand if you or your staff need to work off-site at any point.
Let us know what you want and we’ll send you an email with everything you need attached.
Contact: [email protected]
Self-guided learning sessions are available in the following subjects:
- The census and pupils who are BAME or EAL
- EAL in the Early Years
- EMA co-ordinator support
- Literacy across the curriculum
- Teaching and Supporting New Arrivals
- Primary TAs: supporting pupils who are EAL
- Safeguarding BME pupils and those with EAL
- Is it SEN or EAL?
- Working with refugees and asylum-seekers
What our delegates say
“Very knowledgeable speakers who engaged all participants with a range of different teaching resources and techniques.”
“Lovely, positive, engaging delivery of useful material.”
“This training was brilliant – your passion and knowledge really shone through.”
“I can’t thank you enough for today. The training was brilliant, just what we all needed.”
“Really relevant and delivered with enthusiasm. Lots of really useful information.”
For information, the overall average evaluation feedback from almost 300 delegates who attended EMAS training last year was 3.92 (from a 1-4 scale).
Did you know that we also offer individual support to teachers, including coaching, mentoring and support for curriculum access and planning? We also offer advisory visits to look at particular pupils who might be causing concern – mini support sessions with individual teachers, focused on specific pupils in your class – and assessments for pupils to disambiguate between EAL and SEN.
Any and all training is completely free of charge to schools who have purchased an annual package from EMAS (a General Support Package or an Adviser Package). Membership-only schools are charged £120 per delegate for all central and self-guided training and bespoke INSET prices are available on request.
For further information, contact [email protected].
Assessments offered by EMAS
What are the different assessments that we offer?
EMAS staff can support you with two different assessments. Firstly, an initial assessment which is carried out when a new pupil arrives, or as soon as possible afterwards, and, secondly, if there are any concerns about progress or thoughts that the child may also have an additional need, we can carry out a more extensive, follow-up SEN/EAL disambiguation assessment.
What is the purpose of the initial assessment?
An initial assessment is designed to give all school staff a good introduction to the young person’s educational background and abilities in both English and first language. It may also provide some details about the young person’s life, if he or she (or their parents) are happy to share these. Assessments also share strategies to support the pupil during their next few weeks and months of English language acquisition.
Most importantly, the assessment provides a baseline from which to measure and monitor progress, as well as giving teachers some support while they are getting to know the pupil for themselves. It has been deliberately designed to be shared with all of the members of staff who will be working with the pupil and is generally written so that it fits on to one side of A4 for ease of reference.
However, as there are so many new arrivals in the city (generally between 150 and 200 each year), rather than coming into schools to carry these out ourselves, we will support you to do these yourself. Typically, we will assess a new pupil with you observing, then co-produce the next one or two with you or observe you carrying one out until you are comfortable with the process. BLAs will support you with a child’s skills in their first language and support communication with parents.
What is the purpose of the SEN/EAL assessment?
Where there are concerns about a pupil’s progress or an additional need is suspected, the advisers will carry out an additional assessment, using the ‘Cognitive Assessment for Multilingual Learners’ (CAML) toolkit and/or other resources and toolkits, depending on the pupil’s age.
The outcomes of this assessment can strongly suggest specific areas of need associated with SEN but will never identify or diagnose need.
CAML screening was developed around fifteen years ago in response to the challenges teachers found in getting acknowledgment of SEN in students with EAL, as often any difficulties were dismissed as being a language issue rather than a particular need. It is extremely useful as part of a wider SEN investigation as the tasks are not dependent on the young person’s ability to understand English. We also use an interpreter wherever possible, but the tasks do not assess English language levels.
The tasks focus on skills such as auditory memory, visual memory, short term memory, working memory, literacy practices, phonological awareness and sequencing. Several of the tasks are carried out in L1 as well as English, so we can see what the young person is capable of without the barrier of speaking and understanding a foreign language.
The tasks are measurable and after the screening are compared to what would be typical of a pupil with EAL but without SEN at this age or at this point in their educational journey.
Prejudicial language and behaviour toolkit
Working with representatives of Hampshire, Southampton and Isle of Wight councils, EMAS have produced a prejudicial language and behaviour toolkit for schools. This pan-Hampshire resource can be used when monitoring and reporting prejudicial comments and/or incidents, as well as to support school self-evaluation in this area.
Anti-racism training has been developed with Portsmouth Education Partnership colleagues and is available to schools.
Support for schools
Support from EMAS is available to schools through a service level agreement (SLA). Membership gives a school resources, updates and advice for an annual fee. Members can then buy in services on an ad-hoc basis. Schools can also buy a general support package, based on a proportion of a school’s EAL funding from central government and which gives access to all of EMAS’ services, or an enhanced adviser package. Almost every school in Portsmouth currently has an SLA with EMAS.
For further information please contact Karen Thomas (EMAS Manager and Lead Adviser) or visit the EMAS website.