UK NEWS

PLIGHT OF PUPILS WHO STRUGGLE TO SPEAK ENGLISH

Schools Minister, Maureen Watt

Monday September 1,2008

By Brian Swanson

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Almost 4,000 migrant children in Scottish primary schools cannot speak basic English because of a lack of funding to pay for specialist teachers.

Latest figures reveal that there around 138 languages spoken by 28,000 pupils – but of these 3,595 speak speak no English at all.

According to an investigation by BBC Radio Scotland, because there are just 270 support teachers for 15,000 migrant pupils as well as a shortage of teachers who can teach English as an Additional Language (EAL) some pupils get just 15 minutes of specialist teaching a week.

Marjorie Bell, a teacher at Annette Street Primary School in Govanhill, Glasgow, is in the heart of the city’s Slovakian and Romanian Roma community.

She said: “Although we used to have one or two or three non-English speaking children, to have so many arriving at one time was very difficult to cope with.

“If you get to the situation where almost half your class is non-English speaking, then it really does put an incredible strain on the whole class.”

Mrs Bell added: “I think significant numbers of people view working in Scotland as an opportunity to make enough money to enjoy a better lifestyle back home but under the UN charter all children have the right to an education. Teachers want to do the best for children in their care.”

Fraser McCallum, a geography teacher at Drummond High School in Edinburgh, said: “The kids are flung into the education system and I know there’s an immersion theory of throwing them in and hoping they will pick up the language.

"You know that the pupil should be attaining better but obviously has a barrier to their learning.

“It’s frustrating for the pupil as well that they are not able to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding.”

The Educational Institute of Scotland has said it wants the number of pupils per class without English to be limited but Glasgow City Council has rejected the plan as being illegal under race relations legislation.

Schools Minister, Maureen Watt, said: “Over the next three years the amount of money given to local authorities has increased by 13 per cent and local authorities have told us that the amount they have been given is enough to resource education, and develop skills teachers need to enable them to teach EAL.”

Mother Tongue will be broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland today at 9.05am.

HOW BIZARRE IS THIS ARTICLE?

01.09.08, 6:34pm

Oh, really? 4,000 pupils?

If you want to see a REAL educational problem , then come and look at the TENS of THOUSANDS of CLASSES in England where the teacher cannot teach the native English speakers their assigned subject because they are too tied up trying to teach the non-native English speakers (no fault of theirs, bless them) what cat, dog and cow mean.

Meanwhile, some **** from Ofsted stands in the background and blames teachers for poor results.

Welcome to the fruits of the ruling party's immigration policies. This will only get worse and worse until Labour are gone from office.

• Posted by: Hector • Report Comment