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Tower Hamlets Education
supports a network of 51 projects delivering supplementary and mother
tongue classes across the borough. The projects are supported by mainstream
grant aid and council provided tutors. Currently the authority employs
92 part time tutors who work from 30 different sites within the borough.
Most of the classes are based at local schools, though a large proportion
of the projects are run from community halls, local churches, mosques
and some cases from rented premises. The languages taught are: Bengali,
Somali, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Urdu and Moroccan. The classes are managed
and supervised by a small team within the Access and Inclusion service
of the Education Directorate.
In recent years significant
progress has been made to raise standards in the following areas:
- a survey of tutors' training needs analysis and a qualifications audit
has been carried out to identify a baseline for tutors' training requirements.
On the basis of findings and recommendations an INSET programme has
been developed and run successfully.
- a teacher training
course in community language has been developed for the tutors who do
not have QTS. The course has been successfully running at Tower Hamlets
College, offering London Open College Network (LOCN) accreditation.
- a standard Curriculum
Framework has been produced and is used to support classes at Key Stages
1 and 2.
- a strategy for
monitoring and evaluation has been established to help projects with
appropriate action planning and follow-up support.
- an Assessment
Framework is also being developed to measure pupils' progress at the
end of Key Stages 1 and 2. This is due to be piloted in the coming academic
year.
However, these developments
have taken place largely within the supplementary and mother tongue schools
service and the central team. The relationship of these initiatives within
mainstream schooling is uneven. We feel that a number of new strategies
are needed in order to engage schools as major partners.
The key priorities
for the coming year are to:
- establish a research
project to carry out a longitudinal study evaluating the impact of first
language maintenance;
- develop strategies
to offer INSET for primary teachers to raise awareness of the links
between the development of pupils first language and educational achievements;
- strengthen links
between mother tongue projects and mainstream schools and raise the
profile of mother tongue languages across the education system.
Certificate in
Teaching Community Languages
This is a 17 week training programme designed for community languages
teachers, in particular for tutors who do have any formal teaching qualification.
The course aims to support the delivery of the Tower Hamlets curriculum
and to deepen understanding of the National Curriculum. It also widens
tutors' opportunities for professional development and provides an entry
route to further qualifications. The training is mainly focused on how
to improve teachers' skills in planning and delivering lessons for after
school clubs, preparing materials, keeping learning records, maintaining
portfolios, assessing progress and motivating children to increase their
self confidence. The programme has been running at Tower Hamlets College,
offering London Open College Network (LOCN) credits at levels 2 and 3.
Over the last two years the course has been repeated 5 times for Tower
Hamlets mother tongue tutors, and so far, some 65 candidates have successfully
undertaken it. Recruitment for the sixth cohort is currently taking place,
and admission is now open to all students, as most of the Tower Hamlets
employees have completed the course.
DELL
Projects
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