School Support Services Newsletters

TEAM Solutions Secondary School ESOL Newsletter Term 3: 2004

Welcome back to Term 3 - we trust you all had a relaxing break.
Welcome also to Daya Prasad who joined our ESOL team in May and is working with Helen as an International facilitator. She has had wide experience in the Intermediate and Secondary sectors and has particular expertise in assessment, placement and tracking student progress, accessing resources, planning units, training teacher aides and training tutors for Self Pacing Boxes.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT DATES: TERM 3

ESOL HoD’s Workshop
This workshop is for an opportunity for new or intending ESOL HOD’s or TIC of ESOL to look at key tasks and issues including the following:
Defining the job
Documentation
Building a strong team
Making school wide links
Strategies to reduce workload
Updates on new initiatives

Date:	Thursday August 5
Time:	9am - 3pm
Venue:	Kohia Teachers’ Centre (Register through Kohia: Ph. 623 8977)
Facilitators:	Lyn Groves and Helen Panayiodou.

Pasifika in Mainstream Education Symposium
This symposium is being hosted by the Pacific Education Research group and will consist of half-hour papers and workshops that you can select from.

Date:	Friday August 27
Time:	9am - 4pm
Venue:	School of Education, University of Waikato.
Cost:	$55 (Earlybird registration by 16 August).

Email Jenni for a registration form if you are interested.

Hotwired in the Pacific (Put in your diary for next year)
The NZATE Conference next year will be held at Botany Down Secondary College here in Auckland (14-17 July). This is a great opportunity to have a strong ESOL presence particularly as one of the strands focused on will be Asian and Pacific literatures and the workshops include ESOL and literacy. Check the NZATE website for more information.

NCEA
It is a good idea to keep checking the website for any changes, updates. The NZQA website below has regular monthly updates listed.
http://www.nzqa.govt.nz/framework/updates/index.html

Report on Moderation/Exemplar Cluster
This cluster consists of representatives from 14 schools. The aim is to meet together, focus on a standard, moderate student samples and produce annotated ESOL exemplars. Our next meeting is a whole day workshop focusing on the literacy writing standards 2.2 & 8825. We hope to produce a resource to share with all before the end of the year.

CLUSTERS
We now have clusters that aim to meet at least once a term. Please contact the coordinator in your area if you would like to be part of one.

Area	Name	School	Contact Details
North	Penny Eriksen	Takapuna Grammar School	489 4167 ext 204
South	Sandra Paulus	ASDAHS	275 9640
East	Bachoo Bookwallah	Pakuranga College	534 7159
West	Lesley WilliamsDawn Burling	Kelston Boys Massey High School	818 6185 ext 729 831 0500
Central (1)	Tjitske Hunter	Marcellin College	625 7376 ext 714
Central (2)	Christine Irving	Epsom Girls’ Grammar	630 5963 ext 729
Hibiscus Coast	Breda Mathews	Mahurangi College	(09) 425 8039
Whangarei	Pat Pishief	Whangarei Girls’ High	(09) 430 4400

MoE UPDATE
A number of exciting new policy initiatives were highlighted in the latest MoE newsletter to schools. A reminder that we have copies of the ESOL in the mainstream video available.
ELIP: It has been good to visit schools and find that good use is being made of this resource. It ties in very well with ESOL unit standards and can be used for formative work.
ELLF (English Language Learning Framework) is on its way! Consultation with national reference groups will take place in August. Then it will be sent to the school sector for further consultation.

AKTESOL
Following the success of our last meeting we will be having a "Focus on Listening and Speaking" with a choice of workshops to attend.

Date:	Tuesday August 10
Time:	6.30 – 9pm
Venue:	Kohia Teachers’ Centre

A newsletter will be sent out shortly but only to those who are members. Check to see if your membership is current!

ESOL INTERNATIONAL: Update from Helen & Daya

This term has been quite a productive term. After a Needs Analysis conducted earlier in the year there were 3 areas of focus that have taken up most of our time. These include

• the promotion of the cluster group concept as an effective way of creating networking opportunities for the support of ESOL teachers.
• the development of relationships with schools with few International students such as in Northland where access to support is limited.
• the development of a Reflective Analysis and Vision model. It is a non-threatening review process of a school’s ESOL/International department and the collection of data to make informed judgements. The benefits of this process are:
  • Schools can take responsibility of and own the reflection process.
  • Data already exists in the school - it is a matter of accessing it.
  • After working through the process teachers/the school can obtain a comprehensive overview of the situation.
  • Hard data replaces assumptions to allow for more informed decisions.
  • There are opportunities for whole school input into the process.
  • The model is easily applied once schools have opted to work through this process.

For further information on the Reflective Analysis and Vision model contact Helen: h.panayiodou@ace.ac.nz

Bilingual/multilingual translators
We are trying to create a database of translators who can be accessed by schools. If you know of any person (paid or unpaid) who would be interested in assisting us, please contact us.

International workshops
There has been a positive response to these workshops. The dates of the remaining International ESOL workshops in Auckland are:

Day 1: Effective provision for International students Day 2: Effective assessment for the placement and tracking of International students	Kohia Teachers’ Centre	6-7 October
Introduction to ELIP resource	Northland Kohia Teachers’ Centre	9 September 19 November

For late enrolments contact janet.boyd@minedu.govt.nz

REFUGEE NEWS from Lyn

Greetings: Asalaam Alaikum (Somali), Salaam (Farsi), Chotar Asty (Dare), Selam (Amharic), Si yi bak (Dinka - Sudanese)

Refugee Cluster Meeting: the Term 3 meeting will be held at Lynfield College at 3pm on September 8. Thank you Deanne Hall for hosting it.

The Term 2 Refugee Cluster Meeting held at Avondale College was well attended despite it being the last week of term. Jackie Mortimer Hughes spoke about the Centre for Refugee Education, Mangere, and showed the new DVD about the Centre that an AUT journalism student has produced. She also talked about some of the issues confronting our refugee students. The new Afghani student support worker, Zohra Amin, was introduced by Abraham Mamer. Former refugee student, Shamsa Al-ali answered questions about middle eastern students and offered her cultural perspective on education.

Afghani student support worker: welcome to Zohra Amin who is working with Abraham Mamer at MOE to assist in settling Afghani families. Can be contacted on 374 5475. or zohra.amiri@minedu.govt.nz

Refugee narratives: if your former refugee students have written personal narratives about their experiences before they came to New Zealand, and you think they are good enough to be published, could you please send a copy to l.groves@ace.ac.nz I am trying to gather such narratives from refugee students of different ethnicities, to share with you. Permission from the student must, of course, be given.

Health issues for refugees and new migrants: From consultation with refugee and new migrants, the Auckland District Health Board produced a report (August, 2002) the main issues being:

• Primary care needs to be more accessible, more culturally appropriate, and better resourced
• Refugees and migrants want to be actively involved in their own health care
• Refugees and migrants want a community based health centre that uses their own people as practitioners
• Address the barriers to getting help

The Journey to Work: Jobs for Refugees
As you know, refugees are amongst the most marginalised groups in the New Zealand employment market. Assisting refugees into employment is the aim of a three year programme funded by the JR McKenzie Trust. In reporting on the first two years of the programme the Trust noted that:

• Young people who arrive in New Zealand as teenagers are a high- risk group.
• Negative attitudes from some employers are a significant barrier to refugee employment. Employers running small businesses do not always have time to assist refugees settle in their workplace.
• Barriers exist for refugees moving from income support into employment.
• Gender issues, attitudes to age, and attitudes to time can all raise adaptation problems for refugees.
• Dress codes can be used to discriminate against some groups of refugee women.

For further information and/or a full report on the programme contact Iain Hines, Executive Director, JR McKenzie Trust. Phone (04) 4728876 or email iain@jrmckenzie.org.nz or http://www.jrmckenzie.org.nz

For information on projects in Auckland contact the following project managers:

Shakti	ANVI	Akl Somali Community Assn
Ghazala Tufail PO Box 12 1177 Henderson Auckland Ph: (09) 828 4610 Email: smecc@shakti.org.nz	Beverley Lardner Burke PO Box 5079 Wellesley St Auckland 1001 Ph: (09) 366 0860 Email: beverley@anvi.org.nz	Mahad Warsame PO Box 27196 Mt Roskill Auckland College of Education Ph: 021 366 478 Email: MahadW@adhb.govt.nz

ESOL Online
Appearing soon will be units of work that scaffold student learning as they prepare for the University Entrance literacy standards:
English A S 2.2, 2.4, 2.8.
English U.S. 8825, 12420.
Watch this space: http://www.tki.org.nz/r/esol/esolonline/secondary_esol/classroom/ncea/ue_e.php

Teachers: Professional readings

Profiling reading comprehension in Mangere Schools: a research and development collaboration
A report on a cluster of seven decile one schools developing a partnership with researchers to build students’ reading comprehension skills.

Achieving is Cool: What we learned from the AIMHI Project to help schools more effectively meet the needs of their students
This paper discusses what the schools did that made a positive difference to their students' learning opportunities.

Pasifika Students in New Zealand Schools: Some Explanations for their Literacy Performance
John Dickie argues that Street’s models of literacy may go some way to help us to interpret and explain the performance of Pasifika students in school.

'Like I wasn't there, I didn't exist': The invisible students in New Zealand today
An exploration of recent literature on racism in education and the voices of students alienated from mainstream NZ schools.

Joint Construction
Joint construction is a collaborative writing process involving the students and the teacher in constructing a text, individually, in small groups, or as a whole class. A straightforward explanation from the Tasmanian educational Office for Curriculum, Leadership and Learning.

ESOL Group email
This continues to be an effective way of keeping in touch. Please email Jenni if you have a change of address.

We’re looking forward to working with you this term. Hope to see many of you at CLESOL in September.

Jenni Bedford
Ph. 09 623 8880 ext. 8349
Fax: 09 623 8881
j.bedford@ace.ac.nz

Lyn Groves
Ph. 09 623 8880 ext. 6364
Fax: 09 623 8881
l.groves@ace.ac.nz

Margaret Kitchen
Ph. 09 623 8899 ext. 8795
m.kitchen@ace.ac.nz

Helen Panayiodou
Ph. 09 623 8880 ext. 8334
Fax: 09 623 8881
h.panayiodou@ace.ac.nz

Daya Prasad
Ph. 09 623 8880 ext. 6335
Fax: 09 623 8881

Song Lam Wong
Ph. 09 623 8880 ext. 8347
Fax. 09 623 8881
Mob. 0275 554 639
sl.wong@ace.ac.nz

Charlie Lee
Ph. 09 6238880 ext. 8472
Fax. 09 623 8881
Mob. 0275 423 801
c.lee@ace.ac.nz