The question I most frequently get asked - probably because I grew up speaking English myself and my daughters went through the Swiss public school system - is “how do I deal with native speakers in my classroom?” I will discuss this below starting with my own experiences and then generalize those points to some more practical tips.
First of all, I would like to state that I get irritated by the question. Teachers in Switzerland have a 3-year degree in education and a lot of fieldwork. In every subject there will be learners who are more or less motivated, more or less interested, and have had more or fewer experiences in a subject. So when I get asked about native speakers, I think “have they not learned how to differentiate instruction?” and that they have it wrong. Teachers are not responsible for teaching native-level English (they cannot), but they ARE responsible that every child has an active, positive experience where they make progress. They ARE responsible for not just “following the coursebook” but TEACHING and knowing how to engage learners. They ARE responsible for the GROUP of learners in their class that HAVE ALREADY surpassed the curricular aims, even the A2 aims of the CEFR. They ARE responsible, in the German sense for “Erziehung” (raising/ upbringing) and not just “Bildung” (education). More important than English language skills are those soft skills and educational tenets.
PS: And this answer would not be the same for French because there are native speakers, and there are Italian and Portuguese speakers who perhaps have some access, but probably the general level is not as high as in English though thinking about differentiation is also something important. Plus, French is USEFUL here in Switzerland for BASIC things such as ordering in a restaurant or going into an Epicierie. Thus the more “traditional EFL” topics would actually be better in French than in English as kids in Switzerland are not going to the butcher or baker shop. Here’s one link: https://www.francaispourlesbilingues.ch/ .
First of all, I would like to state that I get irritated by the question. Teachers in Switzerland have a 3-year degree in education and a lot of fieldwork. In every subject there will be learners who are more or less motivated, more or less interested, and have had more or fewer experiences in a subject. So when I get asked about native speakers, I think “have they not learned how to differentiate instruction?” and that they have it wrong. Teachers are not responsible for teaching native-level English (they cannot), but they ARE responsible that every child has an active, positive experience where they make progress. They ARE responsible for not just “following the coursebook” but TEACHING and knowing how to engage learners. They ARE responsible for the GROUP of learners in their class that HAVE ALREADY surpassed the curricular aims, even the A2 aims of the CEFR. They ARE responsible, in the German sense for “Erziehung” (raising/ upbringing) and not just “Bildung” (education). More important than English language skills are those soft skills and educational tenets.
Secondly, there are some ideas and resources out there for you already:
My daughters both started English in the 2nd or 3rd grades (Unterstufe). They both had a fantastic teacher who:
- See my post from 2021: http://elteach.weebly.com/questions-from-the-field/those-pesky-native-speakers
- Read “A fair deal for all: Supporting native speakers in EFL classroom. English Teaching Professional. Issue 70
- Read Nadig, S. (2022). “I’m the teacher! “But I’m the native speaker!” ETAS Journal 39 (1), 29-31. She mentions Kanton Zug’s materials but here they are again.
My daughters both started English in the 2nd or 3rd grades (Unterstufe). They both had a fantastic teacher who:
- Worked minimally with a coursebook (she used Ginger and then Young World, but half-heartedly);
- Made the learners put on Readers Theater and other short skits and plays;
- Had different learners memorize different texts on different levels and practice their recitals in creative ways (so my daughters got the harder and longer poems) and also learn to write their texts;
- Taught a lot about various holidays in English lessons (she was from Germany so she taught about Dresden traditions (in English) and her experiences in Japan and the US) – she brought her world and experiences into the lessons which Dörnyei has shown to be essential for learner motivation;
- Decorated the hallway with lots of child-made English, “wanted” posters, shape poetry, pictures and descriptions, etc….
- Did a lot of arts and crafts with the kids, and listened to music while doing that;
- Included many role plays, songs, etc. from many other sources.
Perhaps one could say that some of this was a bit “old-school” but at the same time, every child profited, the teacher was fairly strict, and the kids were motivated and curious about the language and she could teach 2nd and 3rd graders entirely in English. Her own English was far from perfect, but she was an excellent example of knowing how to manage a class to the benefit of the subjects she was teaching and other, soft skills such as teaching learners to be responsible.
Enter 4th, 5th, and 6th grades. When my daughters moved to the 4th grade, they had teachers who spoke German in the English lessons, worked exclusively with the course books, used “Lexicards” the same way in French and English, graded with points, graded incorrectly (e.g. took points off for American spelling or alternative words (sled vs sledge is one example)) and used vocabulary translation whereby both children came home upset and outraged with their 4s and 4.5s for spelling German words incorrectly. You can read my article here about that. Their teachers followed the course books with very little additions or if so, some silly songs for kindergarten children in the US.
Thus, I pulled them out of English and put them into Pearson’s Connections Academy which was way too much for them (5 lessons a week), cost me something, but where they could work on the computer during English lesson time in the public schools and where the teacher could include the grade from this in the Swiss report card (we copied and stapled the semester report card to their Swiss report card). This we used through secondary and we found our balance (e.g. they focused on the literature sections and less on the mechanics of language sections as they got that from German lessons in the public schools). I did write Pearson asking if they would make a “Light” version but never got a response. There is a lot more I could say about secondary school and Open World (my children had to then take all the tests) but I will not.
My message here to teachers: If parents want that their child gets native-level instruction, then the parents have to organize that themselves. It is NOT the Swiss teacher’s job to teach both native-level German AND English. However, had the upper-level teachers continued along the same lines as the lower primary teacher, then I would not have pulled them out.
Enter Patrick. That’s my husband. He teaches full-time in Schwamendingen, Zürich (Klassenlehrer). He administered the Oxford Placement Test for Young Learners to his fourth graders at the beginning of the fourth grade. One child in his class speaks English at home but ALL but TWO tested at A2 or above. This means that there are only two children, from a standardized diagnostic test of English, who have NOT met the curricular aims. And thus the question is as well the curriculum. It is NOT relevant for those who are way above the CEFR aims (for example, “können in einen langsam und deutlich vorgelesenen/ gesprochenen Hörtext eintauchen (z.B. einfaches Hörbuch, Geschichte“ means absolutely nothing). And thus it is not relevant to 90% of the class. This is one class, but I would wager that it is a similar statistic across the canton of Zurich.
Enter 4th, 5th, and 6th grades. When my daughters moved to the 4th grade, they had teachers who spoke German in the English lessons, worked exclusively with the course books, used “Lexicards” the same way in French and English, graded with points, graded incorrectly (e.g. took points off for American spelling or alternative words (sled vs sledge is one example)) and used vocabulary translation whereby both children came home upset and outraged with their 4s and 4.5s for spelling German words incorrectly. You can read my article here about that. Their teachers followed the course books with very little additions or if so, some silly songs for kindergarten children in the US.
Thus, I pulled them out of English and put them into Pearson’s Connections Academy which was way too much for them (5 lessons a week), cost me something, but where they could work on the computer during English lesson time in the public schools and where the teacher could include the grade from this in the Swiss report card (we copied and stapled the semester report card to their Swiss report card). This we used through secondary and we found our balance (e.g. they focused on the literature sections and less on the mechanics of language sections as they got that from German lessons in the public schools). I did write Pearson asking if they would make a “Light” version but never got a response. There is a lot more I could say about secondary school and Open World (my children had to then take all the tests) but I will not.
My message here to teachers: If parents want that their child gets native-level instruction, then the parents have to organize that themselves. It is NOT the Swiss teacher’s job to teach both native-level German AND English. However, had the upper-level teachers continued along the same lines as the lower primary teacher, then I would not have pulled them out.
Enter Patrick. That’s my husband. He teaches full-time in Schwamendingen, Zürich (Klassenlehrer). He administered the Oxford Placement Test for Young Learners to his fourth graders at the beginning of the fourth grade. One child in his class speaks English at home but ALL but TWO tested at A2 or above. This means that there are only two children, from a standardized diagnostic test of English, who have NOT met the curricular aims. And thus the question is as well the curriculum. It is NOT relevant for those who are way above the CEFR aims (for example, “können in einen langsam und deutlich vorgelesenen/ gesprochenen Hörtext eintauchen (z.B. einfaches Hörbuch, Geschichte“ means absolutely nothing). And thus it is not relevant to 90% of the class. This is one class, but I would wager that it is a similar statistic across the canton of Zurich.
So what does he do? He does NOT touch the local coursebooks because they are full of mistakes and are not “enough” and are not interesting enough. He DOES do the following:
That leaves me, dear reader, at the end of this tirade! There’s a lot more to be said about differentiation and there are so many other tools that we can use (reciprocal reading? Jigsaws and roles based on specific skills?). There are ways of taking the official coursebooks and adding materials and tasks but in my humble opinion, the whole system needs to change whereby we focus more on the “Orientierung der Volksschule” and soft skills than the specific “competencies” for English listed in the curriculum.
- Lets topics from NMG, Math, Art, German determine what he does in English - if they have a unit on Space in NMG, then they read books on Epic on Space in English or watch videos about some phenomena in the NMG lesson in English (answering basic questions in English and more complex questions in German).
- Sometimes lets English topics determine his other subjects, e.g. he uses current events (pictures from newspapers and watching the news, for example the World Cup recently was a “hot topic” that started in English) in simple ways (picture descriptions) and then goes into much more depth in the German lesson. English is a way IN.
- Always has open tasks (no matter what the topic is, there are texts to be written, questions to be asked, language to be produced at any level) – there is basic copying from the board, but it’s always integrated into MORE (e.g. “use these key words to write 5 questions”).
- Teaches grammar in small, regular doses (through games and some traditional worksheets) as everyone needs a bit of a focus on accuracy and everyone still at times has problems using structures correctly.
- Works with Epic and other platforms where learners can select materials themselves, but also do some minimal task that he assigns (e.g. choose a book and write a 5-question quiz).
- Teaches coding in English as that makes sense all the time and there are lots of useful commands (verbs).
- Works with modern songs like he would in a German lesson.
- Lets different learners do different things at different times (e.g. while 18 children are writing up a description of a music video, the 2 NOT at the A2 level are working with https://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/ or some of the tools here: https://padlet.com/laura_buechel/English or reading the description of the music video from another source.
- Works with literature (Sherlock Holmes) one lesson and then with videos (Enola Holmes) the second lesson (when there are two lessons a week).
That leaves me, dear reader, at the end of this tirade! There’s a lot more to be said about differentiation and there are so many other tools that we can use (reciprocal reading? Jigsaws and roles based on specific skills?). There are ways of taking the official coursebooks and adding materials and tasks but in my humble opinion, the whole system needs to change whereby we focus more on the “Orientierung der Volksschule” and soft skills than the specific “competencies” for English listed in the curriculum.
So no, there are no specific books that I know of that would have been specifically for my daughters (because the Pearson Connections materials used authentic literature and a lot of it). Of course, there are better ELT coursebooks than certain ones used where I live that are mandated for reasons I dare not write in a public blog. For instance:
- Macmillan Global Readings
- Macmillan Brainwave: https://www.macmillanenglish.com/us/catalogue/courses/young-learners/brainwave/course-information
- Macmillan Global Stage
- Pearson Longman
- English Code: https://www.pearson.com/english/catalogue/primary/english-code.html
- Now I Know: https://www.pearson.com/english/catalogue/primary/now-i-know.html
- National Geographic ELT, see especially Our World
- World Wonders
- Look
- Eli Publishing has a good book called Think Global that can be used for two years (ONE BOOK!! TWO YEARS!!)
Some I have worked with, some not. They are all for EFL (with or without CLIL) but offer better support materials and are generally more interesting than the local books. If you want kids to just work on their computers the whole lesson, then there would be other materials I could add, but that's not the point of public school education. If you want a teacher, not just a "classroom monitor", then we need to trust in the trained classroom teacher to make something out of the materials.
And no, I do not know of any research describing this issue (Foreign Language Learning in the Digital Age addresses it a little bit or Young Games in the Digital Wilds) though I have to admit that I am more interested in learning becoming better for everyone and I do not particularly focus on native speakers or stronger learners.
PS: And this answer would not be the same for French because there are native speakers, and there are Italian and Portuguese speakers who perhaps have some access, but probably the general level is not as high as in English though thinking about differentiation is also something important. Plus, French is USEFUL here in Switzerland for BASIC things such as ordering in a restaurant or going into an Epicierie. Thus the more “traditional EFL” topics would actually be better in French than in English as kids in Switzerland are not going to the butcher or baker shop. Here’s one link: https://www.francaispourlesbilingues.ch/ .
PPS: I find that the term "heritage" language is laden but perhaps I am wrong.
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