Case studies : ESOL teacher: Jenny

Jenny graduated from Messiah College in the USA in 2006 with a degree in English education with teaching certification. She now works as English as an additional language coordinator for Eastbrook Comprehensive School in London.

After my degree I worked in New Jersey, USA, for a year teaching English to remedial students (students who had failed). I also taught public speaking there. I then moved to the UK and joined Eastbrook Comprehensive School as a SEN (Special Educational Needs) teacher, focusing on teaching humanities subjects to at-risk pupils. Due to certain problems, the programme wasn't achieving its goals and I was asked to use my EAL teaching skills to start working with new-to-English pupils in withdrawal sessions.

From there we got some money in the budget and I began ordering resources and linking in our programmes to the national curriculum and organising various kinds of in and out of class support, homework clubs, etc.

My role has gradually expanded and I’m now responsible for EAL and Ethnic Minority Achievement within the school. Although I am now the coordinator and lead the school team, I still do some EAL teaching in the school. Right now we are preparing to pilot the Edexcel ESOL course for autumn term 2010.

I really like my job as it’s a whole-school position and I love working with the children from all over and hearing the stories of their families and journey. I love encouraging them in their studies and helping them bring who they are into their work.

The downsides are that there are sometimes very sad stories, bullying and racism that needs to be taken into account and worked with.

I think you really need to have a love of children, families and communities for this type of work. I also think it’s important to focus on what you are getting from the child, not on what you are not getting