{"id":1607,"date":"2018-09-11T10:48:00","date_gmt":"2018-09-11T09:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/?p=1607"},"modified":"2019-05-07T21:31:01","modified_gmt":"2019-05-07T20:31:01","slug":"you-must-come-for-dinner-reporting-to-eal-parents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/2018\/09\/11\/you-must-come-for-dinner-reporting-to-eal-parents\/","title":{"rendered":"You must come for dinner – reporting to EAL parents"},"content":{"rendered":"

“You must come for dinner”. I doubt this phrase will be used during the parents’ evening, but let’s face it – it is not a real invitation, it’s just being polite.<\/p>\n

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Much has been said in papers and online about the British and their\u00a0use of language and euphemisms. It is quite funny, as it also suggests\u00a0what other people understand.<\/p>\n

When it comes to understanding, we all know there are some differences\u00a0between people\/cultures\/ languages.<\/p>\n

“I want to see the director now!”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

People from other countries may sometimes sound blunt, rude or\u00a0aggressive. They may not use “please” or “thank you” as much as it is\u00a0used in the UK. A Polish father came to our school saying very directly :”I want to\u00a0see the director now”. He was not irate or impolite, he has just not mastered the whole “I know he is busy, but would it be at all possible\u00a0to see the Principal now, please”.<\/p>\n

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Language barrier is one of the most common problems faced by Central\u00a0and East European parents \u00a0as identified by the “Consultation Work\u00a0with Families from the A8 Accession Nations (Czech Republic, Estonia,\u00a0Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia) living in Cambridgeshire – final report”.<\/p>\n

Also, one of their key findings is the problem of reporting to parents:<\/p>\n

“Some parents are initially misled by the way schools deliver\u00a0information on their children’s progress. Where there is an emphasis\u00a0on communicating positive achievements of students (even if minor)\u00a0instead of focusing on shortages in knowledge and areas that require\u00a0improvement and failures (which would be an approach parents were more\u00a0used to in their home countries), they get the impression that their\u00a0children are doing very well at school and do not need any additional support. They are subsequently often blind to emerging problems with\u00a0the performance of their children, and they do not motivate their\u00a0children to study more or react on time when the first symptoms of\u00a0problems occur.”<\/p>\n

I have so many Polish parents asking me:<\/p>\n

“Please can you tell me the truth about how my child is doing\u00a0 in school. They say s\/he is doing fine, but I do not think so.”<\/p>\n

So, next time you speak to an EAL parent, choose your words\u00a0carefully, please, or you might get a parent at your doorstep\u00a0expecting a full dinner!<\/p>\n

References:<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Consultation Work\u00a0with Families from the A8 Accession Nations (Czech Republic, Estonia,\u00a0Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia) living in<\/a><\/span>
\nCambridgeshire – final report<\/span><\/p>\n

48 Things British People Say And What They Actually Mean<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

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48 Things British People Say And What They Actually Mean Published 24\/02\/2014 by angmohdan<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“You must come for dinner”. I doubt this phrase will be used during the parents’ evening, but let’s face it – it is not a real invitation, it’s just being polite.   Much has been said in papers and online about the British and their\u00a0use of language and euphemisms. It is quite funny, as it Read More …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1631,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-eal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1607"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1607\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1775,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1607\/revisions\/1775"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eal.pjb.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}