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ESOL learners: the demands of reading
An ESOL learner’s understanding of English text is affected by their own cultural background and the literacy practices associated with that culture. They will not be able to make predictions about a text on the basis of their own experiences as easily as first-language speakers of English. Text structure, word order and spelling may be very different in their first language, making any transfer of learning difficult (refer here for information about the concept of language distance).
It is likely that refugees and some immigrants will have special literacy needs if their prior schooling was disrupted. The schooling they have received may not have been sufficient for them to establish a strong academic base in their first language. These learners may appear to be quite proficient in English if they have acquired what Cummins59 calls Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS) – that is, the verbal fluency in English needed for everyday informal situations. However, they are not likely to have the foundation oral-language and literacy skills to prepare them to understand and produce) more abstract, complex and academic texts.60