Teachers often tell me that there seems to be a big difference in their students’ social language and their classroom performance, especially in their second language. ‘Why can they talk well about their weekend activities, for example, yet the work they hand in uses very simple language and is full of mistakes?'

It takes students and their teachers time to develop Academic (school subject) Language fluency, in this talk I will present some strategies for classroom teachers to use when planning and delivering subjects in English that will help them and their students develop a greater awareness of the importance of language in the classroom.