Supporting students who use English as an additional language: Lightening the cognitive load

Teacher Reflection

Published on: May 9, 2022

English as an additional language

5 min read

Emily Walker, Shaw Primary Academy, UK Cognitive load theory has been continually developed since the 1980s and is concerned with the processing ability of memory (Garnett, 2020). The following two areas of cognitive load are important to consider when supporting learners: the characteristics and level of complexity of the material or task itself, known as the intrinsic cognitive load the way in which a task is designed or presented (along with any extra elements that are required to undertake a task), known as extraneous cognitive load (Sweller et al., 2019; Shibli and West, 2018). For students for whom English is an additional language (EAL), the cognitive load of tasks may be heightened since they may have to translate lesson content or understand unfamiliar topics and concepts. In addition to acquiring academic skills, these pupils are also expected to acquire social and academic language simultaneously (Gustad, 2014) which can create more demands on their

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