“She speaks English fine. So why is the writing behind?”

At least six years, and that is normal

The Australian Education Research Organisation tracked over 110,000 students learning English as an additional language through NSW public schools from 2014 to 2022. For a child starting school at the Beginning level of English, the finding is plain.

The report puts it this way: students starting at Beginning levels of English can, on average, expect to participate equitably in curriculum learning only after at least six years of schooling— consistent with international research putting the figure at roughly five to seven years. Each phase of the progression took longer than the one before it: the time for half of the students to move from Beginning to Emerging was a year and a month, Emerging to Developing about a year and eight months, and Developing to Consolidating about two years and seven months EAL-12.

Sit with what that means. A child who arrived in Year 2 is still on that trajectory in Year 8. Nothing has gone wrong. The timeline is simply longer than the conversational fluency that made everyone — teachers included — assume the work was finished.

You are far from alone in this

In the 2024 calendar year Victorian government schools enrolled 8,678 newly arrived EAL learners, an 8% increase on 2023 and more than three times the COVID-affected 2021 figure of 2,695. Those students came from 135 language backgrounds.

This is an ordinary Melbourne classroom situation, not an unusual one — and the scale is part of why a stretched school may not have the time to explain the six-year timeline to you.

What the study does not say

• It is NSW data. Over 110,000 students, but in one state system. Victoria is not measured here, and the study deliberately excluded First Nations students learning English as an additional dialect.
• It measures trajectories, not interventions.It describes how long the journey typically takes. It does not test whether tutoring, or any other support, shortens it — so nobody, including this practice, can honestly promise you that it does.
• “On average” hides real variation. First language, age on arrival and prior schooling all move the number substantially for an individual child.

What actually helps, given a six-year timeline

• Stop reading the lag as a verdict.A Year 8 report that says “needs to develop analytical writing” may be describing a child exactly on schedule. That reframing is worth more than any worksheet.
• Keep the first language. Nothing in this evidence suggests dropping it helps, and the academic language a child builds in one language is not lost when they build it in another.
• Target academic English, not conversation.The gap is in the written, formal register — the sentence that carries an argument. That is the specific thing worth teaching, and it is what the writing clinic works on, free to read.
• If VCE is ahead, check the EAL pathway. VCE EAL is a distinct subject with its own eligibility rules; the four Englishes compared sets out how they differ.