Dropping the requirement for schools to assess pupils’ proficiency in English is a “retrograde step” that could harm the education of pupils with English as an additional language, experts have warned.

Changes to the school census mean schools will no longer have to provide data to the government on pupils’ ability in English or on their country of birth and nationality.

The checks on children’s nationality had attracted controversy.

However, the Department for Education has been warned that the English proficiency check is essential and that getting rid of it will harm EAL learners.

Experts point out that EAL learners have a wide range of abilities and say the check has helped schools to identify their needs.

Peta Ullmann, chair of Naldic (National Association for Language Development in the Curriculum), said: “The collection and use of data on the English proficiency of EAL pupils are totally different from that currently collected about a pupil’s nationality and country of birth.

‘Carry on assessing English proficiency’

“EAL is now a permanent feature of our school population. Our ability to provide a high-quality, inclusive education for all pupils requires accurate EAL proficiency data for planning and teaching purposes.

“We strongly advise that the department reviews its recent decision for the withdrawal of the requirement for schools to collect data annually on proficiency in English. This is a retrograde step.”

She urged schools to carry on assessing the proficiency of their EAL learners even if the school census no longer requires them to do so.

The Bell Foundation, which promotes language education, has also urged the government to rethink its decision.

It said children with EAL have widely varying levels of English proficiency.

In a statement, it added: “Some have no English and some are fluent multilingual English-speakers; some may have lived in English-speaking countries or have been educated in English throughout their childhood and some may be refugees who have had limited prior education.”

The foundation said that although overall EAL learners outperform those with English as a first language, this data “hides as much as it tells us” about the needs of individual EAL learners.

The foundation’s director, Diana Sutton, said: “We know from schools that contact us and those that we work with that proper assessment of learners with EAL is hugely important. 

“If done well, it can help schools accurately assess need so that schools can develop appropriate teaching and support strategies to enable learners to fulfil their academic potential. Schools tell us that they need more support in order to achieve this. 

“However, since 2011 we have seen support for EAL removed throughout the country with specialist support services and expertise disappearing. Proper assessment and collection of data is especially important in this context to enable schools and the government to have a better understanding of the needs of this group of learners.”

A department for education spokeswoman said “The school census will continue to require schools to identify pupils who have English as an additional language and this data will be used to calculate funding for those schools to support those pupils. 

“We were clear from the outset that this data was being collected for internal research to help ensure every child receives the best possible education - and two years of data is sufficient to inform this work.”