ONE of the best examples of multi-racial Scotland at work is Shawlands Academy on the south side of Glasgow.

At the last count, there were more than 50 languages being spoken in the playground, including Punjabi, Urdu, Arabic, French and Polish.

For Ken Goodwin, headteacher at the school since 1999, ensuring all pupils are catered for in such a diverse cultural setting has been a challenge. But he also believes the richness of the school's make-up is a wonderful opportunity.

"In terms of ethnicity, nationality, and language, we are stunningly diverse here and even over the past few weeks we have enrolled new arrivals from the European Union, many of whom do not speak English, " he said.

"On the one hand, the diversity can be wonderfully enriching, but it does pose significant challenges where teachers are delivering a subject in English to a group of pupils with a wide range of linguistic ability."

Mr Goodwin said one of the key lessons learned by the school was that teaching pupils in their preferred language as well as in English was the best way to support their development at school, although so far opportunities were limited.

"Enabling children to take part in discussions in their own language is easiest in terms of Punjabi and Urdu because we have a large number of teachers who speak those languages, but it is more difficult to make that kind of provision for everyone, " he said.

"At the moment, we have kids who sit exams in languages such as Arabic using a system developed in England so at least these children get a qualification in those subjects, but it would be nice to see greater development in this area in Scotland.

"I think it is inevitable that the Scottish Qualifications Authority will have to address the growing linguistic diversity which exists in Scotland by allowing people to get certificates in their preferred language. There should be parity of esteem among all languages, such as Chinese, Arabic and Punjabi, to recognise that Scotland is now a very diverse country."