Learning Foreign Languages In The British Education System

The last decade has seen an enormous amount of flux in terms of language teaching

trends in British schools, stemming from a 2002 change in education policy that had major implications for both primary and secondary schools. At one end, plans were put in place to have all children from the age of 7 learning a language by 2010, in order to improve engagement with foreign languages and address the problem of Britain's monolingual culture. At the other end, learning a foreign language at GCSE level was made non-compulsory in order to give students greater license to choose vocational subjects that better suited them.

So what have the consequences of this change of policy been? One immediately noticeable impact has been the sharp decline in the number of pupils taking a foreign language at GCSE, with year-on-year drops in level of uptake. This decrease has hit the traditional subjects of French and German hardest, leading schools to reduce their foreign language provision in order to adapt to the lack of demand.

It has also had a knock-on effect on the number of trainee teachers specialising in foreign languages, with the profession of language teaching recently described as being in 'decline'. This may be due to a lack of opportunities at secondary school level, and the perceived poor career prospects that come with the decrease in student numbers.

This has also proven to be an issue at primary school level, where educational leaders have bemoaned the quality of provision and lack of teachers with specialised teaching skills. Despite the initiative having been started in 2002, some have complained of a lack of proper training and funding. It has been claimed that a quarter of primary schools were unprepared for compulsory teaching in 2009, and recent research has slammed delivery of teaching across as Britain as 'catastrophically diverse'.

One report from Cambridge University has gone so far as to say that teaching languages at primary school has little positive impact on learning at secondary level, while others are worried that bad pronunciation by unskilled primary teachers may cause children to make mistakes that need to be 'unlearnt' later on.

But while there is concern, the change in educational policy may not have been for the worst. It is generally recognised that teaching a language at primary school has wider positive impacts on children's general educational development, and that learning foreign languages early on may help get kids excited about building their skills later in education. Indeed, part of the thinking behind the educational policy shift was that learning a language early would help improve kids' 'confidence, knowledge and experience' with other languages. Perhaps the changes will lead to more committed language learners at secondary level, although at present it's too early to tell.

There's also hope that the decline in language learning is already in reverse, with optimists pointing to the increasing uptake of Latin as a sign that students are still enthusiastic about language. All in all, the recent nature of the changes means that it's hard to predict the real impact of an emphasis on earlier learning and greater choice, but it's also clear that the government commitment to training and funding will be critical if language teaching policy is to be a success.

by: Hannah McCarthy

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