Scottish children to start learning a second language from primary school

A new report by the Modern Languages Working Group, which was commissioned by the Scottish government, recommends that children in Scotland should start learning a second language from the first year of school. Currently, language subjects are introduced in the sixth year.

Ministers have signed an EU agreement promising to adhere to the recommendations made in the report, and the Scottish government is now looking to run a pilot scheme in around a dozen primary schools as soon as the coming 2012-2013 academic year.

Minister for Learning, Alisdair Allan, said

“The world is changing rapidly and radically and the government has a duty to ensure that Scottish schools prepare young people so they can flourish and succeed in the globalised, multi-lingual world we now live in.

One indisputable aspect of modern life is that more people travel widely for jobs and leisure and we must respond accordingly; we will not be as successful as a country and economy if we remain essentially a mono-lingual society.”