Sound start: How one primary school got to grips with Spanish

The Government wants every seven-year-old to learn a language. Are our schools up to it?

Anyone who has sweated over German grammar in high school or struggled to order lunch from a Parisian waiter knows that the older you are, the harder it can be to get to grips with a new language. Young children, however, have a natural curiosity and a lack of inhibition, which can make learning a new language pain-free – and even fun.

This at least is the experience of many primary schools as they gear up to deliver the languages entitlement of the National Languages Strategy which states that by 2009/10 all primary children should have the opportunity to learn a language from the age of seven. Primary schools appear to have embraced this challenge. The latest statistics show that 84 per cent of primaries are now offering a language to seven-year-olds, up from 70 per cent in 2006.

The results can be impressive. Walk down the corridors of Park Royal Primary in Macclesfield, for example, and the children call out "bonjour monsieur" to language enthusiast and head teacher Nick Warren. French isn't the only language that can be heard in this school of 400 pupils: on 26 September, the school's European Day of Languages celebration saw some 80 activities underway in 20 different languages with the children learning about Polish, Moldovan and even Tagalog, which is spoken in the Philippines, reflecting the ethnic diversity of the school body.

"Languages are embedded in the ethos of the school," says Warren, highlighting the colourful mosaics at the front of the building which depict the different flags of the pupils' home countries (there are 20-odd mosaics). "We start the school day by doing the register in French and from there it is part of everything we do."

The school, which has won plaudits for its approach to languages, teaches French to all pupils. It is taught on an informal basis to Reception, and as part of the curriculum for one -hour-a-week to Key Stage 2. French creeps into all aspects of the curriculum: literacy, geography, even PE. One Year 4 project saw the pupils venture out into the town – following directions given in French of course – armed with digital cameras to take pictures of key buildings, such as the town hall and post office. They then had to build a big map using the pictures and label them in French. Year 5 teachers also developed a whole unit based around French writer Jules Verne that saw pupils learning some German and Icelandic as they followed events in his popular classic, Journey to the Centre of the Earth.

"This is a glorious opportunity for teachers to think outside the box and produce some really inspiring teaching," says Warren. "Not all of our teachers are brilliantly competent linguists. But they are comfortable doing their bit in the classroom, and they know that the emphasis has to be on making it fun so the children feel positive about languages when they go to high school."

Given that most primary language teaching is undertaken by non-linguists, it's surprising how much enthusiasm there is for the Key Stage 2 challenge. "Even teachers who are just dipping their toes into language teaching are full of excitement," says Therese Comfort, head of primary at Cilt, the National Centre for Languages. "There's a lot of willingness among teachers. But that's not to underestimate the challenge for those who may not have spoken a foreign language for a long time. It can be daunting for them."

This explains why most schools are opting for French, as it is the language most of us remember from our own school days. Of those schools providing primary languages, 89 per cent offer French, 23 per cent Spanish, 9 per cent German with a small number (fewer than 3 per cent) offering Italian, Chinese, Japanese or Urdu.

There is a wide range of resources for teachers who want to brush up their language skills and get some lesson ideas ( www.nacell.org.uk and www.primarylanguages.org.uk, for example). DVDs and CDs can be used to provide models for correct pronunciation.

And it seems the primary classroom is the ideal place to learn languages. "Primary schools are very safe and secure environment so children feel they can take risks and try out these new sounds," says Comfort. "And primary teachers can easily make links with other subjects, by doing the warm-up exercises in PE in French for example. This means it's little and often, which is a great approach for young children."

But the real challenge of the Key Stage 2 strategy will come when these children move up to secondary school. Will their enthusiasm be sustained? "It will be interesting because pupils will be arriving with mixed experiences," says Comfort. "Some will have done four years of languages, some will have done just one, and they will have been learning different languages. This is why links between primary and secondary schools are so important to make sure that at some point there's a unity of understanding."

'You hear Spanish in the corridors'

It seems that everyone at St Matthew's CE Primary School in Telford is speaking Spanish. John Newton ( pictured above), Key Stage 2 co-ordinator, explains how it happened.

"As soon as we knew language would become a statutory requirement, we began planning and talking about what language to go for. We decided on Spanish because it's the most widely spoken language after English, and many of our families and staff holiday in Spain.

There were some doubts. Speaking another language in this country is not revered the way it is elsewhere and as soon as it was mentioned I could see the fear in everyone's eyes. But at primary level, it's not about having perfect pronunciation or learning 100-words-a-week. It's about culture, identity and having fun. The vocabulary comes in small drops.

We wanted to get everyone involved. It was a new curriculum and an opportunity to open our doors to the wider community. We started off with after-school classes that that drew in everyone from teaching assistants to cleaners, dinner ladies and caretakers. We also taught parents who would come in with their children after school for sessions led by a native Spanish speaker.

It has got the whole school buzzing and now you hear Spanish everywhere in the corridors. The children have taken to it wonderfully. As adults we are quite insular and worry about sounding silly. But with children those inhibitions are not so strong and they pick things up so quickly. We've really seen that it helps with other lessons in the curriculum. The focus on speaking, listening and grammar has raised skills across the board.

We now have a full-time member of staff with a background in Spanish. We're also planning to make links with a school in Spain, using video conferencing so the children can see and hear their counterparts in a Spanish school."