Schools: Modern Languages

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

Again, I am pleased to say that A-level entries in modern languages have increased by nearly 4% since 2014, but I accept the point that we need to do more. Obviously through its support for strategically important subjects, HEFCE has invested £3.1 million in trying to increase student interest in modern languages. That includes engaging with employers to stimulate demand, promoting the employability of graduates, and increasing the participation of students in spending a year abroad. Although universities are autonomous, a number of them offer free language courses to students studying other subjects. Particularly in science, for instance, a number of universities offer chemistry with, say, German in order to encourage more young people to keep up their language skills.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, it is pretty well known that learning a language is easier the younger you start. A number of primary schools in the country—probably quite a large number—now offer modern language opportunities for their students. Can the Minister tell us how that programme is working out and whether there is any evidence yet that it is affecting the numbers who are choosing to take modern languages once they get to secondary school?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

I am afraid that I do not have the figures specifically on primary schools, but I can say that with the freedom that we are giving head teachers through our education reforms we have seen a number of bilingual primary schools open for the first time. The Judith Kerr Primary School, for example, offers bilingual education, providing lessons in German alongside English, and the La Fontaine Academy offers French alongside English. Both are primary schools. I absolutely agree that we want to encourage children to start speaking languages at a young age, which is why, as I mentioned, we have invested in a number of projects to help encourage teaching. The Rushey Mead Academy in Leicester, for instance, is working with five other teaching alliances to focus and help primary schools on grammar and assessment. The Association for Language Learning is working with 500 schools across the north-east, the east of England and the Midlands to set up regional centres to improve teaching and training and to share best practice. We want school-to-school collaboration to help this to go through the system.