< Previous | Contents | Next >

Citizens of a Multilingual World: Key Issues

5. A Languages Entitlement

This section sets out in detail our view of a basic languages entitlement for all students. If the entitlement is to be effectively delivered, it is important also to specify what support local authorities and schools should be entitled to receive. It argues that while the entitlement should be there for all learners, local authorities should have considerable flexibility in delivering it.

Our Rationale leads us to propose that all students should have a clear entitlement to a significant and high-quality modern language experience during their compulsory period of study at school. This is when much of the 'essential person' is formed. We believe that a significant capability in languages and international culture should contribute to the formation of this 'essential person'. Otherwise, we do not see how students in Scottish schools will be adequately prepared for full inclusion, participation and citizenship in European and international society.

We believe that the above entitlement represents a substantial improvement over the current voluntary, ad hoc and highly variable provision of modern languages across the country. In addition, we see the 500 hours as being a figure that should be reviewed with a view to revising it upwards once our recommendations for the staffing of modern languages at primary school (see Section 10: Preparing and Supporting Teachers) have been agreed and are in place.

Delivering the entitlement: responsibilities and opportunities

Is there one, and only one, type of provision that will meet this entitlement?

• We do not think so. What is important is that the entitlement should be effectively 'delivered', not that this should happen inflexibly in one standard way. We believe that local authorities in collaboration with their schools should be strongly encouraged to develop their own innovative ways of meeting the entitlement.

What is likely to be the most commonly adopted way of meeting the entitlement?

• We believe this is likely to consist of students taking one and the same modern language at P6 and P7 for 75 minutes per week, amounting to approximately 100 hours at primary school, followed by some 400 hours at secondary school from S1-S4 inclusive (in keeping with existing Guidelines issued by Learning and Teaching Scotland). However, the 500 hours from P6 onwards could be distributed in other ways, with more than 100 hours at primary and less than 400 hours at secondary, leading to a National Qualification in S3 rather than S4. It is right that for some considerable time to come most of the language teaching should be done at secondary level, since the nation's main language-teaching force will remain its secondary-school teachers. They have a degree qualification in their language, have spent their required residence abroad and have gained a full specialist professional qualification to teach it.

Why 75 minutes per week in P6 and P7?

• This will allow a sufficient amount of time for students over P6 and P7 to develop an initial capability in their modern language. In turn this will increase their chances of positive transfer of learning to secondary school. Ideally, the 75 minutes will be distributed on the basis of 15 minutes per day, but we accept that this is unlikely to happen until the currently prevalent 'drop-in' model of staffing has been substantially reduced. (The 'drop-in' model refers here to MLPS teaching in a school being delivered to all or most classes at P6 by the one MLPS-trained teacher. It does not refer to secondary or primary school teachers, foreign language assistants or relevant others 'dropping in' in order to complement what is done by the classteacher).

How will this most commonly adopted way be better than what exists at present?

• There will be full 5-14 Guidelines for modern languages that did not exist previously. More time will be made available at primary school by specifying the 75 minutes per week. Better links will be established to Standard Grade or other forms of National Qualification. There will be strong central support of various sorts (via Learning and Teaching Scotland, the Scottish Qualifications Authority, Scottish CILT and the Teacher Education Institutions). Languages will be more positively marketed in schools. A momentum will build up for 'ICT and languages', giving them a modern and motivating image. There will be better feedback for students on their learning and progress and better guidance and information concerning languages for further study and career. From these improvements in provision, improvements in outcome will be expected, in terms of higher standards of achievement for all students and higher rates of uptake of language courses following completion of the 500 hours entitlement.

Why then should all schools not adopt the one common way?

• They can, if they and their local authority so choose. However, although (as indicated above) the most common way will be better than at present, it contains at least one disadvantage. It is based on the 'drip-feed' approach to language learning whereby a relatively small amount of time is given to languages each week for six years. Within the 'drip-feed' approach we have argued that a little each day is better than once or twice per week, especially at primary school. However, the drip-feed approach by its nature allows little opportunity for real language use and places high demands on learners' cognitive and retentive abilities. As a consequence it puts less cognitively mature learners at a disadvantage, as we know from our experience in Scotland. International research suggests that students may make better progress and achieve higher levels of motivation if instead of being drip-fed they receive more intensive experiences in their modern language. Local authorities may therefore wish to explore alternatives to drip-feeding when considering how best to distribute the 500 hours entitlement that we are recommending

What level of modern language competence will the 500 hours deliver?

• If the other aspects of the entitlement are also in place, we believe that the 500 hours will provide all students, regardless of their aptitude for languages, with an invaluable initial educational experience and with sufficient confidence and 'know-how' to enable them to put their modern language to use for purposes they see as beneficial. In Scottish circumstances competence in a modern language does not develop rapidly, it takes time. That is why we have recommended a 'continuous and progressive' 500 hours 'in the same language'. Given the importance of the time factor, we do not favour an entitlement to students to switch languages within the 500 hours. If students were given an entitlement of less than the 500 hours, we believe they would not have had sufficient opportunity to develop a usable competence in the language or (almost equally importantly) a deep enough awareness of the potential benefits to them that competence in a modern language might bring.

Innovative approaches to delivering the entitlement

There are many possibilities that local authorities and schools might consider which would draw on their own ideas and take account of local possibilities. Essentially, they would be saying:

Rather than follow what may be the most commonly adopted route (as indicated earlier), we believe we can deliver the entitlement differently and better.

The suggestions overleaf should not be viewed as an exclusive list. They are only some of the possibilities that local authorities might wish to develop in accordance with their local circumstances, needs and priorities. Innovations such as these may help either to deliver the entitlement in a particularly effective way or may indeed serve to exceed the entitlement, e.g. by adding in a more substantial number of hours through early or late immersion.

Key questions to ask of such innovations would be:

• Do they raise standards of proficiency in the language?

• Do they raise levels of motivation?

• Do they enhance uptake through and beyond the entitlement period, and in particular into S5 and S6?

• Do they contain good systems for monitoring and evaluation?

• Do they contain plans for sustainable development?

Entitlements for local authorities and their schools

How can local authorities and their schools be supported in meeting the student entitlement?

Viewing the entitlement in this flexible way not only 'frees up' curricular space so as to provide local authorities and schools with opportunities for innovation, it also places heavy responsibility on them. What entitlements should authorities and schools in turn have that will allow them to fulfil this responsibility on behalf of their students and ensure the success of these innovations?

In order to make it possible for local authorities and schools to deliver the entitlement we believe the following actions are essential:

• Modern languages should be designated as a priority area for development and innovation funding over the next four years. A pointer in this direction already exists in the Scottish Executive consultation paper 'Improving Our Schools' which, in its section on 'Action Areas' and sub-section 'National priorities in the curriculum', identifies modern languages along with science as possibly meriting national priority status (pp14-15).

• ICT should be acknowledged as fundamental to the processes of learning and teaching languages in order to ensure regular contact with native speakers and up-to-date information that otherwise would not be available, and ICT equipment should rapidly be provided in all modern languages departments and classrooms.

• A special Languages Innovation and Training Fund (LITF) should be created that will allow local authorities to submit bids for innovative projects intended to deliver higher levels of motivation, language proficiency and post-16 uptake and that will allow them to meet their targets within their plans for action.

• Effective assessment and evaluation instruments should be developed for teachers and local authorities to use that will help them gauge and benchmark students' progress and evaluate the outcomes of the initiatives in which they are engaged.

A condition of receiving support from the Languages Innovation and Training Fund would be that the proposals submitted by local authorities contained plans and procedures for self-monitoring and -evaluation and that in addition there was some externality in these processes. The externality would allow the country as a whole to benefit from a greater awareness of the outcomes of different models in place. National bodies should support local authorities in planning, implementing, monitoring and evaluating their innovations. We are not suggesting that the LITF should become a permanent feature of modern languages provision but rather that it should be established for the short-to the middle-term, in order to launch the innovations that we believe are essential for taking languages out of their present situation. Proposals submitted to the LITF, however, should be geared to 'sustainable development' by containing plans for maintaining the innovation after the initial funding period is over.

Would the existence of a special LITF imply favoured treatment for modern languages as compared with other areas of the school curriculum?

• Scottish Gaelic already receives substantial support from the Scottish Executive not only for Gaelic-medium education but also for Gaelic-medium broadcasting. Without this, the language would struggle to survive. We accept there has to be a special case for Scottish Gaelic, given that it is a heritage language with a small and diminishing number of speakers, and so we do not argue that other modern languages require financial support on the same scale. We do believe however, that in any culture which has English as its dominant language, not only Scottish Gaelic but any modern language other than English is likely to require special support if it is to flourish in the education system. Although this is probably true at any time, it is undeniable that at present modern languages are perceived to be a problem area. We believe that the situation will be improved through the LITF that we are proposing. We are not arguing that the LITF should continue indefinitely but favour an initial period of at least four years. By then we will have a clearer sense of what to expect from some of our longer-term recommendations, e.g. on Initial Teacher Education for primary, and the situation can be reviewed.

How quickly can the entitlement be delivered?

• Given the highly variable situation at present on the ground, progress is bound to be patchy in the short-term. We are confident however that if the plans are innovative, forward-looking, have genuinely 'local ownership' and are nationally supported, the time-scale will not be a disincentive. We believe in fact that the extended time-scale will be an incentive, because it will take modern languages away from what participants at the open parts of our Action Group meetings have described as 'short-termism' and towards a more rational basis for securing an excellent mid- to longer-term future. We recommend that local authorities in consultation with their schools should set their own time-scale for achievement of the full entitlement and establish interim indicators that will signal progress towards this goal.

An entitlement for all

The entitlement gives all students the right to the sort of experience that we have outlined in our box headed 'key components of a languages entitlement for all students'. We believe this will greatly help students and their parents in forming a clear idea of the provision which they should have a right to expect when learning a modern language at school. This in turn places a responsibility on the 'system' in the form of national and local authorities and schools to make appropriate provision for delivering the entitlement and serves to reduce the substantial and dysfunctional variation in provision across the country which at present characterises modern languages at 5-14 (and Initial Teacher Education).

We consider that the entitlement should apply to the full range of learners and reject the argument that slower learners should be offered less than the full entitlement on the alleged grounds that they are incapable of making good progress in a language at school. One of the most encouraging submissions put to us has been the case for viewing learners with special needs and learning difficulties as persons who are indeed capable of benefiting from a modern language experience at school.

However we are not proposing that our recommended entitlement should be a legal requirement. The curriculum in Scottish schools does not operate in this way, and we can see no reason for recommending that a requirement should be imposed.

< Previous | Contents | Next >