Michael Gove proposes teaching foreign languages from age five

Education secretary outlines plans ahead of Tory conference, including extension of school day and tougher truancy fines Read the full interview with Michael Gove The education secretary, Michael Gove, today proposes that every child aged five or over should be learning a foreign language, and promises to “pull every lever”, including encouraging longer school days, to make it happen. In a pre-Conservative conference interview, he says “there is a slam-dunk case for extending foreign language teaching to children aged five”. He adds: “Just as some people have taken a perverse pride in not understanding mathematics, so we have taken a perverse pride in the fact that we do not speak foreign languages, and we just need to speak louder in English. It is literally the case that learning languages makes you smarter. The neural networks in the brain strengthen as a result of language learning.” In the interview he also: • Urges more schools to follow the example of academies by extending the school day, for example by adding five hours’ extra learning a week – or six weeks a year. • Calls for tougher, less means-tested, fines for parents of persistent school truants so that parental income needed “for satellite TVs, cigarette consumption or alcohol” is no longer taken into account in setting the fine. He also proposes schools or local authorities being entitled to bring prosecutions against parents of truants. • Says he is prepared for the political flak when A-level results fall, probably next year, as a result of introducing a tougher exam, including fewer bite-sized chunks. • Urges his party not to respond to the constraints of the coalition with the Liberal Democrats “by doing the things that make the most atavistic parts of our party cheer up”. He insisted the Conservative relationship with the Lib Dems “should be beyond businesslike, and instead be understanding and be appreciative of what they bring”. Arguing that the whole education system needs to be reorientated towards language teaching, Gove says he expects the national curriculum review to look at whether there should be more subject-specialist teaching in primary schools. He says that almost every other advanced country teaches children a foreign language from the age of five, adding Britain “has to set itself the same ambitious, but not impossible target”. “One of the problems we have had in education, and as a country, is that we have been too insular for too long.” Gove says the reform will require changes to teacher training, as well as encouraging teaching schools that take over chains of schools to promote languages. Gove pointed out that schools in some deprived areas, such as parts of Nottingham, were already teaching Spanish at the age of five, and if it was possible for these schools, it should be possible nationwide. “If we pull all the levers, change teacher training, help training schools to support others to go down this path, get schools that have language potential to take over under-performing schools, and we move the curriculum review in the right direction, then we can move towards the goal. The number of pupils sitting a language GCSE plummeted from 444,700 in the summer of 1998 to 273,000 in 2010. Learning a foreign language, and the culture that goes with it, is one of the most useful things we can do to broaden the empathy and imaginative sympathy and cultural outlook of children.” Gove also says: “One of the problems we have is children are not in school long enough in the day and during the

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