Education experts call for 10-year plan to boost foreign language learning in schools

Education experts have told NationalWorld the government needs a 10-year plan for foreign language teaching in schools - after figures showed the number of students taking French, German and Spanish A Levels fell again this year in England.

Business leaders are also calling for a “fundamental change” in approach so the next generation of UK entrepreneurs are “born global”. Ministers say they’re spending nearly £15 million improving teaching and promoting the benefits of language learning.

The exams regulator Ofqual said on Thursday (1 June) there were just 2,210 German A Level entries this summer - a fall of 17% on last year, the biggest percentage drop of any subject on the curriculum, and 24% down on five years ago.

Around three times as many people - 6,510 - took French this year, and there were 7,545 Spanish entries, but these figures are still both 12.5% lower than 12 months ago.

The number of students sitting Spanish at GCSE has risen in the past few years - and those taking other modern languages like Mandarin have also increased. German GCSE entries have plummeted, though, from 42,175 in 2019 to 33,945 this summer.

The money problem

Budget issues have been partly blamed for the decline. “In some schools, there may well be kids who want to do A Level French but if there are only six of them, headteachers can’t afford to run the class and that’s a really big issue”, the British Council’s schools adviser Vicky Gough told us.

“In some cases they might do it on a reduced timetable, so children don’t get quite as much teaching, or they might teach the first and second A Level year groups together, which isn’t brilliant”.

New polling by the British Council shared with NationalWorld found that 35% of schools questioned by the charity said they’d no longer teach a language if there were only small numbers of pupils wanting to take it. Another factor is patchy teaching provision during primary and early secondary school, meaning language learning becomes a frustration for children rather than a passion.

“There are schools in parts of the country where [students aged between 11 and 14] have a single lesson a week”, Liz Black from the Association for Language Learning told NationalWorld. “It’s just not enough exposure, and that’s why pupils are saying they don’t feel a sense of progress so don’t opt to continue at GCSE”.

“This is crucial and we want longer-term, strategic thinking by the government because if we don’t do something…it’s dire”.

A sense of complacency

Gough thinks another reason for the drop in French and German A Level entries is attitude. “In the UK many people think English is enough, you don’t need another language, that’s a big part of the discourse, and we’ve done research in the past which found a lot of parents don’t recommend their children do languages - so there’s something around the dialogue that needs shifting”.

Black has a similar view: “In other European countries, they have English lessons every day, they grow up with the expectation that is what happens. That’s not the case [for foreign language learning] here, it’s not expected, it’s not hoped for, it’s not desired, and if we could change perspective, that would be useful”.

The business case

The government says it’s aware of these issues and is working to address them. It’s spending £14.9 million on a programme led by University College London to set up a new Centre of Excellence, which will work with schools across England to improve teaching standards. Language GCSEs are being reformed next year to make them more accessible and attractive to students, while money will be invested increasing the number of German teachers and championing German as a subject.

Despite Rishi Sunak’s recent focus on science and maths skills, ministers insist they recognise language learning is vital for the UK economy which “needs people who can communicate across the globe and trade with overseas businesses”. Researchers agree it’s a cause worth investing in; a study by Cambridge University last year found that for every £1 spent on promoting Arabic, French, Mandarin or Spanish education, the return was nearly £2. Germany is also one of Britain’s most important trading partners.

Jane Gratton from the British Chambers of Commerce - which represents tens of thousands of UK businesses - told NationalWorld her members are very keen to find recruits with language skills and, crucially, cultural awareness. “This helps businesses communicate with customers overseas”, she says, “and to expand into new export markets around the globe. These skills are really important for international trade and we know a shortage will undermine the UK’s export performance”.

“What we want is for the government to fund this properly and appropriately”, Gratton went on. “We need a fundamental change in approach so the next generation of business leaders and entrepreneurs are born global, with an inherent understanding that we are in a global marketplace”.

Gough also thinks it’s a good opportunity for ministers to prove they’re committed to their levelling up agenda. “The more disadvantaged you are, the less likely you are to learn languages, and if you’re a boy, it’s even worse [so] part of this is around communications, promoting the importance of language and culture, and showing what opportunities there are”.

Hopes - and fears - for the near future

Could technology help exploit those opportunities? Gratton says online learning could be one way “for groups of schools to bring students together” and solve the problem of small class sizes. Black is equally excited about the possibility of using tech to enhance language teaching - and says many schools already have “outstanding” provision generally. But she’s worried about the short-term as government reforms take time to filter through.

“If headteachers say they can’t afford to run a language, then students start going to other schools”, she says. “That affects the staffing and budgets. Then if you think about the drop in A Level entries, that affects the number of people going into teacher training for languages. We’ve got degree courses closing at some universities too”.

“The government says it will bring in more teacher trainees with the offer of bursaries, but it’s too ‘stop-start’ - people need to sit down and look at a 10-year plan to address these issues in a logical and coherent way”.