Sydney Catholic Schools guarantee kids can do same language K-12
Students attending Catholic Schools in the Sydney diocese will be the first to be offered the chance to study the same language right through their schooling years — with Japanese the first language offered.
NSW
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Students at Sydney Catholic Schools will be able to study the same foreign language from Kindergarten to Year 12, even if the child moves to the other side of the city.
The Sydney Catholic Schools diocese will be the first region to put an end to inconsistent language offerings between primary and secondary schools, which can prevent students studying the same language throughout their education.
Beginning with Japanese, parents of primary students can send their children to any high school in the Sydney Catholic Schools diocese and be guaranteed they can keep learning the language.
Rather than hire an army of Japanese teachers for its 152 primary and secondary schools across the city, Japanese teacher Peter White has made an iPad app which students can use in class, and teachers will be beamed into classrooms via internet-enabled whiteboards.
From the beginning of next year, expert language teachers will host online classes from four soundproof booths at St Brigid’s Primary School in Marrickville.
To begin, 24 primary schools will offer Japanese from next year, with scope to introduce additional languages if the pilot is successful.
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“If a student consistently learns one language over their schooling, you can expect them to be fluent by Year 8,” Mr White said.
In NSW, students must study 100 hours of one language in one continuous 12 month period in Year 7 or Year 8, which is too little, too late, according to Mr White.
“At the moment it’s not mandatory for primary school students to learn a language, even though it’s so much easier to teach young kids, who are like sponges,” he said.
“Adolescents picking up new languages for the first time aren’t inclined to make, and learn, from their mistakes because they are self-conscious and worry about the judgement of their peers.”
If students take foreign language classes in primary schools in NSW, parents are often hard-pressed to find a nearby high school that offers the same subject, according to Australian Federation of Modern Language Teachers Associations president Amanda Pentti.
According to Ms Pentti, the inconsistency typically comes about because local schools don’t communicate or the schools’ subject selection is based on whatever language teachers are available.
“If kids can continue on from the language they were learning in primary school through to high school, that would be ideal, but it doesn’t happen often in NSW,” Ms Pentti said.
“Sometimes the way foreign language subjects are chosen is purely based on who your can get to staff the school’s languages program.”
There’s no reason the education department can’t adopt online language lessons to address declining foreign language enrolments, according to Mr White.
A 2013 NSW government policy document set a target of 40 per cent of Year 12 students studying a foreign language within a decade.
Only 9 per cent of Year 12 students studied a foreign language in this year’s HSC, which is down from last year.
It comes after an interim report into the NSW Curriculum Review last week criticised the education system for inadequate continuity in foreign language classes across primary and secondary schools.
According to the review, “languages, like mathematics, are subjects where much of the learning is cumulative … and very few students anywhere in Australia have access to continued language learning through their primary and secondary schooling”.
A spokesman for the education department said secondary schools receive students from a wide range of feeder primary schools, which can add complexity to meeting the needs of the local school community.