Evaluation of the Key Stage 2 Language Learning Pathfinders

However, secondary teachers do not universally welcome the growth of primary languageswork:‘The kids who have had German in their primary schools are streets ahead of the others.This can be a problem.’ (secondary teacher)There was still a feeling that many secondary schools did not really value or take full accountof the work done in primary schools. Concern was expressed by primary teachers andheads that secondary schools would not acknowledge their pupils’ prior language learning,which would lead to work covered in KS2 being repeated in KS3. One primaryheadteacher felt that there was little the primary school could really do to influence whathappened at secondary school, particularly when they fed into so many schools. Often theresponse from the secondary was simply ‘that’s nice’ but everyone knew that the pupilswould start again.‘I was worried that our children would be fired up with enthusiasm here and then they go towhatever secondary school it is and they start again from scratch and then they becomedisaffected. It’s like pouring water on that flame, isn’t it?’ (primary teacher)‘But also, it doesn’t have a street cred, if they’re being asked to do very simple things. Thedesign of MFL needs to keep on taking on board that early language skills need to bedesigned for children to access at different ages, but with different images that are modernand have high street credibility. […]’ (primary teacher)In one Pathfinder where schools concentrated on the oral approach to language learning,teachers were less anxious about repetition:‘If they go to secondary school and are doing French there, they will have done no writtenwork, so the secondary school will have to introduce the written work. It’s [then] not so mucha question of their repeating everything, they will have orally similar sorts of things thatthey’re doing, but they won’t have done the written work. It actually gives the children, wefind, a bit of a confidence boost, because ‘Ah, this is something we can already do’. (primaryteacher)One primary languages co-ordinator wondered whether some secondary schools were reallyaware of how much some children could do in French by the time they entered year 7. The97