British schools are not going to meet their targets for language instruction.

There is a  plan in Britain for language lessons to be available for seven to 11 year olds by 2010 - with languages set to become compulsory the following year. This and more is discussed in this BBC article on language instruction in British Schools.

I still say that early language instruction will likely put the kids off languages. Just let them listen to stories and read, (and use LingQ), and keep the grammar commissars and testers away from them. Let the kids enjoy the languages rather than learning to dislike them. They are more likely to learn languages in the long run that way.

Comments

[Alex Case]

"I still say that early language instruction will likely put the kids off languages"

What you describe- stories, maybe reading (although teaching them foreign alphabets may kill any motivation if they do that), also songs, crafts, projects, learning poems, playing with the language- could also be said to be early language instruction. I've taught kids EFL from as young as three, sometimes battling against an idiotic grammar based syllabus, and though they don't learn as much as older kids per classroom hour I doubt you could find a parent, kid or headmaster who would think that my lessons had demotivated them

[BM]

Small nit-pick: This article applies to England, not Scotland (which uses an altogether different education system), Wales or Northern Ireland (where education is handled by the Welsh and Northern Irish Assemblies).

I don't really have anything more that I can add, since all the rest I agree with.

[Steve Kaufmann]

Alex, Yes. Language discovery not language instruction.