Parents in Australia found an opportunity for their children to learn something new outside the school settings. In the past years, a number of playgroups rose where children can learn different languages.
According to SBS Australia, some groups aimed to introduce their culture and languages to children at a very young age. It is supplementing areas that largely devoid of policy initiatives.
The federal government funded the trial program with $9.8 million last year to teach languages to pre-school students using play-based application. The application offered a trial session of Mandarin, Japanese, Indonesian, French, and Arabic.
According to Nesha O'Neil, owner of two childcare centers that supported the trial said that the children were doubtful at first but soon they got a hang of the technology.
"Once they worked out how easy it was a how fun it was for them, they were just enthralled, " O'Neil said. "And we had to really limit the amount of time they could spend on it," she added.
O'Neil also said that some parents are doubtful about their children taking this language learning courses. Some of them are concerned about the length of screen time, or about their children learning Arabic. However, most of them are surprised at how much language their children learned.
On the other hand, the language-learning in England is not new. In late 2002 and 2010, some primary schools are already teaching their students new languages and most of them can cope up, according to British Council. Today, language-learning is a huge part of education. Ninety-nine percent of schools that responded to the national survey said that they teach a language.
The language-learning had become a normal part of children's learning from the beginning of their primary school. Some say that they rather take language learning subject than challenging themselves with new subject associated with pressures of starting secondary school.
