All pupils will study a foreign language for their Junior Cert by 2021 under ambitious new plans to be announced by the Education Minister.
Richard Bruton says Ireland should aim to be within the top ten in Europe when it comes to foreign languages.
When it comes to learning foreign languages, Ireland is at the bottom of the class at second level and barely on the chart at primary school.
But under new plans to be announced later today, Education Minister Richard Bruton says we should benchmark ourselves against the best English Speaking country in the world for foreign languages within a decade.
Under the plan, all pupils will take a foreign language for the Junior Cert by 2021, and there’ll be an extra 10% of pupils taking a foreign language for leaving cert – encouraging them to think beyond French.
Chinese will also be introduced as a leaving cert subject for the first time, and so-called heritage languages such as Polish, Lithuanian and Portuguese will get their own proper curriculum.
Admitting that there may not be enough teachers available to teach these subjects, Minister Bruton says an audit will be carried out to see what language skills teachers may have, with a bid to upskilling them.
