According to a media release from The Hon Simon Birmingham, Federal Minister for Education and Training, pre-schooler will now be taught Hindi as a foreign language.
The Turnbull Government has announced that applications for the Early Learning Languages Australia (ELLA) program will open to all Australian preschools.
Minister Birmingham said that the program to offer Australian pre-schoolers the opportunity to learn Hindi, Italian, Spanish, and Modern Greek.
Minister Birmingham said “almost 10,000 children had been part of the $9.8 million program so far.”
He added - “The ELLA program has been extremely popular with children, parents and educators and it’s exciting to see it not only expanded to a national rollout but to also include an additional four languages.”
Minister Birmingham said 32 per cent of the 8,540 current students were studying Chinese, 29 per cent Japanese, 24 per cent French, 13 per cent Indonesian and 2 per cent Arabic.
“Seeing and hearing young children counting, following recipes and singing in a language that isn’t their native tongue, you understand how engaging this app is and why it has had such positive feedback from kids, educators and families,” Minister Birmingham said.
Federal Minister for Education and Training Simon Birmingham Source: AAP
The media release says that an “independent evaluation found the app had helped 70 per cent of educators in the pilot program feel more confident incorporating languages into their lessons.”
Minister Birmingham also announced that applications were now open for all Australian child care centres and pre-schools and could be found at www.ella.edu.au
