QCA's report on the feasibility of extending the teaching of modern foreign languages (MFL) in primary schools is available to download from the right-hand menu. This report was submitted to the secretary of state for education in March 2001.

The report was based on an analysis of national and international research and an extensive survey of provision in England. It also drew on the Early Language Learning initiative managed on behalf of the government by the Centre for Information on Language Teaching and Research.

The survey was carried out on behalf of QCA by Warwick University, and the analysis of research can also be downloaded from this page.

The results of the survey in 2000 indicated that 21 per cent of maintained schools with pupils in key stage 2 taught MFL, but with considerable regional variations. Approaches to teaching MFL at key stage 2 were also extremely varied, and there was evidence that some of these approaches were more effective than others.

Please note that these PDF files may take a few minutes to download on a basic modem.