English is consolidating its position as the foreign language most commonly taught in Europe and more children are learning the language at an earlier age, a new EU-wide study has found.
According to a study of private and state schools by Eurydice, an intergovernmental EU education agency, English is a compulsory foreign language in 13 countries. However, even when there is a choice, pupils and their parents tend to favour English. Nine out of 10 European pupils learn English at some point in primary or secondary school and the figures are rising, Eurydice said in its 2008 Key Data on Teaching Languages in School in Europe report.
The trend towards compulsory English is particularly apparent in primary schools, with countries such as Greece, Italy and Portugal showing an increase of 20 per cent in the past five years in the number of primary pupils learning the language.
In Germany the number of children learning English before the age of 11 has tripled in five years and has doubled in Bulgaria, while at secondary level, English is growing most significantly in Bulgaria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
'Compulsory learning of a foreign language now begins in primary education in almost all European countries,' the report said. The average age is between eight and 10 but in some cases, such as Spain and parts of Belgium, children start at age three.
German and French are the second most widely taught foreign languages, with German most popular in northern Europe, sometimes chosen ahead of English in the Netherlands, some Nordic Countries and central and eastern Europe. French is popular in southern Europe. The trend towards learning two foreign languages in secondary school is also rising, with 58 per cent of European children now learning two foreign languages.