Factors that influence attitudes towards early foreign language learning in Slovenia

Abstract

The paper presents the research results into young learners’ attitudes towards their first foreign language (FL 1) according to their age and grade. A 406-strong sample of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th graders participated. The results showed no statistically significant differences in the T-test, whereas the results from the ANOVA and the Bonferroni post-hoc test showed statistically significant correlations, establishing that the attitudes of the fourth graders and partly third graders differ significantly from those of the second graders for most of the items. The discourse of primary school class teachers with ESP training might have triggered the formation of different attitudes among students in comparison to general training in philology. Hence, an age- and grade-appropriate teacher training certainly makes all the difference.

Keywords

• young learners
• esp
• foreign language learning
• philology
• state elementary school