ROME -- Italy is one of the top countries for foreign language learning, with 98 percent of adolescents studying at least two, however only 16 in 100 then know how to use them.  So why is this?

 Looking at the numbers we see that all Italian teenagers learn not only the second language of English, but 98.4 percent also learn a third language, which typically tends to be French.  This goes against the European average of only 60 percent of students who study two languages other than their own, according to Eurostat.  So why is it that only 16 percent of Italians speak two other languages, in contrast to 21 percent of EU citizens, whilst 40 percent don’t speak any?

 Italy is amongst the 14 European countries who teach English as an obligatory subject from the age of six, with another foreign language being added as part of the curriculum in 2010 for those over 11.  Once they reach high school, however, less than 50 percent of the courses offer the option of a second language.  So is the investment that happens in middle school – around 200 hours in three years – a complete waste?

 Until several years ago foreign languages were studied almost exclusively in high schools geared towards languages, with very few hours for other specialities, entirely absent from primary education and with little worth at university.  Now it starts from nursery, with several university courses taught in English and the obligatory second foreign language until middle school.

 But with fewer than 50 percent of students pursuing these studies, they are yet to catch on.  The imbalance between the amount invested and the lack of use is significant.  The culprit?  The superficiality with which it is taught: primary teachers who have only attended university funder the old masters, with the majority of teachers who have not refreshed their teaching for at least ten years.

 With the school reforms, however, at last comes investment in teaching, says Gisella Langè,technical inspector of the Ministry of Education and a consultant for foreign languages ​​and internationalisation, “40 million euros a year, for three years, with priority towards languages and digital technologies.”  The new obligations for teachers will also require them to be at B2 (intermediate) level of English.

 Nevertheless, it will take years to see these effects on the majority of the adult population.  Meanwhile “We must rethink how to teach,” says Raffaele Mantegazza, Professor of General Pedagogy at the University of Milan Bicocca, “Languages should be an instrument of learning, before being the object of study, using short, age-appropriate, texts: a comic book, a review, an original idiom.”

 He believes they should be thought of as the vehicle of the nations and as a tool of relationships, regardless of their professional use.  With this objective, he says, it is also important to promote them in the scientific and classical orientated high schools.

 The countries of Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands lead the way in language learning.  School hours dedicated to teaching foreign languages ​​are similar, but the Nordic countries excel because the immersion into idioms starts from an early age, with cartoons which are not dubbed. Then come the original language films, websites consulted in the original English and travelling. The family environment also plays a role: If the parents lead the way, by listening to the original all that you can or reading books in English, for example, a different sensitivity to languages is developped in the children.

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