Teaching English in Primary Schools: Benefits and Challenges

Abstract

Teaching English in primary schools relates to the readiness of the schools and the students’ proficiency levels. If the schools have the sufficiency of English teachers, media, and textbooks, they will be ready to teach English. It is because primary schools deal with young learners aged 6-12 years and this period is believed as the best moment to gain knowledge. It is in line with the basic principle stating that young learners can learn English better [11]. Teaching English in primary schools provides both benefits and challenges. The benefits are reported by Moon [16], Singleton [10], and Read [18], and the problems are pointed by Copland, et al. [9], Khamari et al. [8], and Wei-pei [7]. Regarding the issue, this article identifies the benefits and challenges based on theories and research findings and then proposes several solutions of the difficulties which can be the references for the schools to provide high-quality English teaching and learning. Keywords—teaching English in primary schools, benefits, challenges, solutions