The primary years are highly language centred years for children. They come to school equipped with certain language skills – those skills that they have picked up from their families and neighbourhood. It is now the language teacher’s task to build upon these skills and help children use language effectively for communication and comprehension.

What is to become of these children? It is too early to even guess. But children certainly look forward to life. To speak about the wonders of life; to express their joys, excitements and frustrations, they need to use words and language. Equipped already with functional native language skills, these are the years of rabid vocabulary building and a period of transition for using phrases to using complete sentences for expression. Every child has a natural instinct to observe other people’s talk and to imitate them. The primary school’s language programme is to strengthen this natural urge and to embark on a systematic usage of language.