Page 110 - 《客語及少數族群語言政策》附錄_少數語言法律

110

5. The education workforce, resources
and qualifications

The education workforce

In order to create more speakers, our education system is completely dependent on the workforce –
teachers, support staff, early years practitioners, trainers and lecturers. If we are to increase the
numbers who speak and use Welsh to the extent required, the first necessary step will be to lay
the foundations to create an adequate supply of teachers and practitioners in the right places to
teach children and young people through the medium of Welsh. Creating a workforce with robust
linguistic skills, able to inspire and motivate learners, is essential to the success of the strategy.
Our greatest priority will be to increase the system’s capacity to meet the need to expand Welsh-
medium education and training, and to meet the need to improve how Welsh is taught in
English-medium schools. For the statutory education sector this involves workforce planning in
order to train new teachers, support trainee teachers and teaching assistants, and expand
sabbatical schemes and professional learning opportunities for the current workforce. For primary
teachers, we will need to see an increase in the number of teachers who can teach in Welsh from
2,900 to 3,900 by 2031 and to 5,200 by 2050. In secondary schools, we will need to see an
increase in the number of teachers who can teach Welsh from 500 to 900 by 2031 and to 1,200 by
2050; and we will need to see an increase in the number of secondary teachers who can teach
through the medium of Welsh from 1,800 to 3,200 by 2031 and to 4,200 by 2050.

Welsh language and Welsh-medium training for early years practitioners will be provided by
means of several programmes. Since increasing Welsh-medium early years childcare provision
is essential to our aim of achieving a million speakers, we need to ensure a coordinated plan to
develop this important workforce. We will also need to see a substantial increase in the number
of post-16 lecturers and trainers able to teach through the medium of Welsh.

We will give greater attention to training on Welsh-medium and Welsh language pedagogy
and methodology, in order to ensure that the skills and knowledge of the workforce are
informed by evidence about effective immersion methods and Welsh-medium and bilingual
teaching.

110