Development of a Comprehensive English Instruction Curriculum for Primary Students

Acknowledging the benefits of early language learning and the fact that the ability to communicate fluently in both academic and social English is highly valued, our educators have developed a comprehensive curriculum of EFL instruction to develop young learners in both language competence and social knowledge. The paper is to give an overview of the key elements in developing the curriculum to achieve these goals. To be able to do this, a clear and linear framework, which is mapped to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) levels, is applied for the whole primary curriculum, in which grade 5 is the final stage when students are expected to achieve language competence at A2/ A2 high. Also, the search for relevant materials and the creation of original ones are required to facilitate students’ language acquisition and broaden their social knowledge. The attainment of the goals has been demonstrated in students’ performance in an international standardized test - TOEFL Primary Step 1 and 2 at two stages: by the end of grade 3 and grade 5 respectively. The test results by the end of grade 5 show that 100% of the students achieved the expected outcome. Noticeably, 24, 49% and 36,73% of these students achieved B1 in reading and listening skills respectively, which exceeded the expected outcome of the program. Key words: Curriculum and material development, EFL young learners, testing and assessment