ELLA apps for primary school trial

The Early Learning Languages Australia program (ELLA) is a digital, play-based program that includes a series of interactive applications (apps), aimed at increasing young children’s awareness of other languages and cultures.

Education Services Australia has been successfully delivering the program on behalf of the Australian Government since 2014, with the program expanding every year. In 2019, there are more than 110,000 children in approximately 3500 preschools across Australia participating in ELLA.

In 2018–19, the Australian Government committed to further funding for the expansion of the ELLA program in preschools, including developing preschool apps in four additional languages. In addition, funding was provided to trial ELLA in primary schools with students in Foundation to Year 2 (F–2) in 2019–21. This includes funding for the design and development of four new apps for students in Year 1 and Year 2.

In late 2018, Millipede was commissioned by Education Services Australia to develop the new apps for the ELLA F–2 trial.

Like for the existing preschool apps (apps 1–7), the four new apps (apps 8–11) will be developed in the 13 languages identified in the Australian Curriculum: Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), French, German, Hindi, Indonesian, Italian, Korean, Japanese, Modern Greek, Spanish, Turkish and Vietnamese.

Work on the F–2 trial commenced in early 2019. The first new app will be deployed to schools participating in the trial in 2020.