Purpose Statement
This learning area equips students with the linguistic, cultural, and sociolinguistic knowledge needed to communicate in an additional language.
Learning Languages provides students with the knowledge and practices to interpret meaning, adapt communication for different audiences and situations, and communicate purposefully in increasingly complex contexts. It also supports literacy development by strengthening students’ understanding of how language works, how meaning is communicated, and how spoken, written, and signed language are used in different contexts.
Through learning additional languages, students develop understanding of the cultural and social contexts in which languages are used and recognise that language reflects and upholds the values, stories, and practices of different communities andmcultures. This enables them to contribute meaningfully to New Zealand’s diverse society and increasingly interconnected world.
Learning Languages exposes students to new ways of thinking about themselves and their world. It can deepen understanding of their first language, strengthen cultural connections, contribute to the vitality of languages, and build confidence in communicating with others in a range of contexts.
Learning Languages prepares students to further develop their language proficiency in Years 11–13 in the language they have studied, including Te Reo Māori, New Zealand Sign Language, Gagana Sāmoa, Gagana Tokelau, Lea Faka-Tonga, Te Reo Māori Kūki ‘Āirani, Vagahau Niue, French, German, Spanish, Chinese (Mandarin), Japanese, and Korean.
Word or phrase | Description |
|---|---|
Additional language | Any language learnt in addition to a person’s first language (or home language). |
Character-based writing system | A writing system in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or concept rather than an individual sound or letter. |
Characters | Written script in Korean that represents letters and sound. Characters are combined to create a single syllable, which are then combined with other syllables to create words and meaning. |
Clause | A group of words that contains a subject and a predicate (usually a verb or an adjective). |
Cognitive flexibility | The ability to switch between thinking about different concepts. |
Communication | Process of sharing information, ideas, thoughts, or feelings. Refers to all modes of communication: signing, watching, and interacting in New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL); and listening, speaking, reading, writing, and interacting in all other languages. |
Conjugation | The process of changing a verb or adjective from their dictionary form to match the context of the sentence. |
Cosmology | Scientific study of the origin, structure, and evolution of the universe as a whole. |
Counters | Used alongside numbers to count specific items. Also known as classifiers or measure words. |
Cultural communities | Groups of people who share common cultural traits such as language, traditions, beliefs, values, customs (tikanga), heritage, and stories that shape their identity. |
Cultural context | Belief and knowledge systems that influence how individuals make sense of the world. |
Cultural exploration | The process of learning about, experiencing, and developing an understanding of the cultures associated with the target language. |
Cultural norms | The accepted ways of behaving, speaking, and interacting that reflect a culture’s value system. |
Cultural perspectives | The values, beliefs, and ways of thinking that influence how people from different cultures understand and interact with the world. |
Cultural practices | The customary ways people in a cultural community behave, interact, communicate, and participate in social life. |
Cultural understanding | The capacity to understand, respect, and engage with the values, beliefs, practices, and perspectives of different cultures. |
Dictionary form | Base form of a word (the version you would find in a dictionary). |
Figurative expressions | Words or phrases whose meanings are not intended to be understood literally. |
Formal polite present form | A verb conjugation used to speak respectfully in the present tense. |
Formulaic phrases or expressions | Chunks of language that follow a fixed pattern and are learnt as whole units. |
Hangul | The writing system used for the Korean language. It consists of letters representing individual sounds that are combined into syllable blocks. |
Hierarchical | Describes a system or structure that is organised into levels, where each level is ranked above or below another. |
Hierarchy | The structured ranking of individuals based on age, social status, job position, and family roles. |
Honorifics | Language used to show respect when addressing or referring to others, especially elders, teachers, or people of higher social status. |
Idioms | A phrase or expression where the meaning is different from the literal meaning. |
Informal polite present form | A verb conjugation used to communicate casually but politely in the present tense. |
Initial position | The first consonant in a syllable block. |
Intercultural communicative competence | The ability to communicate effectively, appropriately, and respectfully with people from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds. |
Intercultural understanding | The ability to recognise and respect cultural diversity. |
K-pop | A genre of contemporary Korean music and entertainment that has become a significant part of Korea’s global popular culture. |
Kinship terms | Words used to identify and address people according to family relationships. |
Linguistic knowledge | The understanding of how a language works, including formation of signs, vocabulary, articulation, pronunciation, spelling, and grammar. |
Lunar calendar | A calendar system that is based on the cycles of the Moon. It is used to determine the timing of traditional holidays, celebrations, and commemorative events in many Asian cultures. |
Particle | A dependent element that typically attaches to nouns to show grammatical and functional roles, such as indicating subject, object, topic/contrast, location, or time. |
Productive skills | The ability to sign, speak, write, interact, and present. |
Radicals | A key component of a character that often provides a clue to its meaning or function. |
Receptive skills | The ability to understand signed, spoken, or written language. |
Register | The degree of formality or politeness of language, which speakers adjust according to who they are speaking to and the social situation. |
Respectful forms | Words and expressions used to show respect by elevating the other person. |
Romanisation | Writing a language using the Roman alphabet. |
Sino-Korean | Korean words that are derived from Chinese characters. |
Social norms | The unwritten rules, expectations, and conventions of behaving within a particular cultural or social group. |
Sociolinguistic knowledge | Understanding of how social factors (e.g. age, gender, race, class, location) influence language use and how language shapes social identity and relationships. |
Speech levels | Varying degrees of politeness or formality in spoken language, which is often influenced by the social relationship between speakers. |
Stem | The basic part of a verb or adjective to which grammatical endings are attached to create different forms and meanings. |
Stroke order | The prescribed sequence in which the individual strokes of a character are written. |
Syllabic writing system | A writing system in which each symbol represents a syllable, rather than a single word. |
Syllable blocks | Where consonants and vowels are grouped together to form a single square shaped block that represents one syllable. |
Target language | The language a student is learning. |
Text | Signed, written, spoken, or visual materials that students use to understand and practise the target language (e.g. passages, dialogues, recordings, posters, menus). |
Visual literacy | The ability to interpret, understand, and create meaning from visual information. |
Visual patterns | How words and sentence structures repeat or follow a clear order. |
Vitality of a language | How strong and actively used a language is within a community. |
Learning Languages - Korean Years 0-10 curriculum
The Learning Languages - Korean Phase 1-4 (Years 0-10) curriculum is now available and can be downloaded from the File Downloads section below
Our priority is to get this information to you as soon as possible, and the PDF is the fastest way to do this. However, we understand that an online format is easier for you to work with, so we are working to make full html pages available later in the year.
About this resource
This page provides the Years 0-10 Learning Languages learning area of The New Zealand Curriculum. This content is proposed to be made by the Minister of Education as a National Curriculum Statement under section 90(1)(a) of the Education and Training Act 2020. Once made and published in the New Zealand Gazette, it will set the requirements for the teaching of Years 0-10 Learning Languages in state schools and schools will be required to start using it from 1 January 2027 for Years 9-10 and from 1 January 2029 for Years 0-8. This page will be replaced with the official version made under the Act and published in the New Zealand Gazette once that has occurred.
1 January 2027 used as the date to reflect that Years 9-10 must use this content from then.
