Monitoring: Transition to Estonian-language education going smoothly in Tallinn schools

TALLINN - The first round of monitoring by the education department of the City of Tallinn showed that the transition to Estonian-language education in all municipal schools and kindergartens in the capital is mostly going smoothly, but teachers still need additional methodological support.

Last November, specialists from the education department conducted a comprehensive monitoring, during which they visited 46 kindergartens and the first and fourth grades of 20 schools. Teaching was observed in all transition classes and kindergarten groups. The aim was to obtain an objective overview of the adaptation of students and teachers, identify potential challenges and collect data for further steps.

The results of the monitoring show that teaching in the first grades is going smoothly and in Estonian, no significant problems have emerged. Teachers actively support children and help them develop language skills. At the same time, a need has emerged in the fourth grades for better implementation of integrated subject and language teaching methodology. To this end, teachers have been recommended to participate in methodology training at the Tallinn Teachers' House or the Estonian Language Institute.

Deputy Mayor Aleksei Jašin said that the transition so far has gone better than expected, but greater challenges still lie ahead.

"The first steps have been encouraging, but the real challenge awaits us next academic year, when second and fifth grades will also switch to Estonian-language instruction and Tallinn will again need a large number of new teachers. At the same time, we hope that as many teachers as possible participating in language courses who have received extensions until August 2025 will successfully pass the B2 level exam," Jašin said.

He added that the city is offering as many language and methodological courses as possible to all interested parties and is cooperating with the Estonian Language Institute. In addition, Tallinn will increase teachers' salaries from September, which will also help heads of schools recruit teachers.

"By the end of the school year, we want to have an accurate overview of the Estonian language skills, subject knowledge and mental health of fourth grade students. Based on this, we can draw the first conclusions about the success of the transition process. Finding teachers for schools and kindergartens was only the first step on a long road," Jašin said.

The Tallinn education department will assess the progress of the transition process at the end of the school year. Special attention will be paid to the language skills, subject knowledge and mental health of fourth grade students. To this end, the city will develop a targeted action plan and allocate the necessary budget to ensure a continuous and effective overview of the students' development and the progress of the transition.

The shortage of subject teachers is one of the main challenges that may become acute when fifth grade students switch to Estonian-language instruction. At the same time, another challenge is the approximately 100 teachers with a B1 language level teaching in Russian and who received an extension to take the B2 level Estonian language exam by August 2025 at the latest. Most of these teachers are already participating in language courses that the city supports, allocating 130,000 euros for this purpose.

In addition, the city will continue with a large-scale recruitment campaign to ensure a sufficient number of subject teachers with Estonian language skills at the C1 level. Teachers' salary increases will also begin early this year and methodological training will be organized to ensure sufficient support for teachers in the transition process.