This is a book about teaching that puts learning in the centre of the frame. Teaching and learning are not two sides of the same coin, but are essentially different activities, although they both take place in the public arena of the classroom. This book aims to help readers to make teaching more effective, by attending to learning and the inner mental world of the learner, and by then understanding how classroom activities and teacher decisions can create, or limit, children's opportunities for learning.

Teaching foreign languages to young children, which in this book will mean those between five and twelve years of age, has been happening for a long time; in many African and Asian countries, primary children have long been taught French or English as preparation for their use as a medium of instruction. In Europe and South America, the last ten years have seen an explosion of English classes, both in state systems and in private language schools. While the recent surge of interest has led to the publication of methodology books (e.g. Brewster et al. 1992; Dunn 1984; Halliwell 1992; Moon 2000; Phillips 1994; Scott and Ytreberg 1990), an accompanying debate about theoretical and research issues has been largely absent (but see Rixon 1999, some chapters of Kennedy and Jarvis 1991, and Brumfit, Moon and Tongue 1991). This book aims to provide teachers, and trainers of teachers, of foreign languages to young learners with a useful and workable theoretical framework and set of principles in which they can embed and develop their practice.