Some peculiarities of Italian language instruction at primary school age

Instruction of Italian language at primary school level has not been studied more comprehensively in our expert and scientific literature so far, since Italian has been studied as a compulsory foreign language in Serbian schools since the school year 2001/2002. This paper discusses some peculiarities of learning and teaching a foreign language, with emphasis on the socio-cultural aspect and functional usage of the language as the primary task of instruction. The paper presents the results of one part of a larger empirical research that studies the attitude of primary school students towards learning Italian as a foreign language. The goal of the research refers to identifying the competences that students acquire by learning this language and the possibility of applying the linguistic knowledge and skills in real-life situations of students' interaction with the members of other culture, as well as identifying learning difficulties. The sample comprised 185 fifth grade students and 110 seventh grade students from three primary schools where the Italian language has been studied the longest. Research findings indicate that there is an initial positive attitude towards learning Italian and the sensitivity for extralinguistic and cultural elements of instruction of foreign language. Students pointed out to the need for a more active participation in instruction and selection of teaching contents, for more modern approaches to learning, and for a larger degree of applicability of linguistic knowledge and skills in real-life situations.