The federal government has released a draft plan for a national second-language curriculum, which would

require students should study a language other than English (LOTE) for a total of 300-400 hours from prep to grade 6.

That's a drop from the state government's recommended mark of about 100 hours a year but is still far higher than what most schools are achieving.

The Weekly spoke to two Cranbourne primary schools and neither offered formal language classes. Both principals asked not to be identified because they were technically in breach of education department policy, which one described as a "grey area".

Pearcedale Primary School, which has more than 20 hearing-impaired students, does not offer conventional language classes but teaches Australian sign language Auslan in more informal settings.

Principal Don Mackenzie said it was difficult to find qualified language teachers and even if they could be found, it could be hard to find time for language classes. "The curriculum ends up very crowded and consequentially the basics like science and maths, which we are accountable for, we lose time for them."

Modern Languages Teachers Association of Victoria president Andrew Ferguson said

"the curriculum argument comes up time and time again".

"Within [government] schools there's a very heavy emphasis on literacy and numeracy.

Learning another language other than your first can improve your overall literacy."

One of the major hurdles to increasing language classes in schools was a lack of teachers, he said. "Teachers who have given up being LOTE teachers have gone into general teaching because the conditions they've had to endure just aren't acceptable.

"Sometimes they're responsible for more than 600 students that they have to interact with each week and write reports for. At a certain point those teachers give up."