Bhubaneswar: In view of parents' preference to chose English medium schools to make their children fluent in the second language, Odisha government decided to introduce Spoken English in elementary education.

As per move, English will be added to the curriculum from Class I in 100 schools. Currently, English is being taught in schools as a subject from Class III.

The new initiative is aimed at making the students enrolled in government schools converse well in English, a source in School & Mass Education Department said.

As the parents are keen on teaching English to their children from elementary level, the Spoken English module will improve students enrolment in the state-run schools.

Last year, over 70 percent students had failed in English Paper in annual Matriculation Examination conducted by Board of Secondary Education (BSE). In view of poor results of students in the examination, the government had increased the duration of English class to 90 minutes from existing 45 minutes to improve standard of English education in Odia medium schools.