The implementation of the new early years curriculum is part of the New Curriculum for Wales.
Wales early years specialist Mudiad Meithrin operates more than 1,000 early years settings throughout Wales.
Due to be rolled out in September 2022, the New Curriculum for Wales brings together language learning and teaching in one Area of Learning and Experience and encourages providers to 'enable learners to become multilingual, be able to use Welsh, English and at least one international language and develop an openness to and curiosity about all languages and cultures of the world '.
The Welsh government is aiming to create a million Welsh speakers by 2050, with early years education playing a crucial role and providing a solid foundation in the 3 to 16 learning continuum.
Mudiad Meithrin aims to give every young child in Wales the opportunity to benefit from early years services and experiences through the medium of Welsh. When the charity was set up 50 years ago in 1971 the Census figures noted that year that the number of three-to four-year-olds that could speak Welsh was 11 per cent.
This has gradually increased over subsequent decades and by the 2011 Census this figure had doubled to 23 per cent of three-and four-year-olds able to speak Welsh.
The joint project called ‘Budding citizens of a bilingual Wales in a multilingual world? Exploring the role of Early Years Education in the framework of the New Curriculum for Wales’, and the PhD will focus on the relationship between the Welsh language and the new curriculum that will operate in schools and non-maintained settings from September 2022.
Dr Geraldine Lublin, supervisory team leader, said, ‘The arrival of the New Curriculum is very exciting and we hope that this project will contribute to realising the ambition of the objectives set there.
‘I look forward to supporting the successful candidate along with the rest of the team, Dr Alex Lovell from Swansea University's Department of Welsh, Dr Mirain Rhys from Cardiff Metropolitan University's Department of Psychology and Dr Gwenllian Lansdown Davies from Mudiad Meithrin.’
Mudiad Meithrin said it anticipated that the results of the project will improve understanding of how young learners from diverse social and ethnic backgrounds can be encouraged to learn an additional language or languages on the basis of their Welsh-English bilingualism.
Dr Gwenllian Lansdown Davies, chief executive of Mudiad Meithrin, added, ‘There is little research in the field of Welsh-medium early years so it is great that we will have the opportunity to learn from the findings of doctoral research.
'It is timely because there is a period of great change with the new curriculum for Wales on the horizon. Our Cylchoedd Meithrin are already preparing for this change and investigating the influence of that on our youngest learners will be an important contribution to learning and policy development.’
Mudiad Meithrin said that more details will be available in January.