Could Edinburgh Support a Bilingual English/Italian Nursery?

A community survey is exploring whether there's demand for Italian-language early years provision in the city

Edinburgh has Gaelic-medium nurseries, French playgroups, and German Saturday schools. What it doesn't have is a bilingual English/Italian nursery — anywhere children can be immersed in both languages as part of their everyday routine, not just for an hour a week.

We're exploring whether there's enough demand to make one viable, and we'd value five minutes of your time: Take the survey

What Edinburgh Already Has

The city isn't short of Italian provisions for older children and adults. Girotondo Italian School runs eight Saturday classes across Edinburgh for over 160 children aged 5–17. The Italian Bookbug at McDonald Road Library offers songs and stories in Italian for babies and toddlers on Monday afternoons. The Italian Institute of Culture — now at Italy House on East London Street, having moved to larger premises in 2025 — hosts language courses and cultural events. Edinburgh Italian Classes and Strada22 provide adult tuition. Parent-organised playgroups come and go.

All valuable. None of it provides the sustained daily immersion that builds genuine bilingualism in the earliest years.

Why Daily Exposure Matters

Research on bilingual development suggests children need to hear a language for roughly a quarter to a third of their waking hours to develop real proficiency in it. Weekly classes build familiarity and positive associations, but they can't bridge the gap to functional bilingualism.

A bilingual nursery can. It gives children the chance to hear Italian used for real purposes by adults other than their parents, which strengthens their sense that the language is normal, useful, and worth speaking. For families where Italian is the home language, it means continuity rather than the abrupt switch to English-only that most settings require.

A Growing Community

Edinburgh has had an Italian community since the late nineteenth century. It's still growing. There are now over 27,000 Italian citizens registered in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and Edinburgh is home to more than 30% of them. The Italian government's decision to open Italy House in 2025 — combining the Consulate General and the Italian Institute of Culture in larger premises — was a direct response to this expanding community.

Add in families with Italian heritage, mixed Scottish-Italian households, and the many people who've connected with Italian language and culture through travel, work, or relationships, and the pool of potentially interested families is significant. Girotondo's 160 enrolled children confirm the appetite exists. The question is whether it extends to nursery-age provision.

Help Us Find Out

The survey takes about five minutes. It asks about your family's connection to Italian, your children's ages, what kind of provision you'd be looking for, and what you could realistically afford. It's relevant whether you're raising bilingual children now, planning a family, or simply interested in Italian as a second language for your child.

The more responses we receive, the clearer the picture. If you know other families who might be interested, please share.

Take the survey →