Turkish was yesterday announced among the optional study languages to be rolled out nationally under the new Australian curriculum.

The Shape of the Australian Curriculum: Languages, which was issued yesterday by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, is based on the assumption that all Australian students should, and will, learn a language in primary and secondary school.

The new national curriculum - encompassing English, science, maths and history - is being rolled out from 2013.

Australian-Turkish organizations in Australia and Turkey earlier this year had started a lobby campaign to make Turkish language an optional language for Australian kids. The decision was appreciated by 150,000 Australian Turks.

ACARA will also begin working with the states and territories to develop curricula for Arabic, Auslan (sign language), classical languages, French, German, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Modern Greek, Spanish, Mandarin and Italian.