Children have lunch at a preschool in northern Ninh Binh province. (Photo: VNA) They must also hold English language classes for them if possible in the newschool year.
In the document sent to the departments of education and training in cities andprovinces, the ministry has chalked out pre-school education tasks for thisacademic year.
The ministry has given priority to hygiene and safety for children inpreschools. All schools must ensure that all children attending school havetheir health checked and nutritional status assessed following the growth chartof the World Health Organisation.
The ministry has asked pre-schools nationwide to step up education on personalhygiene practices for children.
Schools must coordinate with families to formulate proper nutrition andexercise regimens for children to prevent malnutrition and obesity. They havebeen asked to guide parents about a balanced and reasonable diet to helpchildren develop well and prevent diseases.
The ministry has encouraged schools to renovate the nurture and care ofstudents, improve education quality, build green, safe, friendly preschool andchild-centred schools for students.
The schools must manage the quality of meals to meet the requirements of food safety,and ensure a balanced, nutritional variety of food for the physical and mentaldevelopment of children.
They are required to coordinate with the local health sector to effectivelyrespond to natural disasters and pandemics, develop response plans forcomplicated situations and ensure the well-being of children.
In particular, the ministry has also emphasised the importance of creatingconditions for students to get acquainted with English language at schools.
The departments of education and training will be in charge of guidinglocalities to organise English classes for preschool children in places where theyhave conditions to ensure education quality.
The Ministry of Education and Training has approved 39 sets of English languagebooks, which are compiled and distributed by the Vietnam Education PublishingHouse, Hanoi National University Publishing House, HCM City’s NationalUniversity Publishing House, and World Publishing House.
Nguyen Ba Minh, director of the ministry’s Department of Pre-school Education,said the issuance of a list of books for pre-school students is part of theministry's Circular No 50.
He said: “Teaching English at preschools is completely voluntary. For schoolsqualified in terms of facilities, teachers with parents’ support can organiseEnglish classes for children as a way of getting acquainted with the Englishlanguage”.
According to the ministry’s Circular No 50, after completing English classes,children should understand some familiar words, phrases and sentences,understand and perform a number of short, simple and familiar requests,understand and respond nonverbally or briefly in simple communicationsituations or in games, and understand the content of comic books.
Also in the document, the ministry has asked localities to review and arrangethe network of schools and preschools. The merging of preschools into higher-levelschools will be forbidden.
The departments will take responsibility to separate merged kindergartens andhigher-level schools, ensuring each commune and ward has at least one publicpreschool and building more pre-schools in disadvantaged, mountainous areas orborder and island places.
The schools must review and supplement toys and learning materials to ensurequantity and quality regulations.
The ministry has also planned to improve the quality of preschool education forfive-year-old children in this new school year. The ministry has developed aproject on improving the quality of preschool education and submitted it to theGovernment for approval. Under the project, all five-year-old students will goto pre-school by 2030./.
VNA
