i read with great delight that a programme has been implemented to better prepare children in non-english speaking families for primary one. organised by the Chinese Development Assistance Council (CDAC), the Eurasian Association, Mendaki and Sinda, with assistance from the Ministries of Education (MOE), and Community Development, Youth and Sports, this programme is called the bridging programme.
While the Bridging Programme is helping only a small percentage of the 2,000 children with no pre-school experience, Minister of State for Education Gan Kim Yong says MOE is looking to extend it to more schools.
Both initiatives, which cost the organisations about $300 to $500 per student and run for four weeks, are designed to give students a heads-up on primary school. What they learn includes deciding what to buy in the canteen, how to make friends and how to follow rules.
At AMP, no effort has been spared in simulating the Primary 1 experience. Actual school texts are given to students, who are also issued a mock timetable.
Acquainting the kids with the topics which will be taught in the first month of school gives them a better chance of understanding, says Ms Hameet Khanee J.Hussain, AMP training and education manager.
The Straits Times 12 December 2006
the bridging programme brings to light a big concern i have about education, and that is that the classroom is not a level playing field. having taught for a few years in a neighbourhood school, i have engaged with students who come in with no inkling of the english language. some might not recognise the 26 letters of the alphabet. i had to even teach a boy how to write his name on his worksheets. how then, it is possible for these 6 year old chilren to read the instructions on the worksheet much less follow them?
the article states, “as worries over class divides and widening income gaps persist, new efforts are being made to ensure that no child is left behind.” let me elaborate what this actually means -breaking the vicious cycle.
parents of families in lower income groups tend not to have had many years of schooling or a decent command of the english language. as a result, the children are not equipped with these tools that the higher strata of the singaporean society take for granted.
being unable to cope with the primary one curriculum, these ill-equipped students fair badly at the end of the year, (yes, one year isn’t enough time for a 6 year old to acquire a foreign language) setting the stage for a cycle of failure. it is not reasonable to expect a child to ‘catch up’ in the subsequent years as the curriculum gets more and more demanding.
as a teacher, i really hate to tell these students to ‘work harder’, ‘try harder next time’ because they truly are trying their darnest. those who do better are not necessarily more hard working, they are simply more equipped.
what do you think happens at the streaming examinations at primary four? (oops, streaming has been done away with only to be replaced by the banding exercise which does the same thing.) or at the primary school leaving examinations? (disclaimer: i’m not condemning the essence of the banding exercise. i just feel that its too little too late)
as cynical as this may sound, i feel that some kids in singapore are fighting a losing battle. with the on-going gifted education programme at the primary school level, i sincerely hope to see resources in a similar capacity also channelled to these students. isn’t that what differentiated learning is about? differentiated learning isn’t about investing scarce resource only to those we deem are deserving of it, and neglecting the others who we fear might ‘waste’ it. i like to believe that the singapore i love has moved on from operating on a basis of the scarcity of resources when it comes to investing in human beings.
give them what those over-privileged kids have, specialist teachers, smaller teacher-student-ratio, programmes specially catered to them, research and development, and a fighting chance.
