Cel, Found it. Heng my job got access to such "useful" tools.
Italian revolution at three PCF kindergartens
Ho Ai Li
533 words
8 January 2007
Straits Times
English
(c) 2007 Singapore Press Holdings Limited
AT A kindergarten in a quiet corner of Bukit Panjang, an Italian revolution is picking up pace.
There are no worksheets or spelling tests, and certainly no exams.
The pupils at the PAP Community Foundation (PCF)-run kindergarten are asked what they want to study - sometimes even whether they want to study at all.
The pre-school at Block 254, Bangkit Road, is one of three PCF kindergartens tasked with trying out the Reggio Emilia approach. The others are at Block 309, Canberra Road, in Chong Pang, and Kebun Baru Community Club.
So far, 240 children have graduated from the programme since it began two years ago to deliver world-class pre-school education to the heartland at affordable prices.
Reggio Emilia is a northern Italian city which was hailed in 1991 by Newsweek magazine as having the best pre-schools in the world. It is also the informal name of an approach to early childhood education, which sees the child as capable, confident and creative.
Unlike the traditional approach where teachers plan lessons and cover a curriculum, those who follow the Reggio method focus on what children want to learn.
Instead of learning spelling and writing in workbooks, pupils are taken on excursions to places in the neighbourhood - such as the park or the market - and are encouraged to express themselves and ask questions.
Teachers document the outings and exchanges on video and review the learning process with the children and their parents later.
Each class of 24 has two teachers, compared to just one in other PCF kindergartens. The Italian experiment was initiated by Dr Lee Wei Ling, director of the National Neuroscience Institute, after she visited the Children At Street 11 childcare centre for students from poor families in Ang Mo Kio.
The centre used the Reggio approach and Dr Lee was impressed by the creativity of the children. The results of the two-year pilot programme are encouraging.Most parents said their children have grown more vocal, confident and inquisitive after the pilot programme.
At Bangkit, for instance, 95 per cent of the 82 parents of K2 pupils surveyed said their children have progressed in areas such as social and problem-solving skills.
Pupils at Chong Pang pay $120 a month, and those at Bangkit pay $78 - compared with an average of $82 in other PCF kindergartens. The fees at the Reggio schools are largely subsidised, with the real cost estimated at between $150 and $220 per month for each pupil.
'The benefits are quite confirmed, but the question is, how do we bring down the cost and make it affordable to parents?' said Dr Teo Ho Pin, MP for Bukit Panjang.
The PCF does not plan to extend the programme to all its kindergartens. Senior consultant Denise Chan said it requires twice as many teachers and 'manpower is the biggest cost in education'.
'We felt the methods we are following are not any more inferior. They subscribe to the same principles,' she said.
Currently, there are 266 PCF kindergartens catering to about 58,000 children, or two-thirds of the kindergarten-going cohort here as of last year.
