Children can look forward to less stress and more fun in schools, as the the government tries to create a culture in which learning is a joy.

In Parliament yesterday (Mar. 6), Members of Parliament (MPs) called for more efforts to reduce students’ stress levels at school.

Responding to these calls in Parliament on Mar. 7, Minister for Education (Schools) Ng Chee Meng said that his Ministry (MOE) was looking towards the nurturing of a joy of learning in children.

This, he said, would be done by getting children to learn through play, such as via field trips and games, and the use of more applied learning through hands-on activities, such as robotics.

Ng said that in these ways, students would find joy in learning and become intrinsically motivated to learn.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="2048"] Source: MOE Facebook[/caption]

Less tuition

One barrier to helping children enjoy learning is tuition.

Acknowledging that excessive tuition for children would erode the joy of learning, Ng also said that it overly emphasised academic results and created a crutch mentality.

He said that more unstructured space to play should be given to children, enabling them to grow their imagination, creativity and socio-emotional skills.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="960"] Source: MOE Facebook[/caption]

To help Singaporeans move away from excessive tuition, Ng said that MOE was developing an online portal to support students’ self-paced learning and revision.

He added that extra help, in the form of levelling up programmes, remedial and consultation sessions outside of lesson time, would also be given to students at schools.

Streaming remains

In response to MP Intan Azura Mokhtar’s call to do away with streaming in secondary schools, Ng defended it by saying that streaming had served students well.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="960"] Source: MOE Facebook[/caption]

He said it catered to different learning needs and pace, and that streaming allowed students to progress as far as possible in their studies with low attrition rates.

Nonetheless, Ng said that students with uneven strengths across their subjects, could develop their strengths through subject-based banding.

Top image from MOE Facebook.

If you like what you read, follow us on Facebook and Twitter to get the latest updates.