Promotion of Bilingualism in Pre-schools

Mr Ang Hin Kee asked the Minister for Education (a) whether there are adequate pre-school educators available to promote bilingualism in pre-schools; and (b) what are the challenges the Ministry faces in uplifting the competency level of these mother tongue pre-school educators to support the national bilingualism strategy.

The Minister of State for Education (Ms Sim Ann) (for the Minister for Education): Madam, early childhood education is an important window of opportunity for establishing positive attitudes and a basic foundation in language learning. Having sufficient pre-school teachers in the English Language (EL) and the Mother Tongue Languages (MTL) is key to achieving this.

While there are generally sufficient pre-school teachers at the kindergarten levels certified to teach MTL, the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) has received feedback from some pre-school centres that they have had some difficulties hiring MTL teachers.

To increase the overall number of pre-school educators in the sector, ECDA is strengthening the training pipeline for the Diploma in Early Childhood Care and Education at the polytechnics, supported by an enhanced Training Award launched last October. In addition, a Continuing Professional Development Masterplan that was recently launched will enhance the attractiveness of the profession and improve retention of pre-school educators. This will provide structured training and professional development pathways for pre-school educators and will also include courses on MTL teaching.

To support pre-school teachers in the teaching and learning of MTLs, MOE launched the Nurturing Early Learners' (NEL) Framework for MTLs in November 2013. Copies will be distributed to pre-school centres in the first quarter of 2014. This will be available in the various MTLs. In addition, the MTL teachers may refer to the available Nurturing Early Learners' Educators' Guide to strengthen their practice. ECDA will also be conducting workshops from July 2014 for MTL teachers to equip them with the requisite knowledge and skills to plan and implement a quality MTL curriculum.

MOE is also developing teaching and learning resources for the teaching of MTLs. These resources are currently being piloted in the MOE Kindergartens and will be shared with the pre-school sector after review and refinement.

In addition, the Lee Kuan Yew Fund for Bilingualism further supports the teaching and learning of English Language and the MTLs, with a focus at the pre-school level. To date, the Fund has sponsored 17 proposals from the community to develop more local resources and promotional events. Several of these have already been launched over the last few months.

Mr Ang Hin Kee (Ang Mo Kio): I would like to thank the Minister of State for working very hard to get more comprehensive support, such as the training award as well as the continual professional development for teachers involved in Mother Tongue Languages. I am just wondering if there is a similar collaboration with WDA CET centres so that there is a broader base, beyond just what MOE can do and the facilities available under MOE, so that teachers who want to pursue other alternative courses under the CET programme can similarly take advantage of the schemes and proposals that the Minister of State mentioned earlier.

Ms Sim Ann: I thank the Member for the supplementary question. My understanding is that the training and the further development of our pre-school teachers, whether fresh from school or mid-career entrants, is something that we have been working with like-minded partners on. We would certainly be very open to broadening some of these training collaborations with partners such as WDA. There is already a range of programmes available but we will always be prepared to work with them to strengthen these.