10MP: Entry age for school lowered to five

Published: Thursday June 10, 2010 MYT 2:04:00 PM
10MP: Entry age for school lowered to five

KUALA LUMPUR: Children will begin school a year earlier, at the age of five plus, during the 10th Malaysia Plan period in line with many developed countries.
It will be rolled out in stages starting with schools in rural and plantation areas, particularly in schools that are under-utilised to allow the pupils to benefit from an earlier head start.
Early childhood development and pre-school programmes will be stepped up for more children to be ready to enter school at a younger age, according to the plan tabled in Dewan Rakyat on Friday by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.
"The entry age for schooling will be lowered from 6 to 5 years during the plan period," he said.
The Permata early childhood development programme will focus on households with monthly income of below RM1,500.
A sum of RM36mil will be allocated to set up 181 Permata centres throughout the country.
Efforts will be made to raise pre-school enrolment for children aged between four and five from the current 67% to 87% by 2012 and 92% by 2015.
The quality of pre-school education will also be improved at the same time.
For this, RM2bil is earmarked between 2010 and 2012.
Another RM400mil is allocated between 2010 and 2012 for the Literacy and Numeracy Screening (LINUS) programme to ensure that all pupils have basic literacy and numeracy skills after the first three years of primary education.
"Improving literacy and numeracy skills is critical to reduce dropout rates due to the inability of students to cope with the syllabus being taught," the 10MP says. - Bernama