The long debates and criticisms regarding Single National Curriculum (SNC) on talk shows and other programs has created a confusion among parents. This article aims at highlighting the steps taken by education ministry to design the new curriculum and its implementation at preschool level. Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) program refers to a two year program for children up to 5 years of age before Grade I which is designed based on international standards of early years education. There are three main steps of implementation that are presented by the government based on suggestions from panel of educationists from around the country.
Key learning areas, Competencies and Outcomes
The seven main learning areas identified for early years by teachers, practitioners and textbook/classroom material developers include the following:
- Personal, Social and Emotional Development
- Language and Literacy
- Basic Mathematics
- The World Around Us
- Physical Development
- Health, Hygiene and Safety
- Creative Arts
The curriculum formulation also highlighted how these learning areas will be analyzed and assessed by teachers as it was established that children at age of 4-5 years should not be forced to learn beyond their capacity and thus, to eliminate the concept of expected results, outcomes for preschool level will be termed as “expected” to avoid focus on completion of tasks and instead focus should remain on learning. This way teachers for preschools will not assess child’s performance on basis of goal achievement but improvements and efforts put in a project.
A detailed and comprehensive guidelines for key learning areas and competencies has been developed by the ministry of education in consultation with educationists and practitioners from Pakistan. This guidelines aims to make it easy for schools to implement new curriculum in totality and in its true spirit without any confusion. Table below summarizes the key learning areas and their expected outcomes for preschool group.
Positive Learning Environment for ECCE Classroom
Apart from teachers’ training and professional development for new curriculum and its implementation, there is a strong emphasis on redesigning and rethinking the learning environment for younger children to ensure that the curriculum designed has a positive outcomes. As recommended by theorists, psychologists and educationists on the panel, federal government has recommended implementation of the following steps to make learning environment more conducive.
- Creation of ‘Goshay’ — The learning corners
In a great attempt to drastically improve the education standards of public and low cost preschools, the panel has recommended every preschool to create work spaces for children called ‘Goshay’ in Urdu for providing a simulated real-life situation. Working in different and specified subject related corners will allow children to
- Take initiative and make choices about what they want to do and how they can do it
- Complete self-chosen tasks
- Question, experiment, discover and make sense of the world around them
- Work, share and cooperate with other children and develop their social skills
- Work independently towards mastery of different skills
For preschool, following well equipped corners with required material corners are recommended:
- Language corner
- Library corner
- Art corner
- Math corner
- Science corner
- Home corner
The idea is similar to what is being promoted in developed countries i.e. to change learning spaces without heavy costs in order to stimulate children’ minds.
Read More: Redesigning Schools and Learning Spaces: Challenging the ‘Traditional’ Classrooms
Moreover, following activities are recommended with time schedule by the Ministry of Education for ECCE grades. This will allow preschools to easily adopt the new curriculum without any confusion or debates regarding its effectiveness as the panel of 45 members who designed this timetable, competencies and expected outcomes are experts in their fields.
Theoretical Perspectives behind formulation of SNC
Pakistan’s education ministry aims at changing the landscape of education in Pakistan as is quite evident from the detailed steps described in official document for Single National Curriculum. A major criticism recently raised by some analysts and critics in Pakistan was that SNC seems to overlook psychological perspectives of child cognitive development. However, the official panel of decision makers have released the details of theoretical perspectives that have been considered in formulating Single National Curriculum for Early education.
SNC has used theoretical perspectives of age appropriate brain development, cognitive development, psychosocial and emotional development as well as ecological system development theories to help understand the holistic development of a child. Some of the major studies and theories considered in development of SNC include the following:
- Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences: an Innovative Approach Towards Understanding Child’s Potential through intelligences including Naturalist, Musical, Logical-Mathematical, Existential, Interpersonal, Bodily-Kinesthetic, Linguistic, Intrapersonal and Spatial.
- VARK Model by Neil Fleming: The most relevant and appropriate learning styles model that expands upon notions of sensory modalities of Visual, Auditory, Reading/Writing and Kinesthetic.
- Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development: Study of development of thinking process in children while going through four main stages in life. The theory focuses on 4 main age groups: 0-2 years, 2-7 years, 7-11 years and 12 years to adulthood.
- Vygotsky’s Theory of Sociocultural Development
- Erik Erikson’s Theory of Psychosocial Development
- Bloom’s Taxonomy
Educator/School Administration Competencies and Training
Since implementation of ECCE curriculum under SNC is highly dependent on competency of teachers, Federal government along with education ministries from all provinces are aiming at developing training programs for teachers as well. This include workshops, meetings, courses and extensive meetings and coordination among parents, teachers, administrators and educational institutions.
All teachers are required to be equipped with knowledge regarding following aspects of children growth and education:
- Theories regarding child development from Age 0-8 years and brain development
- Methods for Child learning and development
- Adult learning, support and development
- Role of parents, caregivers, families and communities in child development
