Government tasked to run pre-primary schools
Cap: Mr Manek Bharat, the principal of Lohana Schools (R), joins pre-primary pupils of Lohana Academy in Kololo on Monday to celebrate their graduation. Photo by Stephen Otage.
What you need to know:
Pre-primary ensures consistency in the child’s learning, an educationist says.
The government has been urged to introduce pre-primary school entities to provide children with a firm foundation.
Mr Manek Bharat, the principal of Lohana Schools, said apart from a curriculum to guide private kindergartens and pre-primary schools, the government does not have pre-primary schools to transfer children to its primary institutions so that there is consistency in their learning cycle.
He was speaking at the graduation ceremony of Lohana’s pre-primary pupils in Kololo on Monday.
Mr Bharat said both the World Health Organisation and United Nations Children’s Fund recognise that the ages between 0 and five years are critical stages in a child’s development.
This, he said, had led to the growing demand for pre-primary education because parents realise that it is a critical stage for children if they are to gain confidence and easily comprehend the thematic curriculum when they join primary level.
“By the time the child is completing kindergarten, they should be able to read short stories, a few paragraphs and basic mathematics so that when they join primary education, they can grasp the thematic curriculum,” Mr Manek said.
The educationist said he only knew Kitante and Nakasero government primary schools with kindergartens.
