<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%"><TBODY><TR>May 13, 2009
</TR><!-- headline one : start --><TR>NTUC to run 20 kindergartens <!--10 min-->
</TR><!-- headline one : end --><TR>Centres get new name, curriculum and facilities to stop slipping enrolment </TR><!-- Author --><TR><TD class="padlrt8 georgia11 darkgrey bold" colSpan=2>By Maria Almenoar & Goh Yi Han
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Four-year-old Little Wings nursery pupils (from left) Shahirah, Akira, Anees, Shafiq and Danial performing for Mr Tharman. The children are divided into smaller groups instead of being taught as a single class. -- ST PHOTO: LAU FOOK KONG
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KINDERGARTENS run by Singapore's largest kindergarten operator have brought in an external consultant to keep their enrolment numbers up.
Twenty such centres of the PAP Community Foundation (PCF) in Jurong and Bukit Timah will now be managed by NTUC First Campus, which itself runs 50 preschools.
NTUC has overhauled the curriculum, added more training hours for teachers and renovated the centres. The cost was paid for by fund-raising.
Now called Little Wings, these kindergartens will have a uniform curriculum for its 2,200 youngsters, with teachers able to move between centres.
Its 600 nursery students have gone through a year-long trial run of the programme.
Other PCF kindergartens are not undergoing an overhaul of curriculum as yet.
Finance Minister and Member of Parliament (Jurong GRC) Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that other MPs in his constituency - Mr Lim Boon Heng and Ms Grace Fu - along with MPs for Bukit Timah-Holland GRC Lim Swee Say and Yu-Foo Yee Shoon, agreed to pool resources to 'raise the quality of the programme' and reverse a gradual decline in enrolment.
The 20 centres are in their wards. Explaining the decline, he said: 'Some of it is demographic - some parents are moving up to upper middle class and are able to afford private centre fees.
'We were no longer growing and in some centres we were seeing a gradual decline year by year...We wanted to act early to reverse the decline.'
NTUC First was picked because of its expertise, said Mr Tharman.
Read the full story in Wednesday's edition of The Straits Times. <!-- end of for each --><!-- vbbintegration : start --><!-- vbbintegration : end --><!-- dennis change request 20070424 : start --><!---Google ad - Start : Wed, 13 May 2009 07:56:51:782---><!-- AdSpace STI Google ad tag --><SCRIPT language=JavaScript1.1 src="http://ads.asia1.com.sg/js.ng/site=tsti&pagepos=20&size=10X10"> </SCRIPT>
</TR><!-- headline one : start --><TR>NTUC to run 20 kindergartens <!--10 min-->
</TR><!-- headline one : end --><TR>Centres get new name, curriculum and facilities to stop slipping enrolment </TR><!-- Author --><TR><TD class="padlrt8 georgia11 darkgrey bold" colSpan=2>By Maria Almenoar & Goh Yi Han
</TD></TR><!-- show image if available --><TR vAlign=bottom><TD width=330>
</TD><TD width=10>
Four-year-old Little Wings nursery pupils (from left) Shahirah, Akira, Anees, Shafiq and Danial performing for Mr Tharman. The children are divided into smaller groups instead of being taught as a single class. -- ST PHOTO: LAU FOOK KONG
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"-->
KINDERGARTENS run by Singapore's largest kindergarten operator have brought in an external consultant to keep their enrolment numbers up.
Twenty such centres of the PAP Community Foundation (PCF) in Jurong and Bukit Timah will now be managed by NTUC First Campus, which itself runs 50 preschools.
NTUC has overhauled the curriculum, added more training hours for teachers and renovated the centres. The cost was paid for by fund-raising.
Now called Little Wings, these kindergartens will have a uniform curriculum for its 2,200 youngsters, with teachers able to move between centres.
Its 600 nursery students have gone through a year-long trial run of the programme.
Other PCF kindergartens are not undergoing an overhaul of curriculum as yet.
Finance Minister and Member of Parliament (Jurong GRC) Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that other MPs in his constituency - Mr Lim Boon Heng and Ms Grace Fu - along with MPs for Bukit Timah-Holland GRC Lim Swee Say and Yu-Foo Yee Shoon, agreed to pool resources to 'raise the quality of the programme' and reverse a gradual decline in enrolment.
The 20 centres are in their wards. Explaining the decline, he said: 'Some of it is demographic - some parents are moving up to upper middle class and are able to afford private centre fees.
'We were no longer growing and in some centres we were seeing a gradual decline year by year...We wanted to act early to reverse the decline.'
NTUC First was picked because of its expertise, said Mr Tharman.
Read the full story in Wednesday's edition of The Straits Times. <!-- end of for each --><!-- vbbintegration : start --><!-- vbbintegration : end --><!-- dennis change request 20070424 : start --><!---Google ad - Start : Wed, 13 May 2009 07:56:51:782---><!-- AdSpace STI Google ad tag --><SCRIPT language=JavaScript1.1 src="http://ads.asia1.com.sg/js.ng/site=tsti&pagepos=20&size=10X10"> </SCRIPT>
