HÀ NỘI –  Vietnamese students will have better opportunities to learn foreign languages other than English with a range of pilot programmes by the Ministry of Education and Training (MoET) being introduced this year.

The MoET will issue a teaching programme for Russian and Chinese as first foreign languages for students from grade three at elementary schools to grade 12 at high school – the highest grade in general education – from next year.

The programme will serve as the basis for preparing textbooks and learning material.

The ministry has also started trial teaching of Japanese as the first foreign language for third graders from the 2016-17 school year. The trial started earlier this month at five schools in Hà Nội and HCM City. If the programme is successful, the ministry will consider expanding it to other localities which have the desire and the conditions for its implementation.

Korean and French are also being taught as second foreign languages from this school year. Korean is being taught in the sixth grade and the 10^th grade at some schools in Hà Nội and HCM City. From 2017 to 2025, this language could be introduced in other grades in junior high schools and high schools.

The ministry is also conducting a pilot programme to teach French across the country with new textbooks being prepared with the help of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie.

English will, however, still be given top priority with the ministry encouraging provincial departments of education to choose and build bilingual Vietnamese-English programmes to improve students’ English proficiency, especially in connection with maths and natural science subjects. The goal is to have at least three per cent of students in elementary schools, seven per cent of students in junior high schools and 20 per cent of children in high schools studying with bilingual textbooks by the 2019-20 school year. – VNS