Begin Teaching Maths and Science Early

At a recent event, the Education Minister of Singapore, Mr. Heng Swee Keat, highlighted the importance of transforming the overall education system to keep up with the changing economy. Mr. Heng particularly emphasized on the need to help students build problem solving and knowledge application skills.

Recently, the Education Minister of Singapore, Mr. Heng Swee Keat, highlighted the need of providing strong foundation in numeracy and literacy to children by the schools. Mr. Heng also laid stress on providing the students a good ground in STEM, i.e. Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths. He said one of the many ways to promote affinity for the subjects is to begin early and incorporate math and science into the curriculum of the early childhood.

Need For Intellectual Learning

According to the NSB (National Science Board) USA, exposing children to scientific concepts at a young age, makes them comfortable with those idea at an older age.

Also, adapting to the concepts of mathematics is a great predictor of not only developing a good aptitude for the subject later in school life, but also for enhancing the reading abilities of children. Based on this concept, NSB has whole-heartily  encouraged the introduction of STEM into pre-school education.

Focus on Teachers

The importance of good teaching skills can certainly not be overemphasized. We need to remember that children are not natural scientists. Despite their tendency of exploring the world they need appropriate guidance to mold their activities into what we might consider as doing science. This is where teachers play an important role as they help in providing them that direction.

However, it seems that the biggest block encumbering the implementation of STEM in early childhood classrooms is the reticence displayed by many teachers. Studies of other countries reveal that teachers lack the required knowledge, understanding and awareness of engineering and technology. This develops a fear to implement these principles in their classrooms.

For pre-schools, teachers can actually take cues from the many questions asked by the students and then guide their learning in ways that develop scientific thinking for successful implementation of STEM.