TAIF/DAMMAM: The Ministry of Education has started preparing an English language curriculum for fourth graders at all government schools from the start of the next academic year. Sources at the ministry said that the plan will be completed within two months. The curriculum includes the teaching of the English alphabet and numbers, in addition to initial applications and practice books. The initial plan will see two classes per week. The language classes will only be for the fourth graders next year. Grade five will be taught the year afterwards. The ministry will request the Council of Ministers to consider English classes for children below the fourth grade, they said. They noted that private schools have been teaching English to children in all their primary classes – from the first to the sixth grades. Private and foreign schools' curriculums are examined and approved by the ministry's Private and Foreign Education Department before they are allowed to be taught. They said the ministry needs 1,400 English teachers, adding that the priority will be to hire university graduates.
