Global Nexus keeps the same three principles and six dimensions from six months to six years, but the emphasis changes sharply with age. With infants the curriculum lives in care routines, close relationships and sensory exploration, and language is mostly adults narrating in both languages. With toddlers the focus is movement, handling objects, early words and learning to cope with big feelings. From three to six, pretend play, questions and increasingly long projects take over, until five-year-olds plan their own investigations and prepare for Grade 1. The framework is one; the classroom at each age looks very different.
Vietnam's preschool system divides these years into a nursery stage, for children up to three, and a kindergarten stage, from three to six, with the kindergarten years usually known as the Mam, Choi and La classes. Global Nexus works within that structure. This article goes through the age bands in turn, describing what the curriculum emphasises in each, how language is used, and what adults do differently.
One framework, different emphases
A curriculum that tries to do the same things with a nine-month-old and a five-year-old will fail one of them. The national preschool programme recognises this by describing different leading activities: activity with objects for the nursery years and play for the kindergarten years. The idea, which comes from developmental psychology, is that at each stage one kind of activity drives development most strongly, and good teaching works through it rather than against it.
Global Nexus applies its principles through those leading activities. Bilingualism, for an infant, means hearing both languages in warm, repeated care exchanges; for a five-year-old it means arguing in English about why a prediction went wrong. Experiential learning, for a toddler, means pouring, stacking and carrying; for a five-year-old it means planning a week-long investigation. Whole-child development, for an infant, means a secure attachment to a familiar adult; for a five-year-old it means managing a disagreement within a group without adult help.
The six dimensions also shift in weight. Emotion and life skills dominate the earliest years, because a child who feels secure and can manage basic routines has the platform for everything else. Thinking and creativity grow in prominence through the kindergarten years. Language runs throughout, changing from listening and babbling to explaining and storytelling. None of the dimensions disappears at any age, but teams plan with an honest sense of which ones carry the most weight for the children in front of them.
The age bands at a glance
The table summarises how emphasis changes across the age range. Real children do not move in step with these bands, and the next sections describe them in more detail.
| Age | Main activity | Language in practice | What the adult mainly does |
|---|---|---|---|
| About 6 to 12 months | Care routines, sensory exploration, being held and talked to | Adults narrate, sing and respond to babbling in both languages | Provides a secure, consistent relationship and reads the infant's cues |
| About 1 to 3 years | Handling objects, moving, early pretend, doing things alone | First words and phrases; adults expand what the child says | Offers safe challenge, supports emotional regulation, names feelings |
| 3 to 4 years, Mam class | Pretend play, simple group activities, why questions | Short sentences, songs and stories in both languages | Sets up play, asks open questions, introduces short projects |
| 4 to 5 years, Choi class | Collaborative play, longer projects, early drawing to represent ideas | Longer explanations, role play in both languages | Extends play, documents projects, supports cooperation |
| 5 to 6 years, La class | Planned investigations, rules games, reflection on learning | Explaining reasoning, telling and retelling stories, early print awareness | Coaches planning and reflection, prepares for the move to Grade 1 |
Ages are approximate, partly because Vietnamese classes are organised by birth year and partly because development varies widely. A child born late in the year may be almost a year younger than a classmate. Teams therefore read the table as a guide to emphasis, never as a checklist for judging individual children.
Infants: the curriculum is the relationship
For the youngest children in the programme, the curriculum is delivered almost entirely through care. Feeding, changing, settling to sleep and waking are not interruptions to learning; they are the main learning situations of the day. In each of them an infant experiences whether adults respond reliably, hears language attached to what is happening, and begins to anticipate the sequence of events.
Global Nexus therefore places great weight on consistent caregivers. An infant does best with one or two familiar adults who know their rhythms, cues and preferences, an idea often called the key person approach in international early-years practice. Frequent changes of caregiver undermine the security on which exploration depends. The Harvard Center on the Developing Child's description of serve and return, an infant offers a sound or gesture and an adult responds, captures what these adults are trying to do all day.
Language at this age is about exposure and responsiveness rather than teaching. Adults narrate what they are doing, sing, respond to babbling and name objects the infant is looking at. In a bilingual room both languages are used, but comfort comes first: when an infant is distressed, the adult uses whichever language and voice will soothe fastest. Sensory exploration, treasure baskets of safe natural objects, water, textures and light, gives infants something to explore and adults something to talk about.
Planning for infants looks different from planning for older children. Rather than a weekly project, teams plan for each infant individually: their sleep and feeding pattern, what they are currently interested in reaching or watching, which sounds they are making, and what the family has shared about the infant's routines at home. Close daily communication with families matters more at this age than at any other, because an infant cannot report on their own day.
Toddlers: doing it myself
Between one and three, children gain mobility, the first words and a powerful drive to do things themselves. The national programme names activity with objects as the leading activity of these years, and Global Nexus classrooms for toddlers are arranged accordingly: low shelves with materials children can reach, opportunities to pour, fill, stack, carry and sort, and plenty of space to move. Practical-life tasks drawn from the Montessori tradition, such as wiping a table or carrying a cup, suit toddlers' wish to be competent.
This is also the age of big feelings without the words to manage them. Frustration, biting, refusals and tears at separation are normal parts of development, and the curriculum treats them as learning opportunities in the emotion dimension rather than as behaviour to be suppressed. Adults name feelings, stay calm, and help children find ways back to calm, in whichever language reaches the child.
Language grows fast. Adults expand what toddlers say, so that a child's single word becomes a short sentence in the adult's reply, and they repeat key words in both languages across the day in meaningful contexts. Toddlers in bilingual settings may mix languages in a single sentence; researchers who study bilingual development, including the work associated with François Grosjean, treat such mixing as a normal resource rather than a sign of confusion.
Three to four: pretend play and the first questions
In the Mam class, play becomes the leading activity in the fuller sense the national programme intends. Children start to take on roles, a parent, a shopkeeper, a doctor, and to sustain simple stories with friends. This kind of pretend play is one of the most powerful contexts for language, social skills and self-regulation, because children must agree on roles and follow the rules of the game they have invented.
Three-year-olds also begin asking why with great persistence. The curriculum treats these questions as raw material for projects. A teacher who hears several children asking why the classroom fish do not sleep can turn that into a short investigation. Projects at this age are short, a few days at most, and they rely heavily on hands-on exploration and adult support.
Group activities begin but remain brief. A morning circle with three-year-olds works when it is short, active and predictable, with songs, movement and a simple conversation, rather than a long session of listening. Both languages appear in songs, stories and play, and adults watch carefully for children who are quieter in one language so that they are not left out of the conversation.
Four to five and five to six: longer projects and reflection
In the Choi class, children can sustain interest for longer and collaborate more. Projects stretch over a week or more, children begin to represent their ideas in drawings and models, and role play becomes more elaborate, often involving several children over several days. Both languages are used in play, and children begin to choose which language to use with whom, a sign of growing bilingual awareness.
In the La class, the oldest children can plan as well as play. They propose investigations, decide what materials they need, carry out their plans and reflect on the results. They play games with rules, which build self-control and the ability to hold a rule in mind. They take more responsibility in the classroom, helping younger children and taking care of shared materials. Reflection becomes a regular part of the day: what did we find out, what would we do differently.
The final year also carries the transition to Grade 1. Global Nexus does not respond to this by teaching the primary curriculum early, which Vietnamese education authorities have repeatedly told preschools not to do. Instead it concentrates on the foundations that make Grade 1 easier, self-regulation, rich talk in both languages, number sense built through handling objects, interest in books and print, and independence in daily routines. A separate article in this category looks at readiness in detail.
When a child does not fit the band
Every class contains children who are ahead in some dimensions and behind in others, and children who seem out of step with their age group altogether. The whole-child principle asks teams to treat these differences as information about the child rather than as problems with the child. A four-year-old who is not yet interested in group projects may be fully engaged in solitary construction; that is a starting point, not a failure.
Mixed-age moments help here. Times when children from different classes play together, outdoors or in shared activities, allow younger children to learn from older ones and older children to practise patience and leadership. They also give a child who is developmentally younger or older than their classmates a chance to find peers who match them. For children who are new to one of the two languages, an older child who shares their home language can be the most effective guide in the room, often more effective than an adult.
Sometimes differences call for more than flexible teaching. When observations over time suggest that a child may have a developmental difficulty, teams share their observations with the family and suggest an assessment by qualified specialists; Global Star also runs specialist early-intervention support for such cases. Observation records are invaluable in these conversations, because they replace general worries with specific examples, and because they show what the child can do as well as what is hard.
Câu hỏi thường gặp
From what age can a child join a Global Nexus class?
The curriculum is designed for children from about six months to six years old. Vietnamese law defines preschool education as starting from three months, but Global Nexus classes begin at around six months, with care routines and close relationships at the centre of the infant programme.
What are the Mam, Choi and La classes?
They are the common names of the three kindergarten years in Vietnam: Mam for children aged three to four, Choi for four to five, and La for five to six. Children usually move up one class each school year according to their birth year.
Do infants really learn two languages in Global Nexus?
Infants hear both languages in warm, repeated interactions during care and play. They are not taught vocabulary. This early exposure supports later bilingual development, while comfort and security always come first, so adults use whichever language soothes a distressed child fastest.
Why do toddlers do so many practical tasks like pouring and wiping?
Toddlers have a strong drive to do things themselves, and handling real objects is the leading activity of these years in the national programme. Practical tasks build motor control, concentration, independence and vocabulary at the same time.
Is the La class focused on preparing for Grade 1?
Preparing for Grade 1 is one focus, but it is pursued through foundations such as self-regulation, rich talk, number sense with objects and independence, not by teaching the Grade 1 curriculum early. Play and projects remain central in the final preschool year.
What happens if a child develops faster or slower than the age band?
Teams adapt activities to the child's actual level, use mixed-age moments, and keep observation records that show the child's progress over time. If concerns persist, the team discusses them with the family and may suggest a specialist assessment.