In Global Nexus, school readiness means a child arrives at Grade 1 able to manage their feelings and attention, communicate confidently, take care of daily needs, get along with others and approach new learning with curiosity. It does not mean having already learned to read, write and calculate from the Grade 1 programme. Vietnamese education authorities have repeatedly told preschools not to teach Grade 1 content in advance, and Global Nexus follows that guidance. The final preschool year builds the foundations instead: self-regulation, rich talk in two languages, number sense through objects, love of books and independence.
Few topics in early-years education produce more anxiety among families, and that anxiety often pushes preschools towards drills that look like preparation but rarely help. This article explains how Global Nexus approaches readiness, where it sits within Vietnam's framework, and what the final year actually involves.
What readiness means, and what it does not
In everyday conversation, a child who is ready for school is often a child who can already write the alphabet, read simple words and add numbers. That definition is narrow and, in Vietnam, at odds with official guidance. Grade 1 in the national general education programme is designed to teach reading, writing and mathematics from the start, and Grade 1 teachers expect children to arrive without formal instruction in them. Children who have been drilled in advance can find the first months of Grade 1 boring and may have picked up habits, such as incorrect letter formation, that their teachers must undo.
A broader view of readiness has become common in international early-years work. UNICEF's conceptual framework on school readiness, published in 2012, describes three dimensions: ready children, ready schools and ready families. A ready child has the physical, social, emotional, language and cognitive foundations to learn; a ready school welcomes children as they are; ready families support the transition.
Global Nexus takes this broader view. Readiness is not a separate subject in the final year but the natural result of the six dimensions developing well: language, emotion, life skills, independence, creativity and thinking. The question teams ask is not whether a child knows enough Grade 1 content, but whether the child has the foundations to learn it with confidence.
This shift in question changes what teachers look at. Instead of checking whether a child can name every letter, a La class teacher notices whether the child can follow a three-step instruction, wait for a turn in a conversation, recover after a mistake, explain how a model was built, and ask for help when stuck. These are the behaviours Grade 1 teachers in Vietnam and elsewhere most often mention when asked which children settle well, and they are all things a play-based curriculum is well placed to develop.
Vietnam's framework for the final preschool year
Children in Vietnam usually enter Grade 1 in the calendar year they turn six. The current general education programme, adopted in 2018, was introduced in Grade 1 from the 2020 to 2021 school year. English becomes a compulsory subject from Grade 3, with earlier English offered as an option in many schools.
For the final preschool year, the Ministry of Education and Training issued a set of development standards for five-year-olds in 2010. They are organised in four areas, physical development, emotional and social development, language and communication, and cognitive development, with standards and indicators describing what most children of that age can typically do. The standards are intended to help teachers and families support development and the transition to Grade 1, not to examine children or select them for schools.
Global Nexus uses these standards as a reference alongside its own six dimensions. Observation records in the La class are reviewed against the standards so that teachers can see where each child is developing well and where more support may help. This reading never turns into testing, scoring or ranking; the standards describe a typical range, and children within the range vary widely.
What often gets pushed, and what actually helps
Pressure from families and competition between schools can push the final preschool year towards activities that look like preparation. The table compares common examples with the foundations Global Nexus builds instead.
| Common push | Why it disappoints | What Global Nexus does instead |
|---|---|---|
| Copying letters and numbers on worksheets | Children can form shapes without understanding them, and some learn habits Grade 1 teachers must correct | Drawing, cutting, threading, clay and mark-making that build hand strength and control, plus writing that has meaning, such as a child's own name on their work |
| Reading drills from a primer | Mechanical decoding without interest in books, and boredom when Grade 1 repeats it | Daily shared reading in both languages, rhymes and sound games, retelling stories, noticing print in the environment |
| Written sums | Children learn to produce answers without understanding quantity | Counting, sorting, comparing and sharing real objects; simple measuring; board games with dice |
| Sitting still for long periods | Compliance is mistaken for attention, and restless children are labelled as problems | Games that build self-control, such as stop-and-go and turn-taking games, with gradually longer periods of focused group work |
| English vocabulary lists | Words learned in isolation are quickly forgotten | Using English in play, projects and conversation so children gain confidence to communicate |
The right-hand column takes more planning and produces less visible evidence on paper, which is one reason the left-hand column remains popular. Observation records and portfolios help here, because they show families what their child can actually do: explain an idea, follow a multi-step plan, retell a story in two languages, solve a problem with friends.
Self-regulation: the foundation under all the others
Among the foundations of readiness, self-regulation is often considered the most important. The Harvard Center on the Developing Child groups the relevant skills under executive function: working memory, the ability to hold information in mind; inhibitory control, the ability to resist an impulse and choose a response; and cognitive flexibility, the ability to switch between tasks or perspectives. These skills develop rapidly between three and five, and they underpin the classroom behaviours Grade 1 requires.
Executive function grows through practice, and play offers plenty of it. Games with rules require children to remember and follow those rules. Pretend play requires them to stay in role and adjust to others. Projects require them to plan, carry out and adjust. Global Nexus La classes use all three deliberately, along with games designed to stretch self-control, such as freeze games, clapping patterns and turn-taking board games.
Emotional regulation belongs here too. A child who can recognise frustration, ask for help and recover after a disappointment is far better prepared for a new school than one who can recite the alphabet. Teachers help children name feelings, think about what to do when things go wrong, and solve conflicts with words. By the end of the La class, many children can resolve small disagreements without an adult, which is one of the clearest signs of readiness.
Teachers track this growth through observation rather than tests. A note that a child waited for a turn in a board game without reminders, or calmed down after losing and asked to play again, is evidence of self-regulation that no worksheet can capture. Over a year these notes build a picture of how a child's control and focus have grown, which is far more useful to a Grade 1 teacher and to the family than a single result.
Independence and everyday competence
Much of what makes the first weeks of Grade 1 easy or hard has nothing to do with academic content. Can the child open a lunch box, use the toilet without help, put on shoes, keep track of a water bottle, find their way back to a classroom, ask an unfamiliar adult for help? Primary schools in Vietnam are larger than most preschools and offer less individual attention, so children who manage these things on their own start with a real advantage.
Global Nexus builds this competence throughout the preschool years through the life skills and independence dimensions, and the La class gives it extra attention. Children take responsibility for their own belongings, serve themselves at meals, help prepare the classroom, carry messages between rooms and look after younger children during mixed-age times. Each of these tasks is small, but together they build a child's sense of being capable in a group setting.
Independence also includes managing one's own learning in simple ways: choosing an activity and staying with it, tidying up when finished, remembering a plan made in the morning circle and carrying it out. Teachers deliberately step back during the final year, offering fewer reminders and more opportunities for children to organise themselves, while staying close enough to help when a task proves too hard. The aim is that children leave the La class expecting to be able to cope, which is the attitude that serves them best in a new school.
Language and early literacy in two languages
For Vietnamese children entering a Vietnamese-language Grade 1, strong spoken Vietnamese is the most important literacy foundation. Children who have a rich vocabulary, can tell and retell stories, and enjoy playing with sounds learn to read more easily. Global Nexus La classes therefore keep Vietnamese talk rich and varied: storytelling, discussion of projects, explaining reasoning, rhymes and word games.
Vietnamese writing has features that shape early literacy work. Words are written syllable by syllable with spaces between them, and tone marks change meaning. Playing with syllables and tones in songs, rhymes and clapping games builds the awareness of sound that Grade 1 reading builds on, without teaching the formal reading programme early.
English develops alongside. Children who will continue in an international or bilingual primary school benefit from confidence in spoken English, an interest in English books and familiarity with English sounds. Research on bilingual development, including work by Ellen Bialystok and others, suggests that skills such as understanding that print carries meaning transfer between languages. Global Nexus therefore treats the two languages as mutually supporting rather than competing for time in the final year.
Ready families and ready schools
The UNICEF framework's other two dimensions are a reminder that readiness is not only about the child. Families can help by talking with children about the move to a new school with interest rather than anxiety, reading together, encouraging independence in dressing and eating, and avoiding drills that turn learning into a source of stress. Global Nexus teams share these ideas with families during the final year and invite questions.
Schools prepare too. Many Vietnamese primary schools organise introductions for new Grade 1 children, and La class teachers can help by preparing children for what will be different: a larger building, more children, a different teacher, a timetable with longer periods of sitting. Visits, stories about starting school and role play of a primary classroom all help children imagine the change before it happens.
Finally, the information a preschool holds can help a primary school welcome a child well. A portfolio that shows what a child can do, how they learn best and what helps them settle is more useful to a new teacher than a list of grades. Global Nexus portfolios are designed to be shared with families, who can choose what to pass on to the next school.
Câu hỏi thường gặp
Do children in the Global Nexus La class learn to read and write before Grade 1?
They are not taught the Grade 1 reading and writing programme in advance, in line with Vietnamese guidance. They build the foundations instead: rich talk, story and sound games in both languages, interest in books, meaningful mark-making and hand control.
Why do Vietnamese authorities discourage teaching Grade 1 content in preschool?
Grade 1 is designed to teach reading, writing and mathematics from the start. Children drilled in advance may become bored, learn incorrect habits that teachers must undo, and miss the play-based learning that builds the foundations for later success.
What are the development standards for five-year-olds in Vietnam?
They are a set of standards issued by the Ministry of Education and Training in 2010, organised in four areas: physical, emotional and social, language and communication, and cognitive development. They support teachers and families in the final preschool year and are not used to test or rank children.
What is executive function and why does it matter for school readiness?
Executive function refers to working memory, inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility. These skills help children follow instructions, focus, manage impulses and adapt, and they predict how well children cope with the demands of primary school.
How can families support readiness at home?
Families can read and talk with their child every day in the home language, encourage independence in dressing and eating, play games with rules, talk positively about the new school and avoid worksheets and drills that create stress.
Does Global Nexus prepare children for international primary schools as well as Vietnamese ones?
The foundations it builds, self-regulation, confident communication, curiosity, independence, serve children in any primary system. Children heading to an English-medium school also benefit from the confidence in spoken English developed through daily bilingual use.