The multimillion-dollar plan to improve Dutch children’s reading and arithmetic is not working and will be completely overhauled. The government is taking drastic action and is now focusing all its efforts on language education. ‘After four years, the results should really have been better,’ admits State Secretary Judith Tielen (Education).
Dutch language and arithmetic education has been doing poorly since the corona pandemic. The most recent international PISA study among 15-year-olds shows that as many as a third of Dutch young people do not even reach the basic level for reading. This means that they have difficulty understanding simple texts, such as a simple leaflet for medicines. At pre-vocational secondary education, the situation is even more serious.
The Rutte IV cabinet found reason to intervene in 2022 Masterplan Basic Skills which invested hundreds of millions in education to improve the basic skills of our youth. For example, schools received money for reading and arithmetic coaches, and the methods were also examined again.
But results from this plan have not yet been achieved, it also turned out an earlier article on this site. When previous ministers and state secretaries were confronted with this, the answer was often: wait and see, it will take a while before you see the millions reflected in the results. But now a different wind is blowing.
Not the desired effect
In a letter to the House, State Secretary Tielen now admits that the cabinet’s efforts are ‘not having the desired effect’. “After four years, the results really should have been better,” she writes. And so the government intervenes.
To turn the tide, the government is now putting language education first. The approach to the other basic skills of arithmetic and citizenship will continue, but the idea is that if children can read and write, the rest will take care of itself. ‘We simply cannot afford for the language base of today’s students and adults of tomorrow to not be in order,’ says Tielen.
The government wants to ensure that language education becomes part of all subjects at school. A geography or history teacher will soon be just as responsible for the student’s language development as the Dutch teacher. The government also wants to allocate more money to promote libraries in schools.
In addition, reading education should be better anchored in teacher training, the government believes. Tielen also wants to make more active use of children’s home environments, including a focus on preschool age, because recent research shows that the disadvantages already start there.
WATCH ALSO to these videos about politics: