The Kazakh Ministry of Education recently approved new standards requiring a minimum of 50 to 90 minutes of homework, depending on a specified class. At the same time, assignments will not be given on holidays, weekends and after control tests. First-graders will no longer have the assigned homework.
A portion of Kazakh high school students will also study English in the new academic year, Minister of Education and Science Yerlan Sagadiyev reported.
“This year we allowed the pilot classes to be taught in English. I think, there will be many students as more than five hundred students have already signed up. We will conduct classes using the methodology of former Kazakh Turkish lyceum since September. Their books will be used for transition to the English language in pilot mode. The transition will be implemented for a year with parental consent,” Yerlan Sagadiyev said.
Nazarbayev Intellectual schools and Bilim Innovation lyceums will be encouraged to develop English language textbooks. Bilim Innovation is preparing two pilot types of textbooks, which will be given to students, according to the minister. The first book is entirely in English and the second is mixed in 25 and 50 or 75 percent. The History of Kazakhstan, Chemistry, Biology, Physics and IT disciplines are going be transitioned into English.
Therefore, about 12,000 teachers will be taught how to teach in English. The pilot project demands the figure of around 16,500 teachers, who will teach four subjects in 10th and 11th grades. The Ministry of Education and Science planned that 5,000 teachers will undergo preparations, but 12,000 have already registered for the courses. There are different types of training, among which the maximum goes up to nine months. Salary and payment of business trips are paid out during the duration of studies.
