Preschool pupils must

not be over 5DepEd

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By: Dona Z. Pazzibugan
@inquirerdotnet

Philippine Daily Inquirer

04:11 AM November 13th, 2012

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How old should a child in preschool be?
With kindergarten now mandatory under the K to 12 program, the
Department of Education (DepEd) has required preschools and day

care centers to comply with the standard requisite age for

preschoolers.
The preschool age should normally be up to 5 years old only, since by
6 years old a child is expected to be in Grade 1, according to the
DepEd.
Under Republic Act No. 10157 or the universal public kindergarten
program passed last year, the DepEd made one year of kindergarten
compulsory and a prerequisite to entering Grade 1.
Kindergarten is free to 5-year-olds in the public elementary schools
under the K to 12 basic education reform program, which consists of
kindergarten, six years of elementary, two years of junior high and two
years of senior high school.
Private (pre)schools should follow (the standard), Education
Undersecretary for Programs and Projects Yolanda Quijano said.
Whether they have nursery, kinder 1 or kinder 2 levels, they should
now follow [the standard] that kinder is for 5-year-olds and Grade 1 is
for 6-year-olds, she said.
Quijano clarified that while the DepEd required only one year of
kindergarten, parents who can afford private day care centers or
preschools can have their children start school as young as 3 or 4
years old to prepare them for regular schooling.
Before the mandatory kindergarten, some private preschools had
pupils as old as 6 and 7 years old.
Quijano said that having over-age or older than 5 years old pupils in
kindergarten would apply only to exceptional cases such as a child who
has learning issues.

In other countries, there are Grade 1 students who are 6 or 7 years

old. But for us now, Grade 1 is for 6-year-olds, she said.
For kindergarten, the DepEd said the pupils mother tongue or the
language used at home shall be the primary medium of instruction
under the mother tongue-based multilingual education (MTB-MLE)
method adopted under the K to 12
program.
Around 1.7 million 5-year-old children are currently enrolled in
kindergarten in both public and private schools, according to Quijano.
But the DepEd believes that not all 5-year-olds this year were able to
enroll in kindergarten.
Quijano said they would conduct a summer kinder program at the end
of the school year for incoming 6-year-old Grade 1 students who
missed kindergarten.

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