Creative programs at Taiwan's selected elementary schools -Ministry of Education Republic of China (Taiwan)

Creative programs at Taiwan's selected elementary schools

Date: 2007-07-30

Creative programs at Taiwan's selected elementary schools

For the past years, lesser children born in Taiwan has meant lesser elementary school students. To encourage schools to inject more vitality into their campuses, the MOE in 2007 granted subsidies to100 selected elementary schools. Twenty of those schools won the Prize for Excellence, among them the Cyu-chih Elementary School in Taipei County, Ben-gang Elementary School in Taoyuan County, and Laosong Elementary School in Chiayi County.

Cyu-chih Elementary School started the school tour in Taiwan

Located near the Swallow Lake below the Feitsui Reservoir, the Cyu-chih Elementary School has rich natural resources. The school president Kuo Hsiung-chun therefore divided the campus into ten theme areas such as the Stream Observation Zone where students can study the topography of the Hsintien River bank and the Ecology Zone for kids to discover all kinds of insects. In addition, students can read books at the Tree House-the school library.. To date, at least 7,000 people have joined the Cyu-chih School Tour to have the experience of studying in a natural environment.

Ben-gang Elementary School seeks to reduce learning gap

The Ben-gang Elementary School is located on a remote seaside in Taoyuan County and many of the students' parents earn a living by fishing. With their lives confined to the fishing port, the students are usually bashful and lack self-confidence. The school principal Chen Hsin-ping concerned that the learning gap between the students and those in city schools might widen, has started to emphasize poetry reading, speech, and drama to strengthen the students' language abilities and self-confidence.

Ben-gang Elementary School also asked Prof. Lee Ying-chao of the Institute of Fisheries Science at the National Taiwan University for advise on how to include the school in designing tours of Hakka fishing villages.

Laosong Elementary School offers a diversified ecology

The Laosong Elementary School in Chiayi County has a diversified ecology and many moving stories about how the pioneer settlers in the area struggled to establish their communities. The school president Tsai Shu-ling likes to take advantage of those attractions and hold school tours focused on "sunshine, waterfall and mountain landscape", bringing more people back to Laosong Elementary School.