Preschools or nursery schools provide care
for children from two and three years old
until they are six. The curriculum aims to
prepare children for primary school, and
includes reading, writing, numeracy and
sometimes even a foreign language.
Most French schools follow a national
curriculum set by the Ministry of Education
but the French government published reforms
in May 2015 that would allow schools to set 20
percent of the curriculum themselves.
France there had been a 18 national curriculum for
early years (pre-elementary) education since 1995,
determined nationally by the Ministry of Education,
with six main areas of activity rather than
subjects: 1) living together 2) speaking and building up
the language 3) learning about the written word 4)
taking action/acting in the world 5) discovering the
world 6) imagining, feeling and creating.
The use of formal assessment
of pre-school children are
discouraged as being premature
and potentially harmful
The primary school curriculum
in France is similar to other
countries, and includes literacy
and numeracy, with classes in
French, arithmetic, but also
geography and history, the arts,
and more frequently a foreign
language, usually English.
France's kindergarten program's main
mission is to inspire children to go to school to
learn, affirm and develop their personality.
Preschool is since September
2014 a single cycle, fundamental to the
success of all students. It is defined in
three areas: A school that adapts to
young children, A school that organizes
specific learning modalities, A school
where children will learn and live together.
The preschool programme is organised into five
learning areas which are: mobilize the language
in all its dimensions, act, speak, understand
through physical activity, act, speak, understand
through the arts, build the first tools to
structure their thoughts and explore the world.
France had a reputation for having one
of the best education systems in the
world, with a nationally set curriculum,
traditional methods of learning, high
academic standards and strict discipline.
France dropped three places for
educational standards. It is now placed 25
out of 65 countries, 43 percent of
students having difficulty in mathematics
and with a widening equality gap within
the school population.
State education is free and
mandatory from ages 6 to 16
for French citizens and others
who have proof of residence