Language/Reading Curriculum in the Fourth Grade
Reading Policy
To ensure a high quality of education in primary schools, the Ministry of Education prescribes a number of core objectives, established in 1993 and revised in 2006, that students are expected to master before they enter secondary education at age 12.11 The 58 core objectives cover Dutch language, English language, Frisian language, arithmetic and mathematics, personal and world orientation, art, and physical education. The freedom of education principle guaranteed by the Dutch Constitution allows schools to determine which curriculum subjects they will teach, the content of those subjects, how much time students will spend on each subject, and when and how the students will be assessed. Thus, the core objectives describe attainment targets only; they neither describe how these targets should be reached nor prescribe any didactics.
Summary of National Curriculum
Core objectives describe in general terms the skills and knowledge a child must have acquired by the end of primary school. Since 2010, reference levels have specifically prescribed the level of knowledge and skills that students must attain in Dutch language and mathematics in any given year of schooling.12 This framework of desired learning results aims to improve alignment among the various types of primary and secondary education schools.13
The 12 core objectives for the area of Dutch language are divided into three sections: Oral Education, Written Education, and Linguistics.14 In the Oral Education section, students learn to:
- Acquire information from spoken language while simultaneously reproducing this information orally or in writing in a structured way
- Express themselves in a meaningful and engaging manner when giving or requesting information, reporting, giving explanations, instructing, and participating in discussions
- Assess information in discussions that is informative or persuasive and learn to respond with arguments
In the Written Education section, students learn to:
- Retrieve information from informative and instructive texts (e.g., diagrams, tables, and digital sources)
- Write meaningful and appealing texts with different functions (e.g., informative, instructive, convincing, and enjoyable texts)
- Structure information and opinions when reading instructional texts and systematically structured print and electronic sources
- Compare and assess information and opinions in different textual forms
- Structure information and opinions when writing a letter, report, form, or paper, paying attention to syntax, correct spelling, legible writing, formatting, images, and, in some cases, color
- Derive pleasure from reading and writing stories, poems, and informative texts
In the Linguistics section, students learn to:
- Recognize, express, use, and assess strategies for oral and written language education
- Use linguistic principles and rules (e.g., distinguish between the subject, verbal predicate, and predicate components of a sentence; understand spelling rules and proper usage of punctuation marks)
- Acquire an adequate vocabulary, strategies for understanding unknown words, and the ability to use terms allowing students to think and talk about language
Formal reading and writing instruction begins in Grade 1 (UNESCO’s ISCED level 1) when children are age 6.15 Preparatory instruction in kindergarten provides an introduction to phonemic awareness and grapheme identification, which is used in instruction in the upper grades. Although the first year of reading instruction in Grade 1 includes reading stories, few instructional activities are aimed at developing reading comprehension; rather, instruction at this grade level emphasizes the acquisition of decoding skills. Most schools adopt a curriculum for reading comprehension instruction beginning in Grade 2.
Over the eight years of schooling at the primary level, schools must provide 7,520 teaching hours with at least 3,520 hours in the first four years and at least 3,760 hours in the last four years. Primary schools are free to determine the length of a school day, so the timetables can be adjusted to the needs of the school, the students, or parents. The Ministry of Education determines the dates of the beginning and end of the school year and the length and dates of the summer, Christmas and May holidays; all other vacations are decided by the schools.