A guideline on evaluating students’ performances of Grade I, II and III will be finalised soon, according to Akram-Al-Hossain, the secretary to the primary and mass education ministry.
Moreover, the pre-primary period is planned to be extended from one year to two years, he said.
"There is a plan to increase the pre-primary period from one year to two years."
In Bangladesh, no admission test is held in 65,593 government primary schools and students get admitted in the pre-primary classes.
The students from the Grade I to III might be evaluated on their attendances in the classes and the teachers' comments on their diaries, an official of the primary and mass education ministry told bdnews24.com.
“However, the ministry will issue a gazette after finalising the issue as per the opinions of the people concerned, including academicians," he said.
But, the government has long been ignoring the academicians who suggested it to scrap 5th Grade Primary Education Completion or PEC examination.
Another official said a process was under way for raising pre-primary period to two years in order to attracting children to the government schools from kindergarten. An instruction will be issued soon, he said.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina had recently instructed the primary and mass education ministry to scrap all examinations from Grade I to III of primary schools to ease the burden on the children.
At a function on Mar 13, she said, “Children should learn in a playful environment; we must ensure that.”
“They will lose interest in education if we constantly tell them to study. They will rather be scared of studies. I would request the teachers and guardians to ensure that they don’t become education-phobic.”
The pre-primary classes were introduced in the government primary schools in 2014. Students who got admitted in the first batch of pre-primary sat for the PEC examinations in 2018.