Nov 30, 2009, 13:24 GMT
Hong Kong - Pushy Hong Kong parents are enrolling 3-year-old children in two kindergartens at a time, schooling them for up to 10 hours a day, a news report said Monday.
Children signed up to two kindergartens typically start classes at 8 am and finish at 6 pm, then have homework to complete overnight, the South China Morning Post said.
The trend among middle-class families in the notoriously workaholic city of 7 million has been triggered by a government scheme in 2007 giving vouchers for Chinese-language kindergartens.
Better-off parents now put their children in a Chinese-language kindergarten for free and enroll them separately in a private English-language kindergarten at the same time, the newspaper said.
Some kindergartens have changed their schedules to accommodate so called 'dual-kinder kids' who dash from one school after morning lessons to attend afternoon classes in another.
The director of a child welfare charity told the newspaper the heavy work schedule was not good for children aged 3 to 6. 'Children have a right to play and relax,' she said.
Middle-class couples in Hong Kong have a reputation for working their children as hard as possible, a trend that sociologists blame for high youth suicide rates and poor inter-family communication.
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