Based on the famous Finnish Early Childhood Education concept, the Zero-to-Hero Program helps over 200 local children in a small village in the Thai countryside to develop the skills they need to become successful in their future life. Moomin Language School is used to teach English to the children taking part in the program. The founder of Zero-to-Hero, Dan Rubinstein, is sharing their experiences.
For the last six months, we have been teaching English with the help of the Moomin Language School program. The results have been very encouraging. The 4 and 5-year-olds understood immediately how to use the learning application. They enjoy the program and are extremely motivated. I’m amazed and happy about this result.
Even our 3-year-olds have learned to use the program in a proper way. When we first started to use the program with them, we quickly realized that a 15-minute time limit in the application was too long for them as they couldn’t concentrate for so long. Later on, we tried the program again with the 3-year-olds, this time using a shorter time limit. To our surprise it went really well. Even the smallest children are now excited about the program and need little help from adults. The program does indeed work with children as young as 3, but they might need the teacher’s help a bit more than the older kids.
The Importance of Thinking Skills
Our biggest challenge is that the countryside way of life doesn’t teach children to think. Yet the skill to think will be the most important asset in the future society. Already in the past six months we have noticed that the children taking part in the program have developed as thinkers more than children who have not participated in the program. Due to this, we will recommend Moomin Language School to all the 151 schools in our area.
Dan Rubinstein
Zero-to-Hero Foundation
