Happier days ahead for French schoolkids

France is to copy the British public school model by introducing compulsory sport, music and art lessons to try to make the country’s children less miserable.

Ministers are launching an experiment that involves primary and secondary pupils spending some of their afternoons on sports fields, in music rooms or painting, to reduce the hours that French schoolchildren spend learning grammar and multiplication tables.

French educational principles were laid out in the early 19th century by Napoleon Bonaparte. However, after an opinion poll published in 2017 found France to be the most pessimistic country in the world, the education minister urged schools to volunteer to adopt a different curriculum.

Proponents of the French education system argue that it produces finely tuned minds. Detractors, however, blame French schools for the country’s dark outlook on life.

A government source said plans to push children to engage in more sport and culture at school could help to lift the nation’s spirits in the medium and long term. Ministers hope to start the experimental classes in September.

Under the current curriculum, children aged between six and eight have only three hours of sport a week and two hours of art, but 10 hours of spelling and grammar, five hours of mathematics, 21⁄2 hours of moral and civic education, and 90 minutes learning a foreign language. – The Times