Chinese localities relieve study pressure on students

CHENGDU/URUMQI - Authorities in Chinese localities are relieving pressure on students.

In Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, the local government issued a work plan that urged middle and primary schools to enhance physical education among students.

According to the plan, schools should organize at least 30 minutes of physical exercise each morning. On days when no physical classes are arranged, schools should organize an hour of group exercises after school in the afternoon. Morning exercises should be arranged every morning in boarding schools.

In northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, authorities of nine departments have jointly released a plan to relieve students' studying workload, with 30 specific items listed.

According to the plan, no paper homework should be assigned to first- and second-grade students in primary schools, and homework for third- to sixth-grade students should be less than 60 minutes a night. The homework for middle schoolers should be no more than 90 minutes. Senior high schools are required to ensure that students exercise for an hour every day.

Extra-curricular training classes should be registered at educational departments and their training programs publicized, according to the plan. It also asks parents to guarantee at least 10 hours of sleep a day for primary school students, nine for middle schoolers and eight for senior high school students. Children should also be encouraged to engage in more physical exercise.

Earlier this month, the Communist Party of China Central Committee and State Council published a new guideline for advancing education reform and improving the quality of compulsory education.

Moral education and all-round development of students will be priorities, and the efforts must cover every student in every school, it said.

It also called for strengthening physical education, enhancing cultural training with more art-based curriculums and activities, and encouraging students to participate in more manual labor to boost their hard-working spirit.