THAI NGUYEN AND MY THO, Vietnam — September 19 and 27, 2020

Around the world, children are one of the most vulnerable road users. Travelling to and from school is often a dangerous activity. In Vietnam, the majority of children walk, cycle or are passengers on a motorcycle. To help make the journey to school safer, AIP Foundation is collaborating with the Ministry of Education and Training to pilot an innovative “E-curriculum” on traffic safety for primary school students.  The course includes ten lessons, which feature interactive videos, games, activities, designed to teach students life-saving skills related to safer road behaviors. The Slow Zones, Safe Zones program is being piloted in Pleiku, Thai Nguyen and My Tho city and is supported by Fondation Botnar, Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP), FIA and Mercedes-Benz.

To progress toward national adoption, the E-curriculum will be tested with students from geographically diverse schools, including Pleiku, Thai Nguyen, and My Tho.

As a part of the pilot, the first two teacher training sessions were held in Pleiku City on 7-8 December 2019 to introduce the E-curriculum content and usage. More than 140 attendees, including teachers from 31 primary schools in Pleiku City, local authorities, and members of the school Directorial Board participated in the training sessions.

After a delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic, these initial training sessions were followed up by sessions in Thai Nguyen and My Tho City on September 19 and 27, respectively. Teachers from 915 Gia Sang Primary and Secondary school in Thai Nguyen City, Thai Nguyen Province and Hoang Hoa Tham Primary School in My Tho City, Tien Giang Province attended the training sessions. During the sessions, teachers received training in both the use of the E-curriculum materials and also conducted an interactive mock class in groups to demonstrate how they would teach the content in a classroom setting.

Following these training sessions, the traffic safety E-curriculum will now be piloted with students in four project schools in Pleiku, My Tho and Thai Nguyen from October 2020 to December 2020. To support the delivery of the E-curriculum, each primary school will be equipped with five televisions or a projector and a laptop to support the pilot.