Mick Hartley

Kindergarten education in North Korea used to consist of a five-hour day, studying the childhoods of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, the North Korean language, counting, abacus calculations, and singing and dance. Now, however, the five-hour day has been reduced to three. The one subject that's been cut to allow for this dramatic change? Obviously not the childhoods of Kim Il Song or Kim Jong Il….

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un recently issued an order to reduce the study time of the North Korean language in kindergartens throughout the country. The move has caused controversy among some parents of the children.

A source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on Sept. 13 that “recently, study time devoted to our language at kindergartens throughout the country decreased from three hours to one hour.” The source added that “this is the result of a policy issued in mid-August by our Supreme Leader [Kim] that ‘spending many hours studying our language can have a negative effect on the growth and development of children.’” 

According to the source, the new policy calls for kindergarten curriculums to conduct education sufficient for students to be able to “write only their own names and numbers one to 30.”

Why would they want any more than that? There aren't any books to read anyway, beyond the lives and teachings of the Kim family.

This change throws the “child-friendly” policies of the Kim Jong Un regime into even sharper relief by demonstrating a special interest in fostering and inducing loyalty in young generations toward the party and the state. In fact, the move can be interpreted as an attempt to strengthen regime solidarity through so-called “love-for-the-people politics.”

However, contrary to this aim, dissatisfaction has surfaced among parents who are upset that language was singled out in the cutback and who feel that authorities are preventing children from learning “necessary life skills.”

The source said that “these days people aren’t having many children, so if they have just one child they really want to raise them properly. Because of this, they’re asking ‘isn’t this too much of a cutback on time spent studying our language,’ which is a really basic, fundamental subject.”

Nevertheless, the authorities have instituted supervision and oversight mechanisms to closely monitor adherence to the policy. For example, they have ordered that children do not have to study the North Korean language after school or at home, and they have instructed homeroom teachers to store related exercise books at school. 

The source explained that “inspection teams made up of provincial and city education officials are even going through the bags of children on their way home from school to confirm whether kindergartens are conforming to party policies.”

The source added that “a threatening directive has been circulated among teachers that if inspectors find language exercise books in kindergarteners’ bags on their way home from school, their teachers will be punished with a month or more at a forced labor camp.”