2024 MOE Kindergarten Open House and Registration Exercise

1. The Ministry of Education (MOE) would like to invite parents to register their child for Kindergarten 1 (K1) admission in 2025 during the upcoming MOE Kindergarten (MK) Registration Exercise from 16 to 20 February 2024. 55 MKs will be participating in this year's exercise, including two new MKs, MK@Elias Park and MK@Hougang, which will be opening in 2025.¹ MOE will also be introducing expanded partnership clusters between MKs and Early Year Centres (EYCs) from this year's exercise. Prior to the exercise, parents are warmly invited to attend the open houses of individual MKs on 3 or 17 February 2024 to learn more about their programmes and facilities.

MKs Provide Quality and Affordable Preschool Education

2 The Government is committed to providing a good start for every child. MKs provide quality and affordable preschool education for children aged five to six. The MK curriculum is designed by curriculum specialists to nurture children holistically in an enriching learning environment, so that they are confident, possess strong social skills, have a good foundation in literacy and numeracy, and are well prepared for Primary 1 (P1). All MKs offer the three Mother Tongue Languages (MTLs) – Chinese, Malay and Tamil – to encourage bilingualism in the early years and help lay a strong foundation for language learning. For parents who require a full-day care service for their child, Kindergarten Care (KCare) services are available in all MKs.

3. MK children will also enjoy priority admission to the primary school that the MK is located within.² In addition, MKs work closely with their primary schools to smoothen and ease their children's transition from Kindergarten to P1.

Details of 2024 MK Registration Exercise

4. The 2024 MK Registration Exercise is open to Singapore Citizen and Permanent Resident children born between 2 January 2020 and 1 January 2021, both dates inclusive. Parents can register their child for admission to an MK via the MK website (www.moe.gov.sg/mk),³ from 9am on 16 February 2024 to 4pm on 20 February 2024. Parents will be informed of the registration outcome by 15 April 2024. Outside this registration period, parents can seek admission to K1 or K2 for their child by contacting the MK directly⁴ to check if there are vacancies.

Expanding partnership clusters between MKs and EYCs

5. The MK-EYC model provides a continuum of preschool education for children aged two months to six years. These partnerships are with PCF Sparkletots Preschool and My First Skool, which currently operate 61 EYCs for children aged two months to four years. For a smooth transition and convenience to parents, eligible children in the EYCs are guaranteed a place at a partner MK and can choose to enrol at the MK to continue their K1 and K2 programme.

6. To provide parents with the choice of more partner MK options, three expanded MK-EYC partnership clusters in Ang Mo Kio, Jurong West, and Sembawang will be included in this year's MK Registration Exercise.⁵ An additional expanded MK-EYC partnership cluster in Tampines will be implemented from the 2025 MK Registration Exercise. Eligible Nursery 2 (N2) children enrolled in an EYC in these clusters will have a guaranteed place in the corresponding cluster of partner MKs, though not necessarily in one particular MK. Parents will be invited to state their order of preference for the partner MKs during the registration exercise, which will be taken into account, among other factors, when allocating MK places. Details of the expanded MK-EYC partnership clusters can be found in Table 1.

Table 1: Expanded MK-EYC Partnerships Clusters in 2024 and 2025

Parents may use SchoolFinder (www.moe.gov.sg/schoolfinder) to find MKs near their residence that have partner EYCs. More information on the MK-EYC partnership is also available on the MK website (www.moe.gov.sg/preschool/moe-kindergarten/mk-eyc).

8. MKs will continue to accept children who are not enrolled in an EYC through Open Admissions to ensure that MKs remain accessible to non-EYC children.

2024 MK Open Houses

9. The 55 MKs participating in the 2024 MK Registration Exercise will hold their open houses on either 3 or 17 February 2024. Parents are encouraged to visit and learn more about each individual MK's curriculum, programmes, interactive learning environment and facilities as well as speak to the MK Educators. The open houses will allow parents to better understand the MKs before registering their child in their preferred MKs. The dates for each MK's Open House can be found in the Annex.

10. For more information on the 2024 MK Open House and Registration Exercise, please visit www.moe.gov.sg/preschool/moe-kindergarten.

Footnotes

1. MK@Blangah Rise and MK@Kranji will continue to operate in 2024 but will not be accepting new K1 cohorts in 2025. More information can be found at: www.moe.gov.sg/news/press-releases/20240116-meeting-shifting-demand-for-school-and-preschool-places-across-singapore

2. MK children are eligible for priority admission to the primary school that the MK is located within under Phase 2A in the P1 Registration Exercise. Like all children who may be eligible for priority admissions, placement into that primary school is not guaranteed and depends on the number of applicants and vacancies in the school during the P1 Registration Exercise.

3. Parents can contact their preferred MK directly should they require assistance during the registration period. More information on the MK Registration Exercise can be found on moe.gov.sg/faqs.

4. Contact details for the MKs can be found at MOE SchoolFinder (www.moe.gov.sg/schoolfinder-mk).

5. Partnership clusters allow one or more EYCs to be partnered with multiple MKs concurrently. There are currently two partnership clusters in Punggol.