By Maria Almenoar & Goh Yi Han

KINDERGARTENS run by Singapore's largest kindergarten operator have brought in an external consultant to keep their enrolment numbers up.

Twenty such centres of the PAP Community Foundation (PCF) in Jurong and Bukit Timah will now be managed by NTUC First Campus, which itself runs 50 preschools.

NTUC has overhauled the curriculum, added more training hours for teachers and renovated the centres. The cost was paid for by fund-raising.

Now called Little Wings, these kindergartens will have a uniform curriculum for its 2,200 youngsters, with teachers able to move between centres.

Its 600 nursery students have gone through a year-long trial run of the programme.

Other PCF kindergartens are not undergoing an overhaul of curriculum as yet.

Finance Minister and Member of Parliament (Jurong GRC) Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that other MPs in his constituency - Mr Lim Boon Heng and Ms Grace Fu - along with MPs for Bukit Timah-Holland GRC Lim Swee Say and Yu-Foo Yee Shoon, agreed to pool resources to 'raise the quality of the programme' and reverse a gradual decline in enrolment.

The 20 centres are in their wards. Explaining the decline, he said: 'Some of it is demographic - some parents are moving up to upper middle class and are able to afford private centre fees.

'We were no longer growing and in some centres we were seeing a gradual decline year by year...We wanted to act early to reverse the decline.'

NTUC First was picked because of its expertise, said Mr Tharman.

The new curriculum focuses on learning through play and hands-on activities. Pupils are divided into smaller groups. Before, teachers would teach all 25 pupils together.

Said one teacher, Madam Ng Eng Moi, 50: 'Children get to move around the class to do different activities which keep them excited.'

Fees will remain at $105 per month. A new $40,000 retrenchment relief fund will help parents pay school fees even if they have lost their jobs.

Mr Chua Shih Yang, 33, a coffeeshop owner, has already seen a change in his four-year-old son, Rui Heng, who is attending the nursery pilot programme.

'He's talkative now and enjoys learning more,' said Mr Chua.

This article was first published in The Straits Times.