Nguyen Hoang Nguyen Tu, a literature teacher at Ly Tu Trong High School for the Gifted in Can Tho City, who has 15 years of experience, said she knows many excellent students with deep knowledge and understanding about subjects, good thinking and dynamism, but they lack soft skills.

A high school teacher in Hanoi also said some of his teachers are clever and very good at social sciences, but remain passive in dealing with daily problems.

“They even cannot tell the difference between the plants on streets. They lack confidence when speaking before the audience and they don’t have teamwork skills,” he said.

Lacking soft skills is a problem of many students nowadays. In modern social conditions, most students are surrounded and cared for thoroughly, and they don’t have many opportunities to communicate with the outside world.

As a result, they do not have understanding about life and social relationships around them. Many children rely on parents and relatives, and do things as arranged by adults. They don’t think about what they need to do and how to live.

Lacking soft skills is a problem of many students nowadays. In modern social conditions, most students are surrounded and cared for thoroughly, and they don’t have many opportunities to communicate with the outside world.

Therefore, equipping students with skills is a very important task for schools and parents.

However, educators complain that there are many barriers in educating soft skills for students. There is not much time to organize integrated activities and the activities cannot be carried out regularly.

Teachers only have one period (45 minutes) a week to carry out a lot of activities, from weekly reviewing, discussing plans for the next weeks and organizing extracurricular activities. Sometimes, the activities are reduced to spend time on learning, which is believed to be more important.

Meanwhile, teachers don’t have much experience in organizing the activities and providing lessons on soft skills. Many students are reserved and reluctant to participate in collective activities or express their opinions. Therefore, the activities are only significant to a part of students.

Tu, in an effort to equip her students with soft skills, has drawn up plans to organize integrated education activities based on many different topics.

The minimum time for extracurricular activities is 15 minutes and maximum time is 30 minutes. The activities are part of the weekly review period and take place at least twice a month.

The topics vary: effective cooperation, career guidance, setting goals and ways to reach goals, creative thinking, and positive behaviors.

Le Ha

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