Life skills of 5-6 year old children in some kindergartens in Ho Chi Minh City

- Group 2: Pre-vocational skills: Communication skills; Calculation skills; Knowledge of the rights and responsibilities of employers and employees; Problem-solving skills...

- Group 3: Vocational skills, such as: Cultivation; Raising livestock; Repairing electrical appliances; Using computers, and Speaking foreign languages...

In Cambodia, life skills are formally taught in schools and are considered key elements in education policy to link education with market needs for socio-economic development. This connection will improve the career effectiveness of graduates and increase local and international investment, while creating a need for self-learning among learners. Life skills education programs in formal schools are aimed at helping learners to be able to apply knowledge from different subjects to real life; After leaving school, they will be active and responsible people towards society; Participate in the world of work; Reduce unemployment and poverty to contribute to social development... To achieve these goals, life skills education in Cambodia is implemented as follows:

- General life skills are integrated into the lessons of basic subjects from grades 1 to 12.

- Vocational skills from grades 6 to 12 are taught and practiced in technology subcommittees.

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- Simple vocational skills are selected and implemented based on the capabilities of each school.

In Malaysia, many researchers consider life skills as a subject of life and this subject is taught as a subject in primary and secondary schools. The objective of this subject in primary schools is to provide learners with basic practical skills to be able to perform tasks in life; while in secondary schools, it is aimed at equipping them with skills to contribute to creating individuals who are independent, self-reliant in life, have technological skills, are confident, creative, and have the ability to interact effectively with others.

In Thailand, the interest in life skills is quite early. Research on life skills is conducted by non-governmental organizations and educational organizations of domestic ministries and departments. Here, they consider life skills as psychosocial attributes or abilities that help individuals cope with all daily situations and respond to future circumstances to live happily. In other words, life skills are the ability of individuals to solve problems in daily life to live safely and happily. From this concept, they believe that: in order for people to mature and adapt, it is necessary to form at least ten basic life skills: Decision-making skills, Conflict resolution, Creativity, Analysis - evaluation, Communication, Interpersonal relationships, Emotional control, Shock control, Empathy, Practice.

In the same vein, in the Philippines life skills are considered adaptive and positive behavioral abilities that enable individuals to effectively cope with the demands, changes, experiences and situations of daily life, and therefore life skills that need to be taught to people include: Self-awareness, Empathy, Effective communication, Interpersonal relationships, Decision making, Creative thinking, Critical thinking, Coping, Emotional control, Entrepreneurship.

In Indonesia, life skills are focused on research as an educational science. Life skills are considered as knowledge, skills, and attitudes that help learners live independently. Life skills education will bring certain benefits: increasing employment opportunities for learners, improving the quality of human resources, thereby promoting the implementation of local autonomy policies, creating quality education for the poor and people in special circumstances. On the other hand, life skills education in this country is carried out by non-governmental organizations as well as specialized centers that are quite prominent and well-invested.

Thus, in Western countries and countries in the Asian region, life skills are studied in the direction of focusing on understanding the concept, classification as well as the direction of training life skills for children and students. However, the clear research on the concept according to the psychological approach is not really clear and profound. On the other hand, the classification methods also have overlaps that cannot be

classification according to scientific criteria when approaching. These are issues that need attention besides the lack of research to assess the current status of life skills of a certain age group, of which preschool children are a typical example.

1.1.2. Research in Vietnam

Before the 1990s, life skills education for the young generation was always a concern of Vietnamese educators. Although the concept of life skills had not been raised or studies on life skills had not been done. However, it is easy to see that this issue was mentioned in our country's education program, such as the subject of Ethics, Textbooks. Besides, there were many authors, translators, scholars who researched and compiled documents and books on how to be a human being to provide everyone with knowledge about how to be a human being, how to behave, study methods, organize life scientifically, etc. Some famous authors can be mentioned: Nguyen Hien Le with the work How to Win Friends and Influence People, Organizing Work According to Science; Hoang Xuan Viet with the work "Forging Personality", "The Art of Communication"; “Politeness” by Pham Cong Hoan,… These documents have contributed greatly to equipping Vietnamese people with certain skills for living and working. That shows that the study of life skills, although not officially called the study of life skills, has been mentioned a lot.

However, the term “Life skills” only began to be of interest in Vietnam in the early 90s (20th century). At that time, society began to have complex changes - the market economy and the introduction of cultures from foreign countries into Vietnam; changes in the natural environment had a great impact on people; therefore, it required each person to learn how to adapt; in addition to academic qualifications and moral character, other skills such as working capacity began to be considered and concerned. This was the condition for Vietnamese education to pay attention to the term life skills in the program and implement a number of projects of other organizations in the world.

In the early 1990s, the Prime Minister also issued a document in Decision 1363/TTg on "introducing environmental education content into the national education system". This document mentioned equipping students with skills to respond to the environment.

school, attitude towards life as the initial manifestations of life skills. Next, Directive No. 10/GD & DT in 1995 or Directive 24/CT&GD in 1996 of the Ministry of Education and Training gave instructions on drug prevention at schools. This also refers to the necessary skills for students such as: refusal, self-protection, behavior with people with HIV...

After the 1990s, a number of projects began to be implemented in provinces and cities to test life skills education for disadvantaged groups. On that basis, research on life skills also began to be developed from 1998 to 2000. With the development and challenges of life, life skills are not only necessary for children but also for adolescents and young people who need to be equipped with life skills. [30]

Some foreign organizations have also conducted initial research on life skills in Vietnam in the form of training and education projects. UNICEF is a pioneer organization with the program "Life skills education to protect health and prevent HIV/AIDS for adolescents in and out of school". Phase one was implemented for subjects in the education sector as well as the Red Cross. The skills included are: Self-awareness skills, Communication skills, Perseverance skills, Value determination skills... In the next phase, life skills began to be mentioned more widely and deeply as important provisions that people need in life. After that, the concept of life skills was mentioned with full content after the workshop: "Quality of education and life skills" sponsored by UNESCO in 2003. The term life skills became popular and received wide attention from many scientists.

Some of the studies on life skills that can be mentioned are those from funded projects in Vietnam:

 Measures to educate life skills for primary school students through teaching ethics in primary schools in the northern mountainous region in 2001.

 Research on life skills education model for students of Khai Tri boarding school, An Giang province in 2002.

 Life skills education for female students in Long Xuyen city in 2004.

Next, we can mention the book “Life skills education curriculum” by author Nguyen Thanh Binh, Hanoi Pedagogical University Publishing House in 2008, after the author participated in the junior high school teacher training project. The curriculum focused on analyzing the concept of life skills, principles and methods of effective life skills education. However, the basic content of each skill has not been analyzed systematically and deeply because it is not the main content of this document. [5]

In 2009, Education Publishing House first published the book “Life skills education for children from 5 to 6 years old” by author Le Bich Ngoc. The author aims to target this book at parents with children from 5 to 6 years old in rural areas. The author classifies life skills into 7 groups; each group includes many life skills; each life skill has instructions on the name, what parents need to instruct their children, and suggestions for activities, means, and forms of education. [27]

The book series "Life skills education in Literature, History, Geography, Biology, Civic Education of high schools" piloted by the Ministry of Education and Training written in 2010 by authors Luu Thu Thuy, Nguyen Thi Hong Van (Literature); Luu Thu Thuy, Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai (Civic Education); Luu Thu Thuy, Nguyen Thi Minh Phuong (Geography); Luu Thu Thuy, Tran Quy Thang (Biology), Nguyen Trong Duc raised some general issues about life skills and life skills education for students in high schools, specifically the concepts, classifications, importance of life skills, orientation of life skills education for high school students and life skills education in Literature, History, Geography, Biology, Civic Education in high schools. In which, the forms of organization, approaches and methods of life skills education, principles and modern teaching techniques are also mentioned and guided for use in lessons to practice specific life skills necessary for students. Also following this direction, in 2011, the group of authors Luu Thu Thuy, Le Minh Chau, Tran Thi To Oanh, Pham Thi Thu Phuong, Dao Van Vi (General issues of life skills); Tran

Hien Luong, Hoang Hoa Binh, Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao (Vietnamese); Luu Thu Thuy, Nguyen Viet Ha (Ethics); Nguyen Tuyet Nga, Phan Thanh Ha (Nature and Society) compiled the book series "Life skills education in primary school subjects". During this time, another group of authors also compiled a book series on life skills with each topic as follows: Pham Thanh Hiep: Life skills - some necessary skills, Life skills - Who are you?; Nguyen Minh Anh: Life skills - Self-training; Nguyen Minh Anh - Nguyen Thi Chung: Life skills

– Self-improvement; Tran Van Nghia: Life skills – First aid and safety; Do Hong Ngoc: Life skills – Diseases and illnesses in school age and how to prevent them. The book series provides basic knowledge about life skills, helping students improve their personality and orient their future life and career; the content is practical and has specific instructions to solve problems in daily life.

In recent years, some textbooks, documents and articles on life skills have begun to receive attention, typically the article on life skills from a psychological perspective by Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Uan published in the Psychology journal [47, pp. 1-4], life skills training programs were tested in the Ho Chi Minh City area by Dr. Huynh Van Son and his colleagues under the sponsorship of DAIICHI LIFE insurance for two consecutive years, many topics on training or equipping life skills for students were implemented. It is also possible to mention a few documents that refer to the concept of life skills, classification and basic content of life skills such as the book Introduction to life skills, Young people and life skills, Life skills model by author Huynh Van Son [36,37,38,39]; Associate Professor Dr. Nguyen Duc Quang with the book "Guide to implementing life skills education for high school students" [33].

In 2010, the author Nguyen Huu Long's master's thesis research focused on secondary school students. However, the author's research was limited to understanding the current state of life skills and initially testing psychological effects to improve some skills of students: self-reliance skills.

self-awareness, communication skills, sharing and cooperation skills, skills to distinguish between reasonable and unreasonable behavior.

Also during this time, in Ho Chi Minh City, author Mai Hien Le studied the life skills of preschool children, with the topic: "Some manifestations of life skills of children in the older kindergarten class of Thuc Hanh kindergarten in Ho Chi Minh City". The advantage of this topic is that the author boldly took the first step in researching the life skills of a new subject, preschool children, and had a fairly complete survey of the life skills of older preschool children. However, the limitation of the topic is that it was only surveyed in one preschool, and the testing of the impact of improving children's life skills only stopped at one communication skill.

However, there are not many documents or research works on life skills for preschool children - the stage of 5-6 years old is the stage of preparation for children to enter general school and is the decisive foundation for the personality development of each individual in the following stages. More specifically, there has not been any research that has examined in detail the current situation of life skills of preschool children in Ho Chi Minh City, so this research direction is still blank.

1.2. Theoretical basis

1.2.1. Life skills

1.2.1.1. Concept of skills

According to the Vietnamese Dictionary, skill is the ability to apply knowledge acquired in a certain field into practice. [48, p.517]

The Oxford dictionary defines “skill” as the ability to find a solution to a problem and is acquired through practice. [38, p.15 – quoted from]

According to the Dictionary of Education, skill is "the ability to perform the right action or activity in accordance with the specific goals and conditions for performing that action, whether it is a concrete action or an intellectual action."[13, p.220]

According to the Dictionary of Psychology by author Vu Dung (Editor-in-Chief), skill is "the ability to effectively apply knowledge about methods of action that have been acquired by the subject to perform corresponding tasks. At the skill level, work

completed under unchanged circumstances, low quality, unskilled operations, and requiring intense concentration and attention; skills are formed through practice.” [11]

In AM Colman's Dictionary of Psychology, “Skill is proficiency, deep specialized knowledge, the ability to achieve high performance in a certain field; specifically, a way of performing coordinated, organized behavior, achieved through training and practice”. [49, p.681]

Thus, it can be seen that the concept of skills is viewed from many different perspectives. Clarifying the common points and differences in each concept to reach a consistent understanding of skills is used in this topic.

Another perspective on skills

First concept: view skills as operating techniques

Author Tran Trong Thuy believes that: skill is the technical aspect of action, people who know how to act have the technique of action, have skills. [40, p.49]

The (former) Soviet Dictionary of Psychology (1983) defines: “Skill is the middle stage of mastering a new method of action – which is based on a certain rule (knowledge) and on the process of solving a series of tasks corresponding to that knowledge, but has not yet reached the level of skill”. [25, p.376].

Authors Nguyen Huu Nghia, Trieu Xuan Quynh, Bui Ngoc Oanh said: "Skills are actions formed by imitation based on knowledge, they require the regular participation of consciousness, concentration of attention, and need to consume a lot of energy from the body". The authors also said that skills have other characteristics such as "actions are not generalized, because the operation is not precise, the control role of vision is important". [26]

Author ND Levitovxam considers skills to be closely linked to the results of action. According to him, a person with action skills must grasp and correctly apply the methods of action to carry out actions with results. He emphasizes that to form skills, people must both grasp the theory of action and apply that theory in practice.

Life skills of 5-6 year old children in some kindergartens in Ho Chi Minh City - 3

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