Bangkok has joined hands with Globish, an online English language institute, to develop English communication skills among the city’s schoolchildren.

The project, which offers extracurricular online English courses, has been implemented at four schools in the city: Phahon Yothin School in Don Muang district, Wat Praya Pla School in Nong Khaem district, Senanikom School in Chatuchak district and Bang Khae Nuang Sangwan School in Bang Khae district.

The English-learning collaboration is part of the city’s Open Education campaign that now covers 65 schools in Bangkok.

“The idea behind the Open Education campaign is to maximise learning opportunities for children both in school and at home,” said Deputy Bangkok governor Sanon Wangsrangboon as he visited Phahon Yothin School on Tuesday.

“Students spend two-thirds of their day at home and there are 150 days per year that have no school, which means most of their learning should occur outside the classroom. This campaign aims to provide learning courses outside school hours and on Saturday,” he added.

Sanon said the city chose Globish for its long-established online learning platform and international-standard evaluation system that has been adopted by several countries.

“Normally children study the English language in class for around five hours per week. This extra course of one hour per week aims to expand and further improve what they have learned in those five hours under the guidance of native-speaker teachers,” he said.

The deputy governor said he will visit three other schools under the programme to check for problems, such as limited learning tools and internet capability, so that they can be addressed by the city’s Education Department.