Schools experiment with six-day week

100 SCHOOLS TO TEST OUT NEW TIMETABLE FROM SEPTEMBER, WITH LESSONS IN MORNING AND SPORT AND CULTURE AFTER LUNCH. CHILDREN at 100 secondary schools in France are to test out a new timetable

from September, with lessons in the morning and sport and cultural activities in the afternoon. The experiment will see the school timetable spread out over six days - from Monday to

Saturday - with fewer lessons each day, all before lunch. The new arrangements will be watched closely to see what effect they have on pupils' health and school performance. As well as

cutting the amount of time spent in the classroom each day, Education Minister Luc Chatel hopes the experiment will also encourage children to become more active and try out new sports and

hobbies. The new timetable will be tested out from September at 100 _collèges_ and _lycées_ - at least one in each department, but only three or four classes at each school will be involved.

The system, which is used in Germany and the US, has been implemented at one class at a _lycée_ in Meaux on the outskirts of Paris since January. Staff say it appears to be having a

positive effect on pupils and improved their concentration - although there has been no noticeable rise in their marks. Saturday morning lessons were scrapped in September 2008 - giving

children all of Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday out of the classroom. The move to a four-day week was optional - but 95% of schools implemented the change. The Education Ministry is holding a

conference next month to discuss new ways of arranging the school timetable. It has written to local education authorities encouraging them to try out alternative timetabling from the

_rentrée_. A number of reports in recent months have criticised the packed schedule of lessons in a four-day week. A report by the National Academy of Medicine in January found that primary

school children were turning up to lessons tired because their timetable was too packed. Doctors said the four-day week, with very long holidays, did not suit a child's body clock and

was harming their ability to learn. Next month's conference will also look at the case for shortening the two-month summer holiday. RELATED STORIES: French schools under-performing

Saturday school back on agenda? Doctors say school day far too long