Computataional thingking in the new general curriculum in Vietnam
Nguyen Chi Thanh, the Vietnam National University, University of Education

On December 26, 2018, the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam announced a newgeneral education curriculum (hereafter called 2018 curriculum) in accordance with the circular
32/2018/TT-BGDĐT and will be implemented from the academic year 2020-2021. For the firsttime, Informatics is officially taught from Primary school (grade 3) to high school (grade 12).
(Primary: Grades 3, 4 and 5: 35 periods per year; Junior high school: Grades 6, 7, 8, 9: 35periods; High school: Grades 10, 11, 12: 70 periods). How is Computation thinking stated in the2018 curriculum?
The approach to design the new informatic curriculum is: Openness; Information andTeachnology (IT) oriented career in the fourth industrial revolution; Exploiting thecharacteristics of STEM-oriented education.
* The content of the Informatics develops around 3 knowledge circuits that are mutually related:
Information Technology and Communications (ICT), General Digital Data (DL), Computer
Science (CS) and is divided into two stages:- Basic education phase: In elementary school, students mainly learn to use simple software to
support learning and use ICT equipment in accordance with the principles of well-being, andinitially formed thinking to solve problems. computer support. In Junior high school, students
learn to use common software to make products for learning and daily life; practical problem
discovery and problem solving with the help of digital technology tools and automation systems;
learn how to organize, store, search and search digital data, evaluate and select information- Career-oriented phase: In addition to the core content of education, each year, students canchoose to study a number of subjects depending on their interests, needs and career orientation.
* 5 competencies: the new curriculum is designed according to the competency-based approach.
Through the Informatic curriculum, students form and develop the key qualities and corecompetencies set forth in the 2018 curriculum; especially forming and developing information
technology competencies, including: Capacity to use and manage automation, tools and systemsof ICT; Competence in understanding and behaving in accordance with the ethical, cultural andlegal standards in the information society and knowledge economy; Capacity to detect and solve
problems with the support of digital technology; Learning capacity, self-study with the supportof information and communication technology application systems

* 7 topics: the above competencies will be form through 7 following topics:
A: Computer and knowledge society. B: Computer network and Internet C: Organize, store,
search and exchange information. D: Ethics, law and culture in a digital environment. E:
Computer applications. F: Solve problems with the help of a computer. G: Career with computer.
* Computational thinking: The core objective of CS is to shape and develop computational
thinking wich is defined as “it uses the abstraction method, how to decompose a task, a large andcomplex design into smaller, simpler problems so that we can devise algorithms to solve them.
Computation thinking dissects relationships to extract characteristics, briefly expresses aproblem, or models important aspects of a problem, making it easy to declare and handle.” Thisis different from the one defined by Wing (2008) “computational thinking is the thoughtprocesses involved in formulating a problem and expressing its solution(s) in such a way that acomputer – human or machine – can effectively carry it out.”
Due to practical conditions in Vietnam (facilities, equipment, teachers), the new curriculum
cannot put CS as the core knowledge circuit as the advanced countries curriculum. The
curriculum has only an immediate goal is towards the curriculum standard of developedcountries. In addition to continuing to attach importance to the knowledge circuits, ICT and DL
skills as the current curriculum, the new point is that CS knowledge circuit is more focused forall students in the basic education stage, especially in career-oriented education.

References[1] Araya, R., Isoda, M., Gonzalez, O, and Inprasitha, M. (2019). Discussion Paper: A
Framework for Computational Thinking for the Transition to a Super Smart Society. Presented atthe 2019 APEC-Tsukuba International Conference in Tokyo, Japan.
[2] The Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam (2018), The informatic curriculum ingeneral education[3] Wing, J. (2008), Computor thingking and thinking about computing, presentation