Beijing Rolls Out Citywide "Learning by Doing" Science Education Program

Beijing has begun a citywide rollout of the national "Learning by Doing" science education initiative, with a launch meeting held at Beijing Shiyi Future City School, according to Modern Education News. From the 2026 autumn semester, all compulsory education schools in the city will implement the programme, the municipal education commission said.

The initiative traces back to a guideline issued by China’s Ministry of Education on August 4, which sets six inquiry themes: life and health, ecological environment, mysteries of the Earth, aerospace, emerging industries, and artificial intelligence. Under the national rule, students in grades 4 to 9 must complete at least one task per semester, occupying no fewer than four class periods.

Grades 1 to 3 are only expected to finish the inquiry activities already required by the standard science curriculum. Performance is recorded descriptively into each student’s comprehensive quality portfolio, with no separate examination attached — a deliberate break from the exam-driven pattern that has long shaped Chinese science classrooms.

Beijing’s local plan adds a "6+2+X" structure. Every district takes on all six national themes, then claims two as priority areas and defines at least one locally distinctive theme drawn from regional assets such as heritage and traditional craftsmanship, university and frontier science resources, geological and ecological reserves, national science centres and big-science facilities, or the local AI and digital economy cluster.

The resource mapping is unusually concrete. Life and health draws on the capital’s sports and medical universities, hospitals and Olympic venue legacy; ecological environment on forest reserves, the Miyun Reservoir and the South-to-North Water Diversion facilities; Earth sciences on the Fangshan Global Geopark and the Zhoukoudian site; aerospace on the city’s research institutes and two international airports.

Three deadlines structure the rollout. By the end of 2026 each district must complete its "6+2+X" layout and each school must file its science curriculum implementation plan with district authorities. By the end of the spring semester of 2027, districts must compile a regional science-practice resource catalogue covering six categories of public resources: universities, research institutes, science venues, companies and industrial parks, natural and cultural heritage, and expert talent.

By the end of 2027, Beijing aims to have a three-tier support system for resources, teaching research and evaluation spanning municipal, district and school levels. It also plans a continuous training chain that links inquiry practice in compulsory education to university-bridging courses and research study in high school, and onward to university majors, alongside five settings: classroom teaching, teaching research, extracurricular activity, industry-academia collaboration and home-school cooperation.

The full rollout builds on a trial that started in early 2026, when the Beijing Academy of Educational Sciences organised 10 districts and more than 30 schools to pilot 21 sample tasks for grades 4 to 9 across the six themes. Teachers involved flagged recurring constraints: insufficient class hours, limited capacity for cross-disciplinary guidance, and the cost of experimental materials.

For education companies and content providers, the programme institutionalises demand for hands-on science curriculum, laboratory materials and off-campus practice venues across an entire municipal system. Artificial intelligence sits inside the six core themes rather than as an add-on, spanning AI experience, application, and safety and ethics — a framing that mirrors how other systems are threading AI into mainstream science teaching.