On the afternoon of May 4, at the regular government press conference in April 2026, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Pham Ngoc Thuong informed about the implementation of the policy of unifying a common set of textbooks nationwide, starting from the 2026-2027 school year.
According to Deputy Minister Pham Ngoc Thuong, in the current context, it is impossible to compile a completely new set of textbooks due to the rush of time, requiring 2-3 years to complete. Therefore, the chosen option is to use one of the three sets of textbooks being implemented under the socialization program, including: Golden Kite, Creative Horizon, Connecting Knowledge with Life.
After a research process, collecting opinions from Departments of Education and Training and experts, the Ministry of Education and Training decided to choose the "Connecting Knowledge with Life" set of Vietnam Education Publishing House as a unified textbook set.
Leaders of the Ministry of Education and Training believe that unifying one set of textbooks does not mean completely eliminating other sets of textbooks. In the teaching process, teachers can still refer to and exploit content from other learning resources to enrich lectures.
The focus of education is still the curriculum, while textbooks are only supporting materials. Therefore, there is no waste with other sets of textbooks," said a representative of the Ministry of Education and Training.
Along with issuing documents guiding localities to use a unified set of textbooks, the Ministry of Education and Training is reviewing and adjusting the content to suit changes in the local government model from 3 levels to 2 levels. In which, some subjects such as History, Geography, and Civic Education have been adjusted.
The Ministry of Education and Training has also directed the Vietnam Education Publishing House to print and distribute with the goal of ensuring that before the school year, no later than 20 days, there are full textbooks for schools and for teachers.
Up to this point, 5/7 publishing areas of Vietnam Education Publishing House have imported books and have announced an average price reduction of about 13.3% compared to before," the Deputy Minister said.
In the long term, according to Deputy Minister Pham Ngoc Thuong, the general education program will continue to be reviewed and updated in the direction of strengthening science, technology, innovation, STEM education, digital transformation and artificial intelligence (AI).
Mr. Pham Ngoc Thuong informed that the cycle of changing the education program usually lasts 10-15 years, but "program development" is carried out regularly to update new trends. The goal is to ensure output standards but not cause overload for students.
Innovating teaching methods and testing and assessment are key factors. The shift from teaching knowledge to developing students' abilities, qualities, especially self-learning ability, is considered a consistent orientation.
Unifying a set of textbooks does not mean that students only study in one book. Teachers and students can completely refer to many different sources of materials to expand their knowledge," said a representative of the Ministry of Education and Training.
This policy is expected to contribute to standardizing learning materials, reducing social costs, while still ensuring flexibility and creativity in teaching and learning.
