Ukrainian philology experts from Kiev-controlled areas supported the idea of LPR’s developing its own Ukrainian language and literature textbooks, Lugansk National University textbook reviewer Oksana Shkuran told a news briefing at Lugansk Media Centre.

“As for the reaction of our colleagues on the other side, it might be negative or positive, but reasonable Ukrainian philology experts basically have a positive opinion of what we’re doing,” said Shkuran (Ph.D), assistant professor at LNU Department of Ukrainian Language and General Linguistics.

“The opportunity for our schoolchildren to study Ukrainian language in our territory is worth a lot. A language cannot be politicized; it’s a completely different phenomenon,” she said.

The expert said teachers had looked through Ukrainian literature textbooks to decide what they should keep and what had to be taken out.

“Nearly 99 percent of Ukrainian literature on the old program has remained intact,” she said.

Earlier reports said LPR teachers had developed Ukrainian language and literature textbooks for the 5th grade, and literature textbooks for 3rd and 4th grades.

LPR teachers developed Ukrainian language and literature textbooks for 5th grade and literature textbooks for 3rd and 4th grades at school, LPR Education Research Centre Director Oksana Kolesnikova told a news briefing at Lugansk Media Centre on Thursday.

“The authors of these textbooks are leading Ukrainian language and literature teachers while the reviewers are senior academic staff at LPR high education institutions,” Kolesnikova said.

“The beautiful melodious Ukrainian language has been gradually turning into a language of politics and nationalism for the past two decades. Our goal was to create a textbook restoring the beauty and melodiousness of this language for our schoolchildren,” she said.

The textbooks were developed following the LPR leader’s orders to provide quality literature for education.

LPR budget allocated money to print these textbooks for all schoolchildren in the Republic. The textbooks have already been distributed among schools, the Center director said.

Print run for 5th grade Ukrainian language textbooks is 9,400, and the same amount of Ukrainian literature textbooks has been printed for 5th grade. The schoolchildren will receive the textbooks for the new academic year starting on 1 September.

Elementary school textbooks are colour-printed and have a soft cover, senior pupils’ textbooks are black and white, and smaller in size.

Kolesnikova noted the input by the team of designers who had integrated local ornament patterns into textbook design.

Textbook author Oksana Shuper said it was the first time Lugansk Region Ukrainian language and literature teachers had the unique chance to participate in textbook development.

“The textbook fully meets school programme requirements; it is written in the modern standard Ukrainian language reflecting its beauty and melodiousness. Textbook tasks are to develop creative thinking and communicative function.

Lugansk National University textbook reviewer Oksana Shkuran said the textbooks were a success.

They were composed by very experienced teachers, well-versed in the peculiarities of the region. Nearly all of them are LNU graduates.