Back to school for the elderly

NEW LEASE ON LIFE: SPACE IN PRESCHOOLS AS CHINA'S BIRTHRATE CONTINUES TO DECLINE

Senior citizens grab opportunity to broaden their horizons.

Senior citizens sway to old-time tunes at a former kindergarten in northern China, as teachers turn their sights away from children in the face of a rapidly ageing population and a baby bust.

Hundreds of millions of Chinese are set to enter old age in the coming decades, while the country's chronically low birth rate leaves ever fewer people to replace them, official statistics show.

The crisis is already hitting the education sector, with thousands of preschools closing around the country as enrolments dry up.

But others are changing with the times such as a facility in Shanxi province, which has traded chortling children for a more mature cohort.

"The problem became particularly evident as the number of children continued to decrease," principal Li Xiuling, 56, said.

"After my kindergarten emptied out, I thought about how to make the best use of it," she said.

Li's preschool was founded in 2005 and once served as many as 280 children, but had to close last year.

It reopened in December as Impressions of Youth, a recreational centre for people of retirement age and above.