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04/03/2008, 16:47 Catherine Joined on 25/07/2007 Posts 14 Do your kids enjoy school? Hello - I'm moving to Ariege in July with my kids who will be 4 and 6 by then and having read this: http://timesonline.typepad.com/alphamummy/2008/02/jenny-colgan-fa.html am having a momentary panic about whether they are going to have a horrible time at school. Just wondered how long yours took to settle in/if you wish you had stayed in teh UK school-wide/something else?    Report

05/03/2008, 8:46 trizzy Joined on 19/12/2007 Posts 31 Re: Do your kids enjoy school? Hello Catherine My daughter started school here almost 2 years ago and to begin with it was very difficult because of the language and missed out on a huge amount of lessons simply because she had no understanding of what was being taught ie most subjects!.......To be honest her day was either filled with maths or she was left to do some quiet colouring by herself.  The school provides a floating teacher who works in the area to come and spend just a few hours a week with her by herself and to teach her the language skills required.  There are 3 other British children at the school who have not benefitted from this because they are much younger and the opinion at this school seems to be that they will manage by themselves because of their age. The first year was tough, however she learnt a huge amount of French if nothing else and now in her second year understands everything and can participate in all lessons and is off to college in September.  My daughter enjoys school now especially the fact that its a 4 day week, loves the fact that she comes home for lunch everyday and is doing well and achieving good results again.  What she would like to see is a bigger variety of lessons and have art, music, more sport etc as these generally are not taught at her school but just squeezed in by the teachers from time to time.   I've even offered to help the teachers (for no cost) with art and some english but although the teachers are keen, the system is too complicated to allow them to take up my offer (i'm not a teacher).  The town where we live offer these clubs though so she can still participate on Wednesdays or Saturdays and has a choice of what she would like to do etc. However the school has amazed me and which is absolutely wonderful,  they give the children sailing lessons once a week from May to September for a full day and now she is  begging me for a boat of her own!...............Its taken time for her to settle in to this new life but she is happy now.          Report

05/03/2008, 9:04 Deby Joined on 23/08/2004 Posts 638 Re: Do your kids enjoy school? It is pleasent to hear of your positive experiences and that your daughter has had help. You have also the benefit of having access to facilities.  Your location is the key thing, there are wide variations is France and the OP would need to check out what is available in her area. Remember school closes end of June, so I would recommend a visit well before the term finishes and takes time to visit the school and her local area to see what is available, the you can be assured. Deby http://www.chateau-de-clerac.com    Report

05/03/2008, 9:47 Panda Joined on 29/01/2008 Charente (16) and Vienne (86) Posts 238 Re: Do your kids enjoy school? Hi It really does depend on the school and the teacher.  My son's current teacher is great, she's young and outgoing and has them doing all sorts of unusual projects, so much so in fact that I've heard the odd gumble from the French parents about it being very 'out of the norm'.   He plays rugby, goes orienteering, makes things out of wood, cross country,hand ball etc. all in the school day so no real shortage of sport here.  This is our second primary school having changed areas and the first was less 'sporty' although they did have swimming lessons every week as there was a pool in the town.  So chose the area and school carefully, they will ony use facilities that are very local to them as transporting kids around costs money they don't have.  As per the othe response if sailing was available here, or ski-ing or whatever they would do it, if nothing was here they would do nothing. On the teasing element, this does certainly happen and even though my son has been here for 5 years and is totally fluent he still gets teased on occasion, he told me just the other day that one child (bit of a thug) told him to go to the back of the line as the french should be first in France!  It doesn't help that he is generally top of the class and in France results or notes for tests are made a big thing of so the whole class knows who was top and who was bottom. Panda    Report

09/03/2008, 20:04 Mackyfrance Joined on 24/05/2007 Posts 24 Re: Do your kids enjoy school? I think I'd probably agree with much that was written in the comments section of that article regarding the downside of schooling in France. We've been in France for 3.5 years having moved over when our children were 6 and 8. Neither got any extra help with their French either in primaire or college so don't take extra help for granted and find out first whether or not your child will get it. My daughter enjoys school here (she's in CM2) but the style of teaching suits her. She loves to memorise her lecons and be the one to stand up and recite them word perfect. She's in the top 3 in her class including for French, which I find quite bizarre. Both the top children are English. My son is another matter. He really, really hates it. He's very bright but a kinaesthetic learner - ie learns through doing. This means that for the sciences, where there is a lot of pupil involvement, he has excellent marks but for the subjects like history and geography, where they sit for hours and are talked at by the teachers, he doesn't do well. He finds it crushingly boring compared to his school in the UK and would go back in a heartbeat. I honestly feel that if we stay here, he will never reach anything like the potential he would achieve in the UK. I've honestly been really disappointed with the French system. My experience of it is that it is rigid, narrow and is  one size fits all. There is no outlet for creativity, the children are not encouraged to analyse or question or debate, just to learn and regurgitate. I don't think the French systems requires much more than a good memory to succeed. He has only just started writing creative stories but they are marked more on grammatical correctness than on imaginative content. The curriculum is very narrow and IT teaching is patchy to non-existent (talking about our schools, not necessarily others). Children are tested to within an inch of their lives with the consequence that French students are apparently some of the most stressed in France. France has one of the highest suicide rates in the 15-24 age groups in Europe. I've also been shocked at the racism at my son's college (in the Lot-et-Garonne) from the surveillants. The non-French children are regularly picked on by them. Also, the behaviour of the students leaves a lot to be desired. My son says that their behaviour is much worse than the UK and certainly the stories I hear not just from him bear this out. Given the choice, I would put both my children back in the UK system, which in my experience, is head and shoulders above the French one. Others of course may disagree        Report

10/03/2008, 7:49 samdebretagne Joined on 19/07/2006 Posts 187 Re: Do your kids enjoy school?  Mackyfrance wrote: My experience of it is that it is rigid, narrow and is  one size fits all. There is no outlet for creativity, the children are not encouraged to analyse or question or debate, just to learn and regurgitate. I don't think the French systems requires much more than a good memory to succeed. He has only just started writing creative stories but they are marked more on grammatical correctness than on imaginative content. The curriculum is very narrow and IT teaching is patchy to non-existent (talking about our schools, not necessarily others). Children are tested to within an inch of their lives with the consequence that French students are apparently some of the most stressed in France. France has one of the highest suicide rates in the 15-24 age groups in Europe. As with everything else in France, there are historical reasons for the why the French educational system is the way it is.  After the revolution, they had to come up with a way to get rid of all the religious influence on the population, as well as find a way to integrate the thousands of foreigners that had moved into France.  What better way to do that, than by the school system?  They set it up so that no matter where you came from and where you were in France, you would leave the school system eating, breathing and feeling 100% French.  And they did this by rote learning and by teaching that the teacher was always right, no discussion allowed, so that there was no room for deviation.  And all the references to kings & popes, etc where erased and replaced with the names of revolutionary heroes (just look at the street names of most French cities or the names of French schools).  The "marianne" was invented for that reason also - to give the people something else to focus on besides the cross.   Creativity encourages people to think outside of the box and to question the way things are done, and that's exactly the opposite of what they wanted.  It's really quite genius if you think about it, especially since it also allowed them to create a future army of fonctionnaires who would do whatever their superiors told them, without ever questioning it.  :-)    Report

10/03/2008, 22:26 Deby Joined on 23/08/2004 Posts 638 Re: Do your kids enjoy school? Creativity encourages people to think outside of the box and to question the way things are done, and that's exactly the opposite of what they wanted.  It's really quite genius if you think about it, especially since it also allowed them to create a future army of fonctionnaires who would do whatever their superiors told them, without ever questioning it.  :-) This is absolutely true!  The sad thing is the ideal was over 40 years ago - at least two generations, so there is a need now to raise the bar and do things differently.  It does make me happy to hear of the positive things about raising children in France, but there are huge disparities and generally based on good luck for location or a chance that you may stumble on a good teacher!  We left France because we were thoroghly disheartened by the education system in our village, we looked around locally and the other schools were not much better.  There are good rural french schools but they are in the minority I'm afraid. Deby http://www.chateau-de-clerac.com    Report

12/03/2008, 19:11 Jura Joined on 28/11/2005 Posts 714 Re: Do your kids enjoy school? I agree with you Deby. We are in deepest rural France and here is a great example of the problems. The kids in my sons class, 4eme, all had to find a business establishment to accept them for one week for the work experience 'stage' very soon. We traversed a radius of 35 km's looking for somewhere for my son to spend a few mornings/afternoons a week seeing how a business was run. None of the local businesses in the surrounding six villages (radius of 15 km's) were willing to help out. None. Further afield it was the same. The other kids in his class have had the same problem so, for his class at his school, the 'stage' has been cancelled. It does not cost these miserable bakers, tabac owners, supermarche/hypermarche, hairdressers,etc a darn centime to give these kids a few hours a week to just sit and watch them at work. Last November my son did the first part of the 'stage' with our neighbour, a vineyard owner, but they are not allowed to do the same job twice. No wonder the local youth are deserting the rural areas. In my opinion rural France is the pits and only for dreamers.    Report

13/03/2008, 6:35 raindog Joined on 26/09/2007 HERAULT Posts 761 Re: Do your kids enjoy school?  Jura wrote: . In my opinion rural France is the pits and only for dreamers. Rural France is rural - that's all there is to it. Why do you insist on staying there? Why did you go there in the first place? sociability is just a big smile and a big smile is nothing but teeth    Report

13/03/2008, 13:37 Joanna Joined on 01/02/2008 Posts 25 Re: Do your kids enjoy school?  Jura wrote: . It does not cost these miserable bakers, tabac owners, supermarche/hypermarche, hairdressers,etc a darn centime to give these kids a few hours a week to just sit and watch them at work. . Actually Jura it does.  To start with the enterises offering the stages are supposed to feed their stagieres, maybe it doesn't amount to much but it still costs.  More importantly the stagieres have to be supervised by one of the other employees, they have to be given work which doesn't put them at any risk, I suspect stagieres wouldn't be allowed in tabacs anyway, the people who are running small business have to cope with someone who knows nothing getting in their way and impeding them getting on with the job etc etc etc.  Sounds miserable?  Maybe.  But if you're a baker (not an easy job at the best of times) the last thing you need on your plate is another hassle in your already hard working life. In addition there is absolutely no point in doing a stage where the stagiere doesn't do anything but sit and watch - that's just demoralising and boring.  They have to be given work to do and it can take quite a lot of time sorting out suitable tasks for a stagiere, I know since I've done it.    Report

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