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Struggling with the French way.


Deby
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We just had my brother-in-law, wife and my niece to stay.  Our niece is the same age as my daughter - 6 and currently attends year I in the UK system.  My daughter is in  GS maternelle and is also 6.

My little niece's writing is very clear and concise, a bit like mine and her mother's. Her reading was excellent, but what really threw me was the fact she had brought along a little book where she was writing stories by herself.  She had written a short story on the plane over and drew a lovely picture.  It brought me to tears.  My daughter was very impressed and said she wished she could do this. I felt miserable for her.

I am pleased with my daughters' level of English reading, given she is taught by me at home and she is doing well with it.  Obviously she is only taught by me and it is the English method.  She will be taught to read next year in CP - I can live with that - just!

The story bit upset me alot and the handwriting too. I showed my sister-in-law, my daughter's 'cahier' and 'travail' - she was totally amazed at the pages and pages of loops, curves and waves! She was also surprised by some of the reasoning exercises too.  She was trying her best to be objective and constructive but in the end she too felt that the emphasis on handwriting was over the top. The reasoning exercises were deemed immature and repetitive.

Obviously lots of french people go through the ed system here and lots of ex-pats do too and are fine and happy.  What does this all mean though.  I have a great fear that my daughter will grow up to be a functionnaire, won't be able to think for herself and when posed with a problem will emit the 'gallic shrug'.  I do like the French, I do but I cannot stand this stifling education system, I am really struggling with it.

Is it just me or are my expectations too much?

Deby (17 Charente Maritime)

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My daugther is 5 and currently in the moyen section of maternelle, I agree that in comparison there is a big difference in styles and what is considered important at what age.  At the moment I am happy to sit back and go with the flow because at 5 she can speak 2 languages with a fluency in one that I would be proud of (no need to guess which one!). 

I am struggling with what to teach in English and when, for example the letter sounds in English are different in French so if I teach her to read in english will this confuse her and delay her progress in french? 

 

 

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I honestly think that you are making a bit too much out of this. Sure, your niece's reading and writing is better, but what will she learn next and when? I think that 'all in good time' would be a good saying here, as your niece might learn stuff earlier than your daughter, but that doesn't mean that she learns it any better, and it might mean that she will get bored with being at school a lot earlier. Different children have different talents and preferences. Maybe your niece is just very good at this sort of thing and if you looked around her class you would probably find that the other students don't write like her, nor do they make up stories.

My eldest daughter will be 8 this year and she is currently in CE1. She also makes up jokes and little stories for herself, mainly in French. However, she can read very well in English and tends to take a book to bed with her every night, French or English, and read a bit before she goes to sleep. We have never made a big deal out of teaching her or the others to read in English, but at home we only speak English, we read books to them in English and little by little they will all pick up how to read and pronounce words. They all make mistakes in English, like this morning, when the eldest said to me: 'Papa really doesn't support that', meaning 'he doesn't like it/can't stand it', and I had to explain the difference between the French and English support to her. But that doesn't worry me as I am sure that the mistakes will get less and less, and should they decide to live in England sometime in the future those mistakes will disappear completely. The same applies to the 'thinking for themselves' in my opinion. They don't have to learn to think for themselves at school, you can teach them that.

I really think that people tend to expect too much from schooling. Our children will learn an awful lot of things at school, but I don't think that you can expect schools to teach them about life and how to live it. That we will have to teach them ourselves or let them find out on their own.
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Ah Pays Basque, I believe you under estimate the influence of school on a child.

My eldest son told us last year that he only went into 'cuisine' because he was useless and there was nothing else for him.

 Not us that said that at all. We encouraged him and showed him all his options. But he insisted at the time that he would go down that path. Last year and it all came out. He said had always been treat as if he was stupid at school, and he would never be good at anything intellectual, which is really all that counts and should become a manuel worker.

When they are at school for such long hours and the people there have their own ideas as to how a child should be 'dresser' then it is very hard for the parents to put the self esteem back into a child. Yet another of my failures, how the list grows.

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Deby, I do feel for you, I seem to remember that you posted before about the handwriting thing, and it does seem completly mad that they insist on this very flowery copperplate when they could be doing other things.

I tend to agree with pays basques above that the apparent difference between your daughter and your niece will probably sort itself out with time. I am sure you do things at home with your daughter to help her creativity, but perhaps you could do more as she was impressed by her cousin's drawing? I see my neighbours kids, the eldest of whom is 5, coming back with the classic macaroni pictures and so on, their mother seems to take them to various activities on Wednesdays. I live in a big city, so obviously this is very easy to do and there is lots availible which may not be the case where you are.

Incidently, my mother used to compare me with her best friend's child, who was born the day before me. I was her first and she didn't know what to expect. He learnt to read on his own at 2 and a half, and I didn't etc... He has actually turned out to be a real genius and has a very prestigious university job and is well known in his particular field... We both ended up happy, but comparisons are not always useful!!
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[quote]Deby, I do feel for you, I seem to remember that you posted before about the handwriting thing, and it does seem completly mad that they insist on this very flowery copperplate when they could be doi...[/quote]

TU, I know your sons have had a hard time and I really feel for them. However, at the moment my kids are doing great at school, the teachers are very good, and, thankfully, they haven't shown any learning difficulties yet. Who knows, maybe when we progress to College or Lycee the whole thing will look different, but at the moment it is still us, i.e. their mum and dad, who have the biggest influence on their thinking.

Tourangelle, how true about the comparisons. I used to hate it when the kids were babies and inevitably there would be a raised eyebrow when my first daughter didn't sit by the time she was 6mths old or the second didn't walk until she was 16months old. Sure, I'm proud of my child if she is one of the best in her year, but I don't start talking to the other mums about it or make comparisons to their children, and I won't let the kids do it either. It can all change very quickly, and my advice to Deby or anybody else who is worried about their children's education: Stop worrying too much, do the best you can, support them and believe in them and their ability to form their own opinions.
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PaysBasque & Tourangelle - thank you very much for your views.  I do make comparissons  and I know I need to give my daughter lots of encouragement and support, which I hope I do. Maybe I should wait and see how things pan out, but I simply can't as my gut feel is no, no, not good enough!

Its just I find the ed system so restrictive and counter-productive to learning and it needn't be. 

Today, I just returned from teaching english at my daughter's school, something which I do voluntary.  We had been working on putting a little rhyme with actions together for their school kermesse.  I am now informed that there will not be any time for this, I was about to ask why, but thought better of it as the decision had been made, one of the other teachers' are disappointed too.  Again, this happens all the time no dialogue, no sense to anything. The iriritating thing is I have taught in other french schools and this type of thing happens alot.  

So I am struggling with this, I wish I could shake some of these teachers I honestly do.  My daughters' teacher is very nice by the way, she is doing her 'job.' 

Deby

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My sons didn't 'have' learning difficulties in primary school.

The youngest was only considered to have comportement difficulties rather than 'learning'. T

 

The eldest didn't have any problems at all. Only he didn't fit into that being brighter than average and his average marks were never good enough to not have the profs ridiculing him and on his case all the time. Fortunately not all the profs (there are some very good ones), but a high percentage never the less.

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The story-writing thing bothers me enormously. My 7-year-old hasn't done a single piece of creative writing since she started school here in September. It's a huge waste -  the vivid imaginations of children set them apart from the fonctionnaire adults and not exploiting their creativity at school means it is lost or buried way before most children are ready to replace it with reality.

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Deby I see from your website you are 30 minutes from Bordeaux, would international schools or a Montessori school be an option for you? In Lyon both options are available, I imagine as Bordeaux is also a large city they would be available there.
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Hi Deby

Don't worry about your daughters writing, I'm sure you will feel differently in a years time when your daughter has beautiful french handwriting.

My daughter is in CP and her handwriting is so lovely, far better than mine or her fathers. It is streets ahead of her contempories in the UK, and I think it is important. Even in this day and age, people are judged on their handwriting. Once children learn all the techniques, the writing comes quickly.

As for creativity, as an engineer I am not convinced it can be taught, I think it is inate. It is not a skill one needs for everyday life, but it's nice ot have if you are born with it.

J.
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I think it's a case of the children being different rather than the education system here being awful. My daughter (nearly 5) is learning all her curves, boucles and also making up great stories that she tries to write down (so far it's only words but she can read the story therein). My 7 year old niece can't do anything like that, educated in Ireland, and hates writing (loves sports).

 

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Deby, I know how you feel. My eldest son is almost 7 and in CP. As far as I know he has never written anything that he hasn't copied down or had dictated. Not even a couple of sentences on 'what we did this weekend' or whatever. The bald truth is that if he was at school in the UK he, as a bright child, would be writing freely by now, like your niece, who is a year younger. Yes, it does upset me and fill me with doubt when I hear about the things his cousin and friends of the same age are doing at school in England; things he is not doing. I think it's natural to feel like that, and while making comparisons can be destructive it can also provide an inspiration to aspire to more.

 It really doesn't concern me what my children's handwriting is like as long as it is clear and legible. In fact I'd rather they didn't bother with all the silly loops and curlicues, but I guess they can forget about them later in life. It's WHAT you write that matters, IMO.

On the plus side, my son is reading quite well in French now. Starting late does seem to mean that they learn quickly.

I think children's abilities are under-used in the early years of the French system. A neighbour's daughter with a January birthday is now six and a half and is so bored in Grande Section that she is starting to misbehave in class. She could easily be reading fluently by now but hasn't even started.

Of course the French kids catch up, and then some. I understand that they will spend huge amounts of time conjugating verbs and learning that the verb agrees with the preceding direct object in the perfect tense, etc, etc. On one level I am sure it is a good training for the mind. But I am curious to know how the equivalent amount of time is used in English-speaking schools, where much less of that sort of learning is necessary.

Doubt is the lot of all parents, but when you've by choice moved your children to a foreign country it gnaws away constantly, for some of us anyway!

Jo

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Deby it does sound as if your niece is quite advanced for her age, I don't think either of mine were doing that sort of thing at 6 when they were in England! I agree about the creative writing comment though - I've found it a bit disappointing that so much of what they do is learning by heart, no room for any creativity. In England they did probjects on the Vikings/Egyptians etc. and made models, wrote stories, thought about their way of life, all sorts of interesting stuff which they don't seem to have time for here. My children have sometimes spent most of the morning doing Maths, or conjugation. My daughter once spent nearly a whole day doing a 6-page test in conjugation!!!

However, as we arrived here last September it has also been quite good for my children (7 and 9) as they haven't really been up to creative writing anyway, and learning all the rules of the language very explicitly as they do here has been great for their French. They can do the creative stuff at home once they have grasped the basics. My son had really scruffy work when we arrived, though he was very good in school generally. Now his book is really well kept and neat, and his handwriting is really improving, which I think is a good thing even if the emphasis on handwriting is a bit over the top.

The lack of differentiation does worry me here though, and must be a problem if you have gifted children, unless you live somewhere where there is a big choice of schools (not the case here). My son is doing very well in school, as he did in England, and I get the impression he just has to sit and draw when he finishes the work ahead of the others. I suspect he might start to get very bored once French no longer poses an added challenge. I'm not sure what the future holds once they get to college ...

 

Clare

 

 

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