School

I never thought I'd be sending my kids to a Catholic school! But once we learned that expatriating with Michelin was likely, we heard about Massillon, the private Catholic school in Clermont-Ferrand that most expats attend. It contains EBI, Ecole Bilinguale Internationale, which teaches English separately to native speakers and as a foreign language. The school also offers French as a foreign language for first-year arrivals. Most speak English as a first language, but there are also Italian, Spanish, Arabic, Japanese, Mandarin, and other languages represented. Lots of local kids attend the school for the Catholic education or for the English. And the catechism classes are optional - our kids will take a global religions class instead, once they're a little older.

SO. School starts later here, early September, and the structure is really different. School is in session for six weeks, then out for vacation. A typical week looks like this for the Maternelle (ages 3-5) and Primaire (ages 6-10) students:

Monday and Tuesday: Classes 8:30-11:30, two hours for lunch, classes 1:30-4:30.
Wednesday: ages 3-6 (end of first grade) are off. Ages 7-10 have class 9:00-11:00 a.m. only. Most kids do a sport.
Thursday and Friday: same as Monday and Tuesday.

French kids don't learn reading in school until first grade, age 6-7, called CP here. But Lincoln loves to read and was moving fast in his Montessori school in the U.S., so his reading was way above the first grade level in his English class here. So after two weeks of school, the directors (one French, one English) of the primary school asked us to agree to a trial advancement, placing him in Grade Two for English, and CE1 for French. We're on day 4 of that trial now, and it's going well. In fact, his FLE (French as a foreign language, or Français Langue Étrangère) teacher casually mentioned to me in a meeting this morning that "Of course he can already read in French, so that is helping quite a lot."

He can read in French?! The hell?

But he can, so after putting both kids through moving away from home and friends and grandparents, learning a new language, starting a new school with lots of kids with whom they can't communicate at all, and adapting to a COMPLETELY different educational environment - one in which the teachers are rumored to yell at the kids and call them stupid, although we haven't had any personal experience with that - we've now also asked Lincoln to start that adjustment process all over again with older kids, no Americans in his French class whatsoever, more school on Wednesdays, and being the youngest kid in the class. This was not an easy decision. But he's so big for his age, and much more studious and calm than many of the elementary school children we know, so his age doesn't stand out like it would for a smaller or more energetic six-year-old. And I really think a full year of studying spelling words he already knows and reading books he could read last year would have been devastating to his overall love of school. Still, we have over a week left in the trial/observation period, so we'll see how it goes.

Over to Sylvia! She's in the equivalent of a K4 class, called Moyenne here. It's much gentler for the "maternelle" kids - no FLE class, English only one hour per week, and for the first few months she's only attending school in the mornings. It's exhausting learning a new language under any circumstances, and since she can't read she's learning it all by listening and absorbing. I can say from personal experience that listening and speaking in a language you don't really know yet is incredibly taxing, so I'm glad she has the afternoons off. Except for Thursdays, because she needs to be there for English class. She had a really tough transition the first couple weeks and cried every morning at drop off. But this week she's come into her own, putting her "cartable" (backpack) on the shelf herself, dropping her snack bag and notebook into the right bin, and walking into class without fear. I give it two more weeks before she's speaking French with some regularity, at least to her teacher. Of course by then it'll be vacation time, after which we start all over again. For now it's really sweet hearing her occasionally drop a French word into conversation with her brother or me:

"What does "qu'est-ce que c'est" mean? My teacher says it every day!"

All of which brings me to my schedule. We live in a beautiful apartment that is within walking distance of the center of Clermont, but far enough out that it's quiet and calm, and most of the noise of the city and the university students is too far to bother us at night. The place is gorgeous and roomy and a stone's throw from a quaint and practical little town square with a small supermarket, two bakeries, a butcher, three or four cheese shops, fishmongers...it's perfect. There are two city bus stops within five minutes' walk of home. But unfortunately we're a half hour walk from the school, which is too far for the kids, so we must take the bus. It winds up being about 30 minutes anyway once we've waited for the bus, ridden four stops, and then walked a few more blocks to the school entrance. I love how much we walk here, and I can feel the benefits in my own health. But because the kids aren't ready to eat at the "cantine" at school yet, I spend FOUR HOURS per day commuting. Half an hour each way to and from the school at 8:30, 11:30, 1:30, and 4:30, four days per week. Of course some days I take the kids out to lunch, or spend one of those 'off' periods in between shopping or something near the school, but it's an inordinate amount of time nonetheless.

I'm tired. The plan was for Lincoln to start eating at the cantine one or two day a week starting about now, but he doesn't want to yet and I don't want to pile one more stressor onto him when he's just started CE1. Lunch at school for the older kids means at least an hour of running around wild with all the other primary kids, in a concrete courtyard - that's "recess" here - and then eating whatever's on the menu when your class is called. Brown bag lunches are strictly forbidden, so some days it'll be a burger and green beans and yogurt, and other days it's squid provençal with bleu cheese after! I think Lincoln would actually love the food, but the extra 'recess' time is intimidating for now. Sylvia's not allowed to eat at cantine until she can speak French. So. I'm tired, and of course Josh hasn't been able to do any of the school runs yet because of his leg. Just this morning he was able to bring them for the first time, so there's an end in sight! Oh, and yes - I could drive. But there is no designated parking for the school, the streets are half the width of those in the U.S., and traffic is heavy in the mornings. It wouldn't wind up saving much time in the long run, and the stress of dealing with parking isn't worth it.

There you have it: French school so far! The kids get a little anxious when I drop them off, but in the afternoons and evenings they're always happy to have been at school. I'm sure I've missed lots of the funny differences, so ask away if there's something you've wondered about! I'll answer questions in either language - may be Lincoln can read the French ones to me.