School in France

Back to School – This Time in France!

Having moved to the Charente-Martime in France in 1992 to set-up our self-catering family holiday business Domaine des Granges, we had put much thought into the impacts this would have on our Sarah and Jonathan's upbringings but maybe we didn't quite realise how difficult the first few months could be for a 5 year old going to school in a foreign country.

In July the supermarché shelves fill with a bewildering array of school stationary and all different sizes, colours and styles of paper!

Having been issued with a list of supplies we carefully cross off each item as it goes into the trolley and choose the most trendy backpack, pencil case and diary.

Now all we have to do is wait for the big day!

The summer passed far too quickly, children in the pool and us juggling with family life and the monumental task of converting our derelict barns at Domaine des Granges into a holiday village, ready for the next season.

The big day arrived - 1^st Tuesday of September. There he was at the age of 5, back pack on and looking forward to making new friends. We gave him to the teacher and set off home hoping for the best. When we went to collect him at tea time we realised that it wasn't going to be as easy as it looked!

What hadn't crossed his mind was that no one spoke a word of English and he didn't even know how to ask to go to the loo! He'd gone to French club in England but he hadn't related it to real life in France. The other boys took great delight in trying to teach him every really naughty word they knew!

The next 3 weeks really were a real uphill struggle – tears before going in the morning and tears once home at tea time (I don't think the hours inbetween were much different!). We felt very cruel & helpless but new there wasn't another plan. After a month things were slowly improving, the odd word turned into sentences and friends started to arrive after school followed by sleepovers and parties.

We were lucky – because he was the first English kid at the school he never had the chance to exist in anything other than French and the few teachers that did speak a little English never let him know they could. It would have taken a lot longer otherwise!

Now, many schools already have English children and some teachers may even speak some English but this is often a hindrance rather than an aid. Particularly at a young age, children have that incredible ability to learn languages very quickly but only if they are immersed into it. The same applies to us adults who are all too happy to realise the family next door in the same village are English, and therefore don't have the urgency to learn the language.

To help the child fit in and learn as quickly as possible, the balance of time spent with their English friends and family and their French ones, should always be slightly in favour of the latter. We had a simple rule, French at school, English at home.

The time will then come when you can't understand them anymore, in which case you want to be careful they're not being cheeky about you! Be warned - never fall into the feeble excuse of getting your children to translate for you.

For us this was 16 years ago – he finished his secondary education in France and having passed his baccalauréat set off to Manchester Uni. From a town with a population of 7,000 to the biggest university city in Europe with a student community of about 70,000. This time he was really up for it – I was the one with the problem – it took a long time to get used to loosing my first baby to the big wide world!

We're still happily running our holiday village here at Domaine des Granges and always love our kids coming home in the holidays and seeing all our regular customers year in, year out and watching their babies growing and taking their first steps into adulthood.

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