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Kindergarten and primary schools on Lamma: languages
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Author:  Kev76 [ Sun Sep 25, 2016 8:55 pm ]
Post subject:  Kindergarten and primary schools on Lamma: languages

We are a western family and are thinking of moving to Lamma from Kowloon early next year.

Our eldest is currently in K1 in an English-speaking kindy in Kowloon (although she is the only native-English speaker in the class). None of us has any Cantonese or Putonghua.

My main worry in moving is that she may be dropped into a almost-fully Cantonese speaking environment in either the Catholic Kindergarten on Lamma (seems to be the only one operating at the moment?), and afterwards into P1 in North Lamma School.

I wonder has anyone else had experience of moving to Lamma with English-speaking kids of kindergarten or early-primary school age, and how did it go?

Thanks!

Author:  Alan [ Sun Sep 25, 2016 11:28 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Kindergarten and primary schools on Lamma: languages

My daughter went to the Catholic kindergarten and the government primary school here, but she's bilingual so it was easier. However, there are quite a lot of non-Chinese kids, European and Filipino, at the kindergarten and school. But they will have to learn Chinese to get anything out of it, and do all the homework, drilling the characters into their heads.

You can get tutorials and other help from the Hans Andersen Centre on Lamma.

Author:  Lamma-Gung [ Mon Sep 26, 2016 11:29 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Kindergarten and primary schools on Lamma: languages

Lots of non-Chinese kids in the Kindergarten and Primary School. The feedback from most non-Chinese parents I know sending their kids there has been very positive.

The private fee-based kindergarten closed just last year because not enough children enrolled (according to the teacher I spoke with), so the local low-cost kindergarten is so full now that they've been turning provisionally enrolled kids away.

This happened to a couple of my new friends recently; their daughter is roaming free on Lamma till now, making friends of her own. The parents have to look for an off-island kindergarten now.

But it wouldn't be a bad way to spend your first few years of life, free of school learning till P1. We did the same, kindergarten-less and organised-learning-free in the countryside, roaming outside by ourselves frequently, climbing trees in the forest, building dams in rivers, exploring behind waterfalls, not learning any ABCs or math till we were 7 years old enrolling in Primary School. We walked/biked/sledded to school by ourselves from Day 2 of P1.
Most of us turned out fine (not counting occasional scrapes, bruises and minor injuries) and some even made it to university, like myself...

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