L'école

People talk a lot about French bureaucracy, but never have I known anything less bureaucratic than getting into French school - it was certainly a lot easier than doing it in Canada.

They wouldn't register them before we arrived, so I was a tiny bit worried, but when we got here we simply took their birth certificates an vaccination cards to the Mairie and they gave us a stamped form with the name of the school on it.  We walked from there straight to the school and the Directeur (Principal) gave us an appointment for 5pm the same day.  He went through all the details about the school and told us to bring the boys back at 9am the next day for their first day of school.  Was amazingly simple, and everyone involved was just so lovely and unstressed about it all.  Such a joy.

The boys got placed in age-appropriate classes - CM1 and CE1.  The Directeur said they would review those placements after a few weeks if they were struggling, but I expect they'll stay there now as they seem to be doing just fine.  I really think that the Ontario French immersion system has prepared them well for French school.  Apparently the other kids say they have a big accent, and our boys don't know any of the slang, but they can cope OK with the classroom work, and seem to be doing well on tests.  The only thing that either is behind in is that Andy hasn't learned joined up writing yet (they learn it in Grade 3 in his Canadian school) whereas all the kids in his class already know it.  One thing we do notice is how easy the maths is here compared with Canada, but that is nice for the kids to have one subject that they don't need to worry about.

The school day goes from 9-12 and then from 2-5.  There is a "cantine" from 12-2 we could sign them up for, but they boys like coming home and lazing about, and it is nice to see them for those 2 hours.  The best thing about school here is no school on Wednesdays.  It is brilliant, I think it should be like that everywhere.  It seems to be the day that kids do all their sports and other activities, but we haven't got round to signing them up for anything yet - school is a big enough step for now! 

So, so far so good on the school front, although the boys really really really miss all their Alta Vista friends.