Education has been on my mind a lot lately. In fact, I'm going to devote an entire post on this subject, but for now....
The conversations in our house sound a bit like this:
Yesterday:
"Did you know there are two Waldorf schools in Hyderabad (India)?"
"Really? Are we moving to Hyderabad?"
"No. Well, maybe. I was thinking of the Finnish education model and then I was reading some articles on that and one referenced how the Finnish model of early education (the children don't start school or learn to read/write until the age of seven) is incredibly similar to Waldorf. Both stress the importance of play and age appropriate learning. And you see how well the Finns are doing with their model (number one in case you've missed the news--the USA ranks in the middle or worse on all subjects). It got me thinking...you know since we can't move to Finland."
"I could work for my company in Hyderabad. There are loads of expats there. You think it's really dirty?"
"Yes. It's India. But I'm OK with that."
Today:
"You know I was just talking to someone in my company who got transferred to the office in Singapore because his wife got a job there. That could be an option for us."
What I think is: "There's no Waldorf school there or Hong Kong. Bangkok has two. The Singapore education system, while ranking incredibly high, is just the type I wish to avoid with its rote memorization, lack of creativity and hours of homework and tutoring. I wonder if there's a Montessori school...."
What I say is: "I'm down with Singapore. It's close to everything else we love in South East Asia."
(By the way Singapore does have at least two Montessori schools and the added benefit is the Chinese Mandarin immersion offered. Because if you're balking rote memorization and hours of homework, why not strive to have trilingual children? Yes, I am a Gemini and I am a complete contradiction.)
Also: Chicken has informed me she 'likes my blog and gets excited to see a new post. It's almost like reading about someone I don't know.' I find this highly entertaining since we live/work/sleep in an 800 square foot space and have been in this same room day after day, night after night for two years running. Apparently I don't tell her everything.
Update: After reading this article on malaria, I thought hmmm, should check something out before going deeper in my head. Found this article on Hyderabad and malaria and.....no thanks. NO Thank You.
3 comments:
This post made me laugh out loud.
J used to look forward to reading my blog....mostly because she wanted to see what I'd say about her. Now I have to direct her to it, so that she can read the shit I write about her.
As far as the country. The skies the limit ladies. That's why this is so cool and why I'm so jealous.
I love these posts and am very interested to read along as you plan your trip. Having lived in Europe with my daughter and traveled to several 'developing' countries with the babies, I was wondering how you are going to handle the pollution/different parenting styles/car safety. Traffic fatalities are 7 times as high in India as the U.S., and the pollution in major Asian cities is awful. Which is not at all to suggest that you shouldn't go, but I was just wondering how you are factoring the long-term health, pollution, traffic safety, etc. into your equation. I have been willing to expose my children to all sorts of chemicals for a few weeks, but worry about longer exposure (in India and Pakistan all hotel rooms are sprayed with insecticides daily. Those chemicals are banned in Europe because of their toxicity, and yet they were sprayed directly onto my kid's sippy cups and pacifiers before I realized what was going on ...). I also refused to put either child in a car without seatbelts which added a -lot- to our travel costs because there were entire cities where we couldn't rent a car or find a taxi with seatbelts (they often cut them out) and thus landed up having to order a car from a larger city and have it brought over. Of course, all minor hassles but worth looking at some ex-pat blogs for inspiration (even in Europe our daycare absolutely refused to even limit my 9 month old's sugar intake ... they gave her juice and cookies every day despite my explicit instructions not to because that was normal).
Interesting questions from Rachel BUT all countries do things differently and most kids turn out okay, right?
I most love how Chicken likes your blog :) D used to subscribe to my business newsletter and said the same thing. My MIL also used to subscribe to my newsletter to find out what's going on in my life!
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