What are schools like in France?

[Katharine]

My husband and I and three young boys (aged 5, 4 and 2 months) are very seriously thinking about moving to France to live but are obviously concerned about their education. Our eldest son is dyslexic and our second son has speech problems and we wondered how the French deal with children with special needs - we're not too impressed with the help they're getting currently here. Has anyone got any experience of French schools?

I have friends who have kids in French schools. They are quite pleased but it will really depend where you are going to live... you will get good and bad schools everywhere. Dyslexia is also recognised in France but I was hearing a specialist on French radio over the holidays complaining that too many children are incorrectly diagnosed as dyslexic (I am not saying this about your son) but this does mean that this will be something they are familiar with.
Are you looking to move in a (large) town or in a rural area?

Thanks Pupuce for your message. I've had such conflicting advice about the French attitude to dyslexia but it is early days yet. We are thinking of buying a house and gite complex within 20 minutes of the sea in either the region of Vendee or Languedoc. We want it to be warm but not boiling. I invisage that we'll be in a pretty rural area, certainly not a large town, but not too remote, but we'll have to wait and see. It seems that private French schools will be the best for us - nothing like as expensive as in UK.