Sending your child to a foreign country by themselves to learn a language...

[FourArms]

I remember that this came up on here a year or so ago.. will try and find the old thread. They're going to have a family on BBC1 in a minute who are sending their son to France for six months by himself to learn the language. Would you do it?

Here's the old thread.

No I don't think I would do this. I would miss my child too much.

But I do think british people should be more brave when it comes to foreign exchanges - I went on the french exchange when I was 14 and it had a huge influence on my life. It made me realise that I could learn a language if I lived in the country; and it made me determined not to spend my whole life living in England.

I'm watching it!

I went on an exchange trip at about 14 to Germany, don't think I learnt much German though as I was with my best friend.

Having an aupair taught me very good French though. Don't think I could send my kids to France. I'd miss them too!

0856 - on now.

that french boy is adorable!

No I couldn´t -not with a 9yr old.
A teenager though....

I wonder why they call the other parents "Mama & Papa"and why calls home are restricted?

I think they limit phone calls because they increase the feelings of homesickness. The American fat camps do the same thing.

Or is it so that they're not using the English language to talk at all - total immersion in French. Wonder how realistic the communication ban is these days in the era of FB, Bebo, IM and the like!

My DM threatened to do something like this with me. School in France, living with her French exchange's family for a year when I was 11 because I jumped a year in primary and she was worried I'd be bored repeating year 6.

I kinda regret that she didn't although I have no idea how I would have coped.

To me if phone calls need to be restricted to avoid homesickness, then the child shouldn´t be going for so long!

We used to host exchange children. There are 5 kids in our family so my parents insisted that the children woudl fit in between our ages so there would be company for them and they always had a great gtime.
They could call home every night if they wanted but it wasn't encouraged as the total language immersion is what was important, if they called home twice a day they would not be 'living' in English IYSWIM.
We did have parcels and stuff arrive every week for most fo them though, the best ones were the Japanese children's parcels as theyw oudl always send shitloads of Hello Kitty stuff as presents for us
They only used to stay with us for a month or so though, I think any longer would have been hard, and the youngest child staying with us was 12, and she came with her 16 yr old brother.

helenwombat - do you remember the french you learnt?

Depends on the length of time and the age and confidence of the child. I was sent as a 14yo, 15yo and 16yo to the UK for 2 month stretches. My brother at a similar age went to Germany. In those days, phone calls were limited by sheer cost, I think we made a weekly one.

But a 9yo strikes me as very young and 6 months as very long.

When I was doing A levels at sixth form, a couple of people went for a term and really enjoyed it. I wouldn't send a 9 year old though - far too small.

meh, French. What use is that?

Send them to Mumbai.

my family played host to 15/16 yo foreign students - generally escaping ishoos at home. they did get very good at english, if nothing else.

i think 9/10 is a beeet too young. although i suspect a very confident child could get much out of it.