Moving DS from UK Prep School to French école privée - any thoughts?

[sunnychild]

Dear all,

In a search for a better quality of life we're planning a move to the French countryside where we hope to buy a farmhouse and gite complex to live in and run as a business. Hubby will continue to work in London and come down at weekends (which was starting to be the norm when we were in Suffolk anyway). My mother tongue is French and I learnt English in about half a term aged 9 when we moved here, but I failed to teach it to DS to my eternal shame though he is coming on ok through school lessons.

He is 9 and thriving in a local Prep School where he is all top sets and A/B teams for competitive sports which he loves, but he is very open about moving to France which he knows and loves. The areas we are looking in need to be close to my parents in the Poitou-Charente area where there are no international schools.

We would definitely opt for an école privée as I understand they don't strike as much, are more flexible with kids new to French and some of the ones I've found even offer rugby and theatre productions. We hope to enhance any gaps in the French school teaching through private tutors etc in order to possibly send DS back to UK to a boarding public school at 11 or 13 depending on how much he misses it and how good we find French schools.

I would value experiences particularly of the areas around Niort / Angouleme for primary / secondary schools if you have any, or of anyone having moved from UK prep schools to an école privée please (and back to UK independent system perhaps too).

Thank you so much.

We are just looking to do the reverse of you! my children are younger but have just done their first couple of years in a french school, they also when to creche a couple of days a week, but they don't really speak the language that well yet. In spite of this they love it and really enjoy going, there are some other English kids in their classes and I think this hinders them with learning french quicker. We are going back to the UK because neither DH or I speak particularly good french so will struggle to help with the homework. As you are a native speaker, I would say go for it, it is a fab country and offers an amazing lifestyle. Our other really big reason for coming back is Family, as you have family there too then perfect! we are in a different region though.

Thanks! I hope it works out but at least there is the option of renting out the house for holiday lets if it all goes pear shaped!

hi
i have no experience of 'ecole prive' in France as most French don't assume to pay for education.. but i did read that 20% of children use them, actually far more than the number that use private schools in UK.
The curriculum will be exactly the same as the State schools or they lose their funding. You can check which books he will have easily.

If your question whether your English-speaking 9y old will do ok in a French school, thats difficult to answer w/out knowing the child. I would say if he already speaks French and can understand spoken French -the level at 9y is approaching gcse btw for a native.

Sorry but French school aren't interested in the childs sporting achievement (tho private might be nicer about it!) they want the child to keep up in French and Maths.
If your child is totally 'British' and doesn't speak French, he could be very isolated. Teaching staff in private schools are not necessarily qualified, they recommend checking the standard.
A child cannot learn a language fully in half a term to the level of a 9y old (like you say you did) unless the level of the class is pretty low/average etc There are many aspects of a language too and cultural differences.
You are obviously very attached to the British system of education, talking about boarding school 2 years later, so I would analyse your motives a bit before you go ahead. French school is nothing like a British school, which many French friends of mine, despair at.

Lastly life is not a peach in France -ppl complain bitterly about tax demands arriving every month, my brother returned to UK after living there a while because of this!

On the plus side, your child will definitely learn to speak better French if you make this move. But presumably that was not a goal of yours if you did not use your mother tongue with him.

hope this helps.

You need to be clear about which type of private school you are using: sous contrat or not.
The latter have no obligation to follow national curriculum and their recruitment standards may not be high.
Other private schools, the sous contrat ones, are subject to stricter rules. They are usually nominally RC or other faith schools, which may or may not suit you.

An ecole privée is a selective school that, unlike a catchment state school, does not have to offer your DS a place, still less help him adjust and catch up. Most écoles privées are oversubscribed.

OP.
Private schools in France are really nothing like private schools in the UK.
They are as cheap as chips and have to follow the French NC.

One thing they definitely won't do is prep your DS for entrance exams back into the UK system. You could probably do 11+ prep yourself, but common entrance would be a big ask.

wordfactory - surprisingly, the reverse is true: Anglophone DC who have been in the French system seem to manage to get places at Eton, Marlborough, Sevenoaks and other boarding schools without too much trouble as the French NC is rather rigorous in the equivalents of Y6, Y7 and Y8 and they will have had time to catch up in English, which often lags a bit earlier on. And private schools do allow for DC arriving from overseas. But the 11+, taken at the very beginning of Y6, is quite different and the VR component in particular is very, very hard for DC who have been to French school up until Y5 (unless they have been to bilingual schools). And state schools make zero allowance for DC arriving from overseas.

I agree that private prep schools in England are nothing like écoles privées but the difference very much lies in the breadth of the curriculum - in France, schools do not offer the sports, art, music, drama and other broadening experiences that private prep schools do. The academics are the focus in France and while primary school gets off to a rather slow start compared to England, the start of collège (Y7 and Y8) is quite hard work and very, very academic. Entrance to sixième (the start of collège - equivalent of Y7) is academically highly selective in many écoles privées (state schools are all comprehensive and catchmented), with entrance exams, interviews and great attention paid to le dossier (previous school reports) so DC who make it to a good collège privé are in an academically more competitive and demanding cohort than in many/most English prep schools.

Oh I didn't mean CE required particularly exactly standards. To be honest its quite dull! But it is a curiculum all of its own. The UK NC doesn't cover it. That said many public schools these days have their own exams, of course.Sat earlier. I don't know why prep schools keep banging on with CE to be honest.

I'd suggest going on an expat forum like Anglo info which has section for poitou charente. We almost moved to France a few tears ago and had a place for Dd at school recommended through that. She would have had a term 'adaptation' at another school for her to have intensive French lessons. Then the school was one that was bilingual which actually meant some lessons taught in English as there was a big call for it. There is a huge amount of info on the forums and there were two or three we used.
We didn't go, sadly, as stuff happened here that meant we couldn't go. Still hope to go, maybe in 2 years but Dd would have to go to international school to do A levels or international baccalaureate.

Good luck, everyone we know really loves it. And you have family in my favourite region of France.

CE is certainly not the be all and end all for DC coming from overseas. As long as DC are clever and have received a solid academic grounding private schools seem to be able to assess their suitability.

What bonsoir says is no doubt true of the schools near Paris and other big cities it is not true of the more rural areas. I am not far from Niort. Our schools have no selection, no waiting lists for those within catchment, so not competitive. They are mostly the choice of the Catholic and conservative site of society. I don't think there are any non-catholic private schools in the area.

Teachers in the écoles privées ARE qualified, though they may have non-qualified staff to help they do not take classes.

I would normally say 9 is a bit old to move, but as you are French and even if he doesn't speak fluently he has no doubt been exposed to the language much more than most he will probably be ok. You don't say which year he was born, so if you moved today he would either go into CE2 or CM1. If you don't move over until next summer then he could end up in CM2 giving only one year to catch up before college which might be a bit just.

As for moving for a better life, be careful; The gite market is saturated, once you buy it is very difficult to sell again, and if your DH is going to rely on flying to come out at weekends then you are at the mercy of the low costs flying into la Rochelle or Poitiers, who can change their schedule on a whim, and in winter a weekend just isn't possible, you have to fly Thursday and Tuesday. It is definitely NOT the same as commuting from Suffolk.

Catholic schools ( not écoles privées as a whole) consider that being a mother of 4 DC is a teaching qualification...

What do you mean Bonsoir?
Mothers of 3 or more children are able to sit the CAFEP w/o having an M1, just as they can take the CAPES. Doesn't mean they'll pass, though.
Do RC schools in France take on many teachers w/o the CAFEP?

Have you considered boarding prep?

Yes you are right it's three DC. They start work in anticipation - the teacher shortage in Catholic schools is very severe - and carry on working without doing the exam. DP's cousin's wife has been in this situation for 8 years, and she has similar colleagues. They mostly have higher level academic qualifications (doctorates) though not in the discipline they teach.