British mums in France - tell me about parenting and raising children in France!

[SophieInTheSky]

Hello,

I am French and living in England, and I have been reading the threads about lockdown in France. I have really enjoyed reading accounts of French life seen from a British perspective, and now I want to hear more about what you think and feel, as far as raising children and parenting is concerned.

E.g. what do you miss the most about raising children in the U.K.? What you prefer in France and also in the U.K.? What do you love and hate about French parenting? What about schools?

For instance I still don’t get how early a lot of (most?) British children have their dinner and go to bed.

Thank you. Really interesting!

interesting thread, as a parent of children with SN and SEN i wasn't surprised to read that its not a pleasant country to have any child with sensory, educational differences? im a very particular eater, mostly sensory. Ive never understood the logic of treating particular eaters like they are being deliberately naughty.

I’m not sure that’s entirely fair. My sons school has a special class for children with special needs like down syndrome etc., fully integrated into the school life and a specialist autism unit.

is that a common experience of French schools? plus one very common aspect of ASD is limited diet.

This is some info on special needs classes in mainstream schools (in French obvs): fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit%C3%A9_localis%C3%A9e_pour_l%27inclusion_scolaire

This thread is so interesting! Thanks to all who contributed.

I am British and have been living in rural Province for five years with my husband and son, I moved here a month before my son was born. I really prefer the french way of ‘doing’ family life. Meal times are sacrosanct here, (eg restaurants close when it’s not time for lunch/don’t visit your neighbours during eating hours). There’s also more of a collective mentality to do things a certain way here that pervades many aspects of life, it means the french can be less fussy than a typical Anglo-American parenting style; eg ‘of course kids will behave at meals: they want to eat the delicious food, like all the adults.’ Sometimes the french think of children as ‘little adults’ which helps with this no fuss approach. Also, (dare I say) stronger socialist values offers many families more support, eg my son’s school would have been closed down in the U.K. for being too small and financially inefficient, but in fact having a close knit school on the doorstep is invaluable to me.

@JoD18 interesting choice of words : "little adults". There is no French word for toddler . You are either a baby or a child. Some might add an adjective in front and say a small child or a big child, but mostly we divide them in babies or kids. We have expectations with children. We expect them to behave, sit still in certain circumstances and from the earliest age.
And you are right about our meals. They are important. So important we don't want to ruin our appetite with snacks and we take them seated all together at the dining table. No TV trays !

I am glad you like your son's school. Teachers get more respect I would think and have way less admin chores than in UK/Australia.

How do you find life in a small village? You must love the weekly market! I definitely miss them !!

…I don’t think this is much different from many British families to be fair. We all eat together and meal times are sacrosanct. Our kids go to a school of 20 pupils. I’m sure there are also French families that don’t think/behave the same. It’s nonsense to generalise.

Interesting thread.

I'm British living in France and don't appear to be doing things the French way!

In particular, my son is nearly two and he eats his dinner sometime between 6-7pm. One of us will sit with him while he eats but we don't eat with him, we eat later. If he's not in bed with the lights out by 8pm he gets too tired. He usually sleeps until 7am so he's not waking up super early.

I read that book "French Children Don't Throw Food" before I had children, and now it makes me laugh because my French child definitely does throw food. He didn't learn it from us; we're pretty sure he learnt it from "that little shit Raphaël" at crèche. My husband's words, not mine. He also doesn't eat much in the evening because they have goûter at crèche. Yesterday I went to pick him up a bit early, at 4:30, and they were all still sitting at their tiny tables, including the horrible little Raphaël, and I think my husband is right about that. My son had had a yoghurt and a compote and two slices of bread with jam, and then when he'd finished his teacher offered him another slice of bread with jam. So maybe French children don't snack on big bags of crisps, but they do have a whole extra meal in the day consisting only of sweet things, which definitely does spoil my son's appetite for dinner.

I've also been an au pair in Paris, where I looked after two very badly behaved little French boys who definitely had tantrums, threw food and ate lots of snacks. One of them, the five year old, was already having weekly appointments with the child psychologist, which didn't seem to be doing anything at all other than lining her pockets. He slept in his parents' bed, wasn't fully toilet trained, and was permanently exhausted because he went to bed at about 11pm.

I've never raised children in the UK, but as far as I can tell the main differences at this stage are:

• children having lots more routine medical appointments in France
• short maternity leave
• it being completely normal for children to be in full-time childcare from 3 months upwards
• the cost of childcare overall - France definitely wins at this
• the difficulty of securing childcare, and the insane administration that comes with employing a childminder if you don't manage to get one of the coveted spots in crèche
• very few SAHMs, and mums seem a lot more comfortable leaving their children to go out for the evening or even away for the weekend, you don't seem to get mothers of 2 year olds who haven't had a night out since bébé was born here
• fewer mother and baby activities, probably due to the short maternity leave
• much more formula feeding - I breastfed my son for 15 months and he's never tasted formula, which makes him very much the exception to the rule
• pretty much everything to do with antenatal care, childbirth and postnatal care - here I also think France wins overall, although I do have a few minor grumbles

I used to work in a creche and that is a standard gouter, yoghurt and compote and bread and jam. Or yoghurt and fruit. Sometimes birthday cake if we were celebrating a birthday (so at least once a week). Gouter was given at 4 pm, but a lot of children weren't picked up by parents untill 6, then they would have to get home and sorted and so probably weren't even eating dinner with their parents until 7.30 - 8, so gouter was definitely needed.

I find discipline in French creches and schools very heavy handed, not in a hitting children way, but definitely physically moving them away from the trouble (quite brusquely) and a lot of shouting. I never fitted in as an employee because I was regarded as too soft, and I started looking for a new job on the day I caught myself speaking to the children like my colleagues, I didn't want to be like that.

My own DCs teachers used to think we were strange as my DCs were in bed by 7.00 - 7.30 right up until they started college, and they would sleep for 12 hours, they were exhausted by the school day. In maternelle they would have a couple of hours nap in the afternoon too. No gouter at school but mums would be waiting at the gates compotes in hand for the children to eat as soon as the school day ended, my two would just go home and have dinner at 5.30.

The cost of French childcare is amazing, we used to have fairly wealthy parents who would complain about their 500 euros a month childcare bill for two children in full-time creche, which included a 3 courses lunch and a gouter, plus nappies. Government aid in this area is amazing, however,I agree finding childcare can be difficult, but fortunately DCs can go to school from 2.5 years.

Yes @brittanyfairies, it sounds standard but I'm not surprised he's not very interested in eating much at 6:30. Apparently he quite often eats a second helping at lunch too. I suspect he would also be less keen on throwing food if he were hungrier.

Interesting to hear your take on the crèche culture from an insider. Obviously I don't see what goes on all day but the staff there seem really lovely with the children. We've definitely fallen on our feet.