International school, what do we need to know?

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We are living in China, DS(4) is in second year at a local kindergarten. My contract of employment includes tuition fees for him to attend the nearby international school and we are going to take a look on Monday.
I have never "checked out" a school before so what should I be looking for and what sort of questions should I be asking the staff? There is only one IntlSch nearby so I don't have options to chose between, although FWIW, my colleague's kids were there and he and his wife rated the school highly before they went back to the US.

Just don't want to walk around the place nodding and then get home wishing I'd found out about xyz. So if you could all help me make a list of questions.......

Thanks

What curriculum do they follow?

(International schools usually follow either US or U.K. or IB curriculum. Which one you want depends on your nationality and where if anywhere you are likely to be in future)

How many students per teacher?

Wrap around care and holiday cover.. does it exist, what are the costs?
Languages spoken at school / languages taught
Parent / teacher interaction, assessment and feedback on how child is doing

Percentage of children who are Chinese, purely from a language point of view. I think it’s less of a problem when they are little, as your DC will probably absorb quite a lot of the language, but if you are 12 and in a class where 28 kids are Chinese and two are not, the language in the playground is not going to be English, which can be pretty miserable.

Do they have a bilingual stream? It would be amazing if your DC could learn Chinese as well.

How many teachers have English as their mother tongue?

Absolutely this.
And sometimes it's just a vibe you get from a place. Do the teachers look cheerful or less so?
Look at play areas and the equipment on there. Ask about specialist teaching (music/ PE). Do they have a pool?
And yes, consider the curriculum they offer and they philosophy.

In my experience, very few will have English as a mother tongue. The problem is more when you have a dominant group in the class with whom your child cannot communicate i.e. Koreans.
This could lead (note could) to those with a same language sticking together and this is not great.

Honestly, what will you do if it's unsatisfactory? It sounds like it's the only choice in town, so it's what he is going to, unless you move country.

As he gets older, the things above are worth keeping an eye on - and if it's Cambridge curriculum, keep an eye on his progression. DS1 walked into a Cambridge school in exam week. And got over 90% in every assessment even tho he hadn't been in class. We pulled the kids out 6 weeks later when spaces became available at a British curriculum school.

I think we asked about things like languages, music, sports teams, leavers destinations, ratios of teachers to students, gifted and talented programs (being optimistic here but why not), support for areas of weakness (what do they do if kids start falling behind or turn out to have learning disabilities etc), bullying policies etc.

TBF they had provided a lot of information on Dd’s assessment day so we were must filling in blanks.

If you want to know the percentage of 'Chinese' students you need to ask about native speakers. Most Chinese students in international schools there have foreign passports that have been granted after business investments. There will be few if any Chinese passport holders there. You don't have many options but I would ask about support. It may have changed but I know some of the prestigious schools didn't recognise SEN on cultural grounds as the parents would not accept a diagnosis and therefore help. I hope it is an IB school Op. It is a wonderful programme!

Yes, the worst 'International' school my kids went to was one with a high percentage of locals who used it as a status thing (it can be done well, they went to another school that had quite a few locals, but for whatever reason it worked and the kids were able to make friends - national character maybe) - it was miserable for them as they were very excluded in the playground (vs. other international schools with kids from all over where they were fantastic - everyone played with everyone, even with very little common language when they were young)

The other issue we had was with my youngest at that school, where because so many kids were put in to learn English, reading was absolutely put on a back-burner - so when we moved to an English-speaking country a year later he was put back a year as his reading was basically non-existent (this was also him - he was resistant to reading, as he just got his older brother to do it for him)

We've switched between IB/English/US curriculums. At your childs age I wouldn't worry too much yet, depending on how long you've been there, although my least favourite was the US curriculum - the workbooks tended to be fairly rubbish (both in physical quality and content)

Personally I go with my gut when visiting a school. When it's the right place for your child you can kinda feel it I think. Although with only this single choice I'm not sure what your alternative is anyway!

Id ask about pastoral care, what support is available?
How do they help the children to settle in?
What does a day look like for him at the school, do they have an example timetable?
As others have said language is important ask about how many kids are native english speakers in a class?
We put our son into a bilingual montessori pre school - given the sales pitch that it was bilingual with an english speaking teacher and a french teach, even split of english speaking kids & french kids, even mix of girls and boys. But when he started there were only 4 native english speaking kids vs 20+ french. The 4 kids just stuck together and were mostly isolated from the rest of the class. There were way more girls than boys. We also found the school had very high expectations for how a 3 year old should behave, and were not remotely accomodating for when DS behaviour slipped (due to frustration from tiredness, sickness, rules), they were restraining him when he was upset. We moved him to an English school and all his behavioural issues stopped and he is so muvh happier, so setting and environment is really important and how the school treats children who are struggling with a new environment - you want a school thats compassionate not using punishment or shaming as tactics.

Thank you very much everyone.

The curriculum is IB.
There is a large German expatriate community here so there could be some playground language issues and that’s something I am a bit worried about.