Advice about bilingual schools

[lwfhthebagpipeplayer]

Bit of background:

My son is 20 months, we live in Argentina, my husband is Argentine, I am from the UK. I speak English to him (although I do speak Spanish within his earshot if we are out and about). My husband speaks Spanish to him. My husband and I speak English to each other. We have English speaking friends, and also spend lots of time with Spanish speaking family.

My son has a few words now, but not very many at all, but understands and can follow quite a few commands now in both English and Spanish.

We are hoping that he will start a nursery in March 2011, he will be 2 years 7 months. It is quite common with schools here to start nursery at about this age and then stay at the same school for the next 15 years.

And so we are looking at schools, and this is why I am looking for some advice, even though he is so young ...

Background to schools in Argentina:

Most likely that we will send DS to a private school. The private schools that we have been looking at can be:

Half day only, Spanish only, with a few English lessons. Cheap.

Full day, Spanish speaking but with about 10 hours of English classes a week from age 5.

Full day, bilingual. Normal classes taught in Spanish in the morning and English in the afternoon.

We can't afford a fully bilingual school so ...

We are left with Spanish only, or Spanish with intensive English.

My perspectice is that the intensive Englsh that DS would study at school would still be much lower than the level at which he will be speaking, given that he will hopefully grow up bilingual. For example, one school said that their students take the first certificate in English at age 11-12 and the Cambridge advanced certificate at the point when they leave school. I think that it will be frustrating for DS to have so many irrelevant classes to him (and that we would be paying a premium for a lot of English classes that he doesn't need). Generally students at these schools would be Argentine, and initially only speak Spanish.

My husband says that this might well be the case, but that we still need to be careful with English that he grows up speaking and learning, that he still needs to be taught to read and write English, that we can't just take it for granted.

Anyone, any ideas?

But surely you will be reading with him at home too? Won't a lot of his English reading skills come that way, in the early years at least?

Yes, absolutely.

Maybe I'm more asking for later years. Is it possible to have a high level of written and spoken English without much formal tuition, and all the education in the other language - or at some point is it normal for bilingual children to need some kind of formal education in both languages?

I know that there probably aren't any definite answers, these are just the questions that I am wondering about at the moment.

Hi I'm very interested in your post. I'm British, married to a Honduran and living in Peru. 2 children aged 3 years and 3 months. We don't have the option of a bilingual school where we live so my 3 year old is at a Spanish speaking nursery with a small amount of basic English input. We moved here 8 months ago when her English was fluent, now her English is deteriorating as her Spanish improves, though actually she currently speaks neither well.

I worry that me just reading and speaking to her in English isn't enough. I don't want to home school but have been thinking about getting some UK home school materials just to supplement her learning. I'd ideally like her to be able to read and write in English to the extent that she's able to integrate into a UK school if and when necessary.

And of course just the writing here is so different to the UK, with all those funny squiggles and curves. I want her to learn to print and write English the way we write in the UK . It is actually a lot harder than I imagined it would be.

It's nice to know there are other people out there with similar concerns.

I think you're right about the English at school being irrelevant.
I would go for the half-day Spanish only. He'll get the rest of the day with you, and the interaction with you is the main thing that will make him bi-lingual. You say it's cheaper, so the money you save you can spend on a holiday to an English-speaking country or on picture books and DVDs. Far more useful than anything else.

Time, time, and more time with you is the only thing that will make your child bi-lingual.

Also, your DH is right that they don'T just learn. You'll have to make a proper effort to teach him. But if you want him to be 100% perfect in English, as I want my children to be, it's better coming from you than from an expensive school. There are loads of resources on mumsnet for teaching kids to read. It's not something you need to start worrying about till at least 4, unless they're particularly interested in letters, then 3 is okay too.

Thank you for all your replies (I am the OP). Good. We are still thinking, but it is really nice to have some different perspectives.

i would also go with the half day, i agree the english being taught at each level will prob be largely a waste of time, I'd consider tutoring when he's a bit older (either you or external) . Ds will also go to spanish school and I do think that in a couple of years we will need to think about some kind of after school support to help his written english develop as well as it should.