Live Love Laugh

之前我有說到我們煩該送E到私校還是公校。我和T都想選私校，可是拿出計算機按一按，每個月要英鎊一千! (汗)

其實E現在上托兒所的費用也差不多這價錢，但如果她念公校的話，我們就可以拿那一千鎊還房屋貸款。如果到時我決定到全職媽媽，我們也ok。

我們為了給我們自己多點時間考慮，我們給了家裡附近的兩間私校訂金留了位子給E。上個月WL私校來電問E幾時可以來個trial morning。我原本想說我們決定了讓她念公校，所以不用trial morning了。但T說即然給了訂金，讓E去試一試吧。

就這樣E昨天去Trial morning了, 9.45 至11.45。她是到小班體驗一下他們的上學情況。班上的小朋友是大E一年(4歲)，很友善，看到我們很興奮。他們很想和E一起玩，但E在陌生的地方顯得害怕，害羞，很黏我。我逗留來大約半小時候，其中一位老師建議她抱E，然後我就離開。E起初哭了，但我還沒離開走廊，她已經停止哭了。我一個半小時後回去接她，她和小朋友們正好在草場玩。她看到我很開心地一面叫媽咪一面跑過來。和我擁抱後，她又跑走了! 老師告訴我，我走後她很快就不哭了。她起初要老師抱，不肯落地。但之後就沒事了。我去接她時，她和幾個小朋友還抱抱道別呢。她一直對我說她要去‘friends的家’!!  

我和T之前有到家附近的公校參觀，其實C公校很不錯。我有幾個鄰居的小孩都在C公校上學，他們都滿意。C公校每年級有兩班，每班三十位小孩，兩位大人(老師和助教)。WL私校則每年級一班，每班二十位小孩，昨天在班上看到有三個大人。

為什麼我們還是對私校念念不忘呢? 英國小學生十歲時會考一個叫11 plus的試。私校很注重11 plus, 所以有些家長送孩子到私校，希望孩子考到好的11 plus成績然後被好的公立中學(Grammar Schools)錄取。(當然念公立小學不代表不會考好11 plus。我同事的兒子就考得好成績，但同事要很努力地在家幫兒子溫習。) 我們幸運地走路10/15分鐘就已經有兩家好公立小學，所以我不太擔心E的小學。但我怕她考不好11 plus，進不到好的公立中學。我怕她進不好的中學，認識損友! (這位太太想太多了吧? 被電視劇嚇壞了!)

還有我喜歡E如果上私校的話，她可以小小年紀開始學法文西班牙文。我喜歡她可以在上課時間一對一地學鋼琴或其他樂器(當然要加錢)。

我有一位中學學姐的兒子大E一年，她送兒子進私校。她和我分享她的經驗:

‘.... I looked at my son's progress, in terms of reading, speech, behaviour and most of all, his joy of learning, I'm glad I made the choice to send him there. My sister-in-law was telling me that the difference between state & private is they all learn the same thing, but for private, you pay the teachers to do the work, and in state, parents have to do the work. This is a matter of opinion. I think that parents have to put in effort wherever you are. Having said that, I'm more than happy to let the teachers work on his English, this frees up my time to do Chinese reading and music with him.my sis-in-law, she's complaining that her son (in state) is not reading (7 months older than my son), and the teacher is not doing much, parents have to do reading themselves. And her son is just not into it. But she doesn't mind, Scandinavian kids learn to read at 7. Once they click, the reading will become unstoppable.

Well, I believe in 早教, if they can learn the joy of reading earlier, why not? What warms my heart is that when workload was bad, I sometimes get lazy and didn't want to do his reading with him (he has homework every night, apart from Wed), he will be very upset. He loves them. He has 1 to 1 reading session (not long) with his teachers everyday. I heard that in state, because of the class size, teachers can't afford to do that. But there are still super-clever kids (and/or with super coaching from parents) who can read extremely well in state....'

如果有能力的話，我們當然想送E進私校。但我覺得她進公校也一樣會開心的。

錢啊錢啊，請你從天掉下來吧!