School stream for mixed kids?

Our kids are UK/HK Chinese and born here. My eldest is now in ESF K1.


I want my kids to be able to grow up speaking English, Cantonese and Mandarin and be able to read/write Chinese. But I don't want them doing hours of homework every night, forced to learn 2 musical instruments irrespective of their musical talent and have a solely academic focus to school life. Team sports and lateral thinking please.


But I'm on a budget so that rules out expensive international schools. And ESF just keep putting up their fees each year - how affordable will they be in 5 yrs time?


If we want to go the DSS route, it looks like we'll have to move to a local K2 which will mean he won't get into an ESF primary. My wife is inclined to go ESF as she experienced the local system but this will deny the kids the opportunity to read/write Chinese. Decisions!


Are there others in the same boat out there? What advice would you give?

Thanks for your patient and helpful reply.


Bilingualism is the easy part, it's biliteralism that's the snag. To my understanding, access to DSS schools is dependant on the kid having a reasonable grasp of written Chinese picked up during K1-3. I'm considering getting a private tutor for this a couple of times per week but am not sure if that will suffice.


The danger is that if he leaves ESF kindy for a local kindy with a view to going to a DSS and doesn't get in to a DSS, then there's no way back to ESF.

Cara - which school in Sai Kung is that?

All good advice. I'll just add that biliteracy does require a certain amount of homework and a certain teaching style. However, it is possible to achieve a good balance.

And, switching to a local kindy for K2 will not in itself take you out of the running for an ESF school. It's the fact that their primary starts at 5 yrs old whereas DSS schools start at 6. So, it will be hard to get back into ESF at YR2 or YR3. However, there are many other int'l schools where it won't be so hard BUT you'll be giving up the idea of achieving bilteracy.

A natural fork in the road is when you've not been offered a place at one of your preferred DSS/private schools, nor been offered a designated place in the first round. Do you then proceed to the second round and/or go back to seek a place at an int'l school?

All the best with your decision.

Thanks guys. I found a wealth of info on the EDB website but interestingly none of the DSS/private schools make any reference at all to whether biliteralism is a prerequisite of admission to their P1. I've heard that Creative for example only start teaching written Chinese in P1.


ESF say that being at an ESF kindy no longer gives priority but I'd guess that dropping out of ESF kindy and then trying to get back into the system would not be looked at favourably.


EDB do run a conversion Chinese literacy programme for late starters but I don't know how effective that would be.