non English speaking 5-yr-old looking for International School

My husband just accepted the offer to be expatriated to Hong Kong. Our family will also move there. We just realize how difficult it will be to find a suitable international school to our 5-year-old. All the 2014-2015 formal applications completed last Sept. More important, our daughter does not speak English. According to the agent who is assisting us to schools, all the good international schools will have English interview, they do not accept non-English speaker at all!


I do not know if it is true. Could any parent who had similar experience before help me out - Can a non-English speaking 5-yr-old to apply for ISF, ESF, HIS,etc?


Thank you very much!

Oh, forgot to mention, she is speaking mandarin.

Hi


I am a schools placements professional. A lot of the expat focused school consultants are not familiar with the needs of mainland Chinese families, whereas I have experience there.


Your daughter can apply to ISF but they won't accept the application just now. You can apply for G1 in Sept 2014. A few other schools you can consider immediately are KCS, SIS and VSA.


The best advice is to get a K3 place immediately upon arrival for English immersion/bilingual at least half a day. The other half, she could work on her Chinese writing. In my experience, children of that age are behind HK kids in Chinese writing and not familiar with traditional characters.


If you're interested in English medium schools such as ESF, she'll have a definite disadvantage and she won't continue to learn Chinese at a level acceptable to most Chinese families. This may not be viable.


You can also consider Cantonese medium schools, or schools that do use Cantonese to some extent.


Hope that helps.


Regards, Ruth

Ruth

Thank you, Ruth. They are very good advices!