Bilingual education - Nursery and preschool- ANCHORS, YEW CHUNG, HKIED Kindy

Hello all,

I know this subject has been talked about before on this forum, but i would like to get more information and perhaps am able to connect with a few people who happen to be in the same boat as me and my husband.

I am a British born chinese lady and can speak cantonese to a good standard having had chinese parents and have picked up a lot in Hong Kong. My husband is learning cantonese at the moment and both of us are unfortunately not at a level to read and write properly.

We are hoping our children will go to a more mainstream school rather than an International school as we would like our children to be fluent in all languages Cantonese, Mandarin and of course English.

We have been looking at schools around our local area such as Anchors Kindergarten (the mainstream section) Yew Chung also have a bi-lingual toddler and baby group and nursery and also Hong Kong institute of Education kindergarten which is also based in Tai Po.

Are there any expats out there who send their children to a more local school and can communicate effectively with the teachers and principal even though you can't read chinese? This is my only cause of concern as in future when they have circulars sent home with the children, i am unable to read it and i can't exactly employ a full time translator! what do you do in these types of situations and would the schools be willing to take my son on even if the parents can't read and write chinese?

Please share your experiences with me as i would like to know what the options are. We are not looking into schools until next year but its always useful to have the information at hand before!

Much appreciated

Hello - I currently send my 4 year old to Precious Blood Kindergarten (Cantonese-only school) for their afternoon 1/2 day program (3 hours). I can't write/read Chinese but I can speak it. I stress all the time about the homework and paperwork that is in Chinese but my work around is Google Translate and local friends/family that can help translate. My son's Cantonese is much better since we have sent him there but I still worry about having enough exposure to "international" schooling so he also does 1/2 day AM program at a more standard international pre-K nearby. To be honest, I consider the intern'l school to be more for socialization and play while the Chinese school is more "serious" schooling (learning language concepts and local culture). He loves both so I am ok with this for now but we'll need to make a final call soon when he goes to P1 since has to be one or the other at some point. You might want to check out the Facebook group "Cantonese School Parents Group" - lots of info on non-Chinese reading/writing parents who are sending their kids through local school.

Hi there LL207
Thanks for your reply. How does your son find it going to 2 kindy's a day? is it quite exhausting for him?