Is it SO important to EMPHSIZE Chinese in IS?

oooray

Any Parents could share experiences of the achieving good (or poor) Chinese Standard as an IS student?
Emphasizing in Chinese component (like YC) seems to be a GOOD selling point of IS to more and more parents.
Can we really get both FISH & BEAR PALM by sending children to those IS emphasizing Chinese?

Govinda

No

WYmom

I think YC is emphasizing a balanced program in Chinese and English, but not emphasizing Chinese as its selling point.

Among IS, only SIS and CIS have much more Chinese than others.  You can check their exam results (CIS and YC) as reference. Yet for SIS, it only starts to have secondary this year.

Kycmc

Unless for exceptionally bright children, it is unrealistic to expect a child to be equally good at both languages. It is basically a zero sum game: more English time means less time for Chinese and the vice versa. Students in IS generally love English better than Chinese as the latter is intrinsically a more difficult language.

I will not accept zero Chinese but I am not going for a level equivalent to local schools. It is simply impossible given the limited exposure time.  I doubt if any IS parents are prepared to achieve good Chinese at the expense of English. I would settle for Chinese at a survival level and allow my child more exposure to English. To me English is always the "bear palm". English opens up a much wider world to children.

oooray

Thank for all your valuable comment!
Kycmc: personally, i totally agree with you.
:

Ruby1219

Kycmc,

I totally agree with you the it's a zero sum game and it's just unrealistic to assume a kid to achieve excellently in both languages. In fact, especially for us Cantonese-speaking families, I found it even more difficult for my kid to master the 3 languages (Cant., Mand., Eng.). My son has confusion between English and Cantonese (applying English grammar to Cantonese) as well as Cantonese and Mandarin (when he has to read the words from the books, he would mix up the pronounciations of Cantonese & Mandarin). I think it's the learning process that they have to go through (and I'm sure they will get through well someday) and we parents have to give them our full support (teach them, correct them and give them a lot of positive reinforcement).

Cheers,
Ruby

Kycmc 寫道:
Unless for exceptionally bright children, it is unrealistic to expect a child to be equally good at both languages. It is basically a zero sum game: more English time means less time for Chinese and the vice versa. Students in IS generally love English better than Chinese as the latter is intrinsically a more difficult language.

I will not accept zero Chinese but I am not going for a level equivalent to local schools. It is simply impossible given the limited exposure time.  I doubt if any IS parents are prepared to achieve good Chinese at the expense of English. I would settle for Chinese at a survival level and allow my child more exposure to English. To me English is always the "bear palm". English opens up a much wider world to children.

mtot

Why?  Can you elaborate more?  

Govinda 寫道:
No

Govinda

need a tradeoff

you cannot get 200%