Are you smart?

« Mum, I am smart », explained my son while drawing another Ninja. As a proud mother I rather agree with his statement. Yet I challenge him: “How do you know that? How do you know you are smart?” To what he replied: “Because I find lots of solutions.”

SolutionS with a plural. Not “a” solution.

Yes sweetie, you are smart. When I attended school it was all about finding THE solution. THE right answer so you can pass exams, enrol in a highly regarded school, find a stable job and climb the corporate ladder. With the unemployment rate rising after what was called in France “les Trente Glorieuses” (Glorious Thirty), this model was shaking on its feet. Yet we were blindly following the principles built to educate for the industrial age.

This time is over.
In the school of the 21^st century, it is all about how to find lots of solutions.

This was inspired by a previous post on my French blog. 

Public Speaking Competition : are my kids really French?

My blog from last week is taking an interesting turn. The whole point was the French couldn't be really good at Public Speaking cause we were too literary and focused on beauty instead of entertaining and convincing our audience.

I was wrong. My son in Year 1 made it to the final. So I was half wrong actaully since my older one didn't (and I was so proud of her and all the effort she put in rehearsing her speech).

Going with the flow or not : the fight for multilingualism

 Monday morning. Coffee machine. Small talk with one of my colleagues. The type of colleague you only meet now and then because you worked on a project together a couple of years ago. Multiculturalism is one of our favorite topic. He is Lebanese, settled in Australia for quite some time now. He is mentionning an interesting fact : his wife is Chinese.

Could it be his kids can speak English, Arabic and Chinese? Maybe even French since he is a fluent speaker just like 40% of his fellow countrymen, legacy of the mandate France had received over Lebanon after WWI?

Unfortunately his kids are speaking only English. A little bit of Chinese, but they started to forget it when they started primary school and spent less time at home with their Mum. I was sipping my coffee placidly but felt sad inside.

And then he declares : "you can't go against the flow. Speaking another language than English is too hard." This sentence really stayed with me : you can't go against the flow.  Can you?

With so many resources available now, books, websites, apps, videos, of course you can. You just need to make the concious decision that having more than one language is right for your family. And as a famous sports brand said : "just do it". The fight for multilingualism is now on. 

Speaking skills : communication vs beauty

It is that time of the year again. My French kids hate it. It is the annual public speaking competition at school.

Learning how to become a confident, eloquent and engaging public speaker is an important part of education in Australia. It is also a major differentation point with French education.

In France, children do listen a lot. They do write a lot (running writing with a beautiful fountain pen). But they are not encouraged to speak.

In primary school, speaking is mostly about learning by heart poems from classic writers such as Jean de Lafontaine, Victor Hugo, Prevert... Poems are a great way to teach about the music of the language, the mystery of meaning and the beauty around us.

Are poems sufficient enough to prepare French kids for their adult life in the 21st century? I am afraid the answer in no.
I wish my French kids raised in Australia will take the best of both worlds. And be as convincing and entertaining as French street artist JR in this TED talk.

Raising bilingual kids

Since we relocated Down Under we went through several phases with bilingualism.

Australian primary school oblige, English is now the kids favorite language. I came across this compelling interview of Eowyn Crisfield, bilingual expert and mother of three children. Her main ideas echo our own experience of a French family living in Australia for 4 years:

1. Parents should build a plan from infancy to adulthood. Even if the children learn a language quickly at a very young age, in the case of an expatriate for example, they will forgt it if they do not practice once they return to the country of origin.

2. Children are not "little sponges". Maintaining bilingualism requires effort, time and resources.

3. Sometimes one must also be forgiving with yourself. And with your children. 20 times per day I found myself screaming "Les enfants, parlez fraaaançaaais! " and then I burst into laugh. I understand that it requires a lot of effort for them to recount their day in French when they have experienced it in English.

4. Each child is unique. Even within a family, each child will react differently to bilingualism (or multilingualism for the matter).

Are you rasing bilingual kids? What is your experience here?

This was inspired by a previous post on my French blog.