Well I suppose I brought it on myself…I have been hassling older daughter to write about the lycée experience, as an aid and guide for other expats about to start. I set no ground rules, but expected stories about hard work and too much homework.
I now have the first episode ready for your, ermmm, ”enjoyment’ – short and sweet, and enough to put you off the idea of moving to France for ever. Forthcoming articles will look at the practicalities of lycée life, a typical day at school, and the problems of children going on strike!. (These will be published during the next couple of weeks).
While reading, remember this is one of the top 10% of lycées in France, not an inner-city slum school, and really has a very good reputation…(articles are unedited):
[Start of article]
When you go to lycée for the first time, the first thing that strikes you are the groups. Different places in the playground, different seats in the ‘cafeteria’ for the different kinds of people.
The sports group gets the seats nearest the door because they must hurry to eat so they can attend their activities, the goths will hide in the far end dark corners, and the ‘populars’ will go in the big table in the middle of the room, trying to get noticed.
[oops, paragraph too controversial and had to be removed before somebody got into trouble, sorry - means the article is even shorter than it was before!]
So us new folks always make sure we are last in the cafeteria to make sure we get a seat we’re allowed.
[End of article]
If that hasn’t put you off, check back soon!
Transitions are always difficult. Going from being the oldest and most experienced students in a college to being the youngest in a lycee will always throw up the unexpected. Sounds like your daughter is successfully navigating the social hurdles with her peers. Am I right in thinking the next episode will be about class sizes and sarcastic teachers with impossible sounding expectations…. (We’ve got a son in quatrieme at the moment and I’m following your blog with interest)
Hi Janice (Sorry for the delay approving the comment, the comment passed into the spam detector twilight zone)
Mrs B has asked daughter to write a couple of entries about how French lycée and BACS work, and about school work and typical timetables. Another entry is about the problems of pupils going on strike!
I’m sure we can find stories about sarcastic teachers and problem teachers, but I’m always slightly wary what to post on a blog – never anything that can be identified as rude about a specific person is my general rule…(politicians and chamber of commerce employees aside) and there are many tales from the children that I could never post for that reason!
I should add that our daughter is very happy and well integrated at lycée (she is also class delegate etc), with lots of friends, and reasonable academic performance.
More to follow…
Am a teacher of french language in a high school in Kenya.I would like to create an exchange program between my school with a school in france.This exchange program will help in promoting international cooperation and appreciation of one’s culture.Already my school has an exchange program with two schools in the United States and one in U.K.How do i go about establishing a contact and by extension an exchange program with one or two schools in france?
Good question Victor – I don’t know the answer, but I’ll ask around and hopefully someone else will have a suggestion to post here.