At School
Both Clara and Oliver are going to school. Yes, we put both children into local,
Chinese-speaking schools! Oliver is in youzhiyuan, normally translated "kindergarten,"
and Clara began first grade in guoxiao ("elementary school") at the end of August.
Both children love their schools, and despite speaking no Chinese at all on arrival,
they now are able to communicate in Chinese just fine.
Maybe you are thinking, "but wait a minute, isn't Oliver only three?" In Taiwan, kindergarten
includes nursery-school-age children as well. Most kindergartens start at three years old, and
go up to age five; Oliver's kindergarten has a "baby-class" that starts at 2 1/2.
Kindergarten is a lot like nursery school cum daycare: it
lasts all day long, but involves a lot of directed-learning activities
as well as ample time for free play. Kindergarten is not part of elementary school, which begins
with first grade.
From January to August, Clara attended the kindergarten affiliated with Academia Sinica,
but she is now in first grade in the local public school, called Hu Shi Elementary School.