French Immersion: Best Kept Secret at CBE!

Tonight I went to the School Council meeting at the school. It's always an interesting time. Tonight one of the topics was how crowded the school will be next year. We have two programs in our school: French Immersion and a kind of 'back to basics' program called Traditional Learning. The Traditional Learning program is really popular and it seems it doesn't matter how many spots they open, they fill quickly. As a result, next year our school will be full to capacity. A number of parents expressed concerns over how many students per class this means. I didn't really say much because the concern doesn't really apply to us because our kids are in French Immersion. I sure was glad! Peirce's class has 16 kids and Jill's has 21. It's a far cry from the 26+ they're predicting in the Traditional Learning classrooms. I've always said, French Immersion is one of the best kept secrets. Apparently it is even in our school! If I were a parent I'd really consider moving to the other program if my child had 28 kids in their class. But that's just me! My kids have been really lucky to always be in small classes.



Recently Jill has been dropping hints that she wants to go to English Junior High. She's in Grade 5 so we still have a year to figure it out. I decided though, that since she was already on top of that issue maybe we should start checking things out. The other day there was an open house at the French Immersion school she would go to as well as the English Junior High she says she'd like to go to. We decided to go check both of them out. I couldn't have planned it better if I had tried! The French school had an amazing set up planned. There were displays and activities and demonstrations in every classroom...and not just the elective subjects either - even the math teachers were there with displays and kids in the classroom, and the science teacher had some kids there cutting up cow eyes (blech!). They had games going on in the drama room and kids playing volleyball in the gym and even a French cafe set up in the library where they were serving crepes. It was amazing!! When we went to the English school there was nothing in comparison - but there were still lots of kids there. Which mostly meant there were kids running around acting like junior high kids do. Jill said she really didn't feel great about the English Junior High. Just to make sure she knew I was seriously considering the option I even went and talked to the principal (who happens to be an old friend) about whether or not they accept out of bounds students. We explained our situation (Jill would love to attend there because its close to the pool) and since he was also a swimmer he was quite sympathetic to the situation. In the end, though, I don't think we'll need to take him up on that favor. I think we'll just continue on in French.



YEA!! I'm excited for Jill to go to Junior High. I think she is really going to love it! That girl was built for Junior High!