A Mother's Fear

Since my eldest daughter was born, I had some concerns about her going to Kindergarten and understanding the Swiss-German teacher. As we already speak French and English at home, would she be able to make friends and be understood?

When she started playgroup last year, one of the first things I told her to remember was how to say: "I want to go to the bathroom" in German. Deep inside me, I was afraid that she would be tagged as the kid that can't say she wants to go to the bathroom and peed on herself the first day at preschool! Ridiculous, I know…

Thankfully, her playgroup is a special playgroup for foreigners to learn German and Swiss-German. They learn by playing and, I have to say, it works pretty well. After one year and a half, she can speak German a bit, count to ten in Swiss-German (if you accept that after five is eight) and sing songs that I can't understand because they sound more Thaï than Swiss-German.

But as the 1st year of Kindergarten is going to start in August, I am still worrying about her going to school.

Yesterday, I received the paper for Kindergarten registration. I was relieved to see that on the pink register paper (is it blue for boys?), they were asking if the foreign child can speak "good, little or none" German. I think in order not to worry as a parent, I am going to answer "little". She won't be overwhelmed and maybe she could learn that after fünf comes sechs, not acht and after sieben comes acht not nün!

One of my big concerns is how she is going to make friends if she is shy and doesn't speak much German. Well I may under estimate kid language.

Last week was the second Zürich Mom Coffee-meet up (organized by mamicafe).
We were in a restaurant with a kid’s corner. A came with her two daughters who speak Norwegian and German. My daughter played with her daughters, without saying a word for the entire time. It was clear they had fun. As we all went our own ways, my daughter and the two girls wore happy smiles on their faces.

My daughter keeps asking when we are going to see her two new friends again. She told me that they didn't speak to each other. When I told her that she had to speak German with them, her face lit up: "Why didn't you tell me before?" she asked. Well sorry my dear, I assumed it was clear for everybody...

In fact, I was happy to see that even without speaking she made friends and had tremendous fun. My sensitive and shy child is in fact a gregarious beast. And my fear for Kindergarten is disappearing slowly. I learnt that kids don't need to talk much to each other to play, have fun and like each other.

My big concern now is that school starts at 8.00 am.
That is too early to have 3 kids and a mother ready to go. I don't know how we are going to manage that point!

---