Pre-schools headaches

Recently, mummy has been busy searching for pre-school for both my darlings here in Korea and in Singapore.

In Korea, it has been quite a disappointing find cos' the pre-schools here cater more for Korean kids, ie. lessons are conducted in Korean. Throughout the half-day program, there maybe only 1 English lesson (half-hour). Had initially wanted to enrol my Cutie in a English speakng school, but too bad they only accepted 4 years and above (ie. my Cutie is not eligible). They recommended another pre-school, but too bad the minimium age of entry is also 4. Fyi, it was really hard to find a full/partial English-speaking school in Daejeon and it's even harder to find one (pre-school) for a toddler. Through recommendation, we also went to another pre-school which has good learning environment for little ones. But it is mainly catered for Korean kids, so language and food concern, will be a problem for my Cutie (who don't eat spicy stuff). Guess we have to forget about finding a pre-school here for my Cutie.

Then we went to Gymboree, with belief that this American-based International playgroup for toddlers will be taught in English. Similarly, the teachers conduct the lesson in Korean and understand little/nil English. Mummy thot it will be fine if the songs are in English (like any Gymboree branch worldwide), but to our surprise, even the songs are in Korean too.

Well, mummy gave the situation a thinker.

In the first place, why do I want to send my darlings to child-care when a mummy's love and care is the best. In Korea, many woman become a SAHM (Stay-at-home mum) naturely after marriage. But in Singapore, many women have to make a difficult choice of whether to sacrifice their well-paid career and stay at home to look after their children. I am blessed to be able to take care of my children myself.

In child-care, the teacher-children ratio is 1:4 (in most desirable situation). At home, it's 1:2 (for my case). Definitely, a mummy would be able to provide better care than any teacher. Besides, being a trained teacher myself, I am sure I would be able to teach and care for my kids better.

Numerous researches have also shown that the first 3 years of a child's life is the most crucial formative years and a mummy's care is considered the best for any child. In addition, young toddlers have higher chance of falling sick after going to pre-school as their immune system are not strong enough.

Food concern, spicy food (eg. kimchi) is considered a staple food for the Koreans, but not for us Chinese. In addition, Mummy would rather that my Cutie masters her Chinese language instead. At this stage, my Sweetie is also at the stage of speaking proper sentences, it would not be wise to entrust her with someone who cannot understand English and thus the possibility of eroding her confidence to speak up in future. Well, the main factor is that understanding my babies well, they would prefer to stick with their mummy (aka me).

See, it's not easy being a mother. Well, but it's worth it especially when they hug and call you "mummy" sweetly. Keke...

Arrgh, settled the issue here in Korea and now got to worry about their pre-school back in Singapore next year. The registration period for next year pre-school is around April this year, so got to make decisions fast. Hee... the problem with the pre-schools in Singapore as compared to Korea, is that there are just too many to choose from. What a vast difference. Mummy will have to spend numerous nights to search for the information online, haha... there goes my beauty sleep.