Moving to Brussels with a 2 year old

Hi,

The big and eternal question of where to put my child in school ... There is more than a hundred articles on this subject on the site. Take the time to read them and the practical guide published by the website.

The Anglo-Saxon habit of putting one's child in a private school has no real interest in an educational system like that which exists in Belgium. All you will do is put it in an artificial environment with no real openness to the country in which you live.

Belgium has three national languages ​​(French, Dutch, German). So enroll him in a public school where he will receive a bilingual education in our national languages. And teach him English at home.

You do not even imagine the intellectual faculties of children. In less than three months he will speak better French than you !!!

My daughter is twelve years old and speaks French / Portuguese / English and my two year old son speaks French / Portuguese ...

The biggest mistake you can make is to ghettoize yourself in an environment where other English-speaking people live. The faster and more completely you will introduce yourself in the life of the new country, the better your expatriation will succeed.

Regarding the duration of the school day, the child does not ask for anything better than to spend full days at school. He is constantly with other children where he can express himself freely. It is the parent who stresses by not having his offspring under the eyes permanently ...

On the first day we put our first child to school, she told us that we could go home because she did not need us anymore ... For the second, he argued with his mother because she was crying on his first day of school in front of his new classmates ...

Give an assessment on one or the other school is purely subjective and unproductive. Because a school can be very appreciated by some people and hated by others ... Have confidence in your instinct and that of your child.

TC

Existing discussions you can read through (as mentioned in the previous reply): https://www.expat.com/forum/257-6-study … ssels.html

Once you've finished reading the 100s of relevant discussions, there is a simple conclusion for public French school.

1) Look at commuting routes to NATO and the type of environment you are after and choose a relevant area. Schaerbeek/Evere/WSL/WSP/Etterbeek.

2) Once you've chosen the environment you want and relevant area, choose all of the nearest half dozen French schools and apply by picking up the phone / email / turning up in person.

3) Since you're not interested in full time school and the French schools are set up as full time, you'll have to prepare yourself for your child having more likelihood of integration and acceptance difficulties, more likely to cry, more likely to have separation anxiety, will mean also less time in French so longer to learn French.