Tutor Time in Braemar Hill or Island Children Montessori School in Tin Hau???

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baby09

Registered User
Hi, my daughter just turned 1 and i would like her to attend a playgroup.

Any input on tutor time in braemar hill??? and has anyone attended the Island Children Montessori School in Tin Hau temple street??? is this the same as the international Montessori school??? - And finally, what are the chances of getting into an ESF kindergarten if she attended either of these playgroups???? thanks!!:woman
 
reneeleung said:
Don't try Island Children Montessori School!
Click to expand...

I think it's quite unfair to post that as your first post and not even explain in a factual kind of way what your experience with them has been. I know people who have had great experiences with that school.
 
So? What specifically didn't you like about it? Why are you against other people wanting to send their kids there?
 
Besides the canadian teacher called "Kelly" or "Karen" is very knowleadge in Montessori teaching method in ICMS, another teachers are not professional. And the teacher always change.
My son attended their class when ICMS started few months. If they are learning centre is ok, as the campus is very small. But right now it changes to Kinder.
 
My friend has been there for nine months, starting with the playgroup class and now in the nursery level and has been with the same teacher the whole time. I never heard of the school before then though, but she's always been very positive about it, the administrators have always been very flexible for her, etc. I know that the campus is small but that's a common problem for Hong Kong. The class size is also small though. I think for nursery, it's only about ten kids with two teachers. I don't know how many other schools here in HK have a 5:1 ratio of students to teachers.
 
Tutor Time is extremely commercialized, which to be honest, is 'ok', IF they provide the service that you want, but they are just so commercialized to a point that they don't care about parents' concerns, suggestions, feelings, etc., and they do things as a show, but not w/ a heart. Bring your child there at your own risk!
 
My 2 yr old has been going to tutor time redhill over a year, just switched to nursery there. He likes it and I like it. The teahers and principal are all very nice and caring. The place is clean and bright, and admin and communications are great too.
Perhaps googlebaby can elaborate on your bad experience?
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I checkout Tutor Time In Braemar Hill couple weeks ago enquring K1 class. The place is very clean and and impressive until I asked to see inside one of the classes. The door opened and I was a little shocked, there were 20 or more in there. The classroom was nice but seemed crowded and too chaotic in there for me. My son is currently going to a nursery that got 10 kids or so and he enjoys the personal attention he is getting. Regarding IMS, I went to elementary school in the exact same location twenty some years ago, it used to be a local govt. school. IMS really remodelled it nicely, it is small but I think it is sufficent for kindergarten and primary. Montessori school works best for kids who are independent. It really depends on how you feel about Montessori teaching. I suggest you go and check both places out and see what kind of feel you get from it.
 
Tutor time: I 100% agree that TT is very commercial. But if you don't mind, it is actually a well organise school. The environment is good and the teachers are nice too. My Daughter stayed there for a year from she was 1years old till 2.
Island Montessori: I really suggest you to avoid it. I went to a school visit and they are very rude knowing my daughter's age coz there will be no vacancy for her at all, so they don't even border talking to us.
The environment is also very bad and the classroom is very small and dark. Ventilation is very bad, I think I won't be too happy to let my daughter study there!
 
I think Wegetable has misunderstood. baby09 is talking about Island Montessori, not International Montessori School (IMS), the one in the previous Govt. school is IMS, there is no playgroup in the IMS Tin Hau Campus, IMS is a excellent school with a long waiting list. The one that Baby09 talked about is the small school under the residential building opposite to Art Plus, which as I mentioned above, is terrible!!
 
I have no idea what you are talking about dmk. My daughter has been there for the past six months and they have been great. The staff have been very helpful and flexible on a number of issues. The school, although small, has a great teacher to student ratio so at least the rooms aren't packed full of kids (they only have 10 kids in the precasa class, with 2 teachers, plus at least another teacher's assistant). The classrooms are bright and I've never noticed any problem with the ventilation. It really sounds like you are talking about a completely different place. I've been nothing but happy with ICMS.
 
YOu can PM me if you want to know my personal experience... don't want to disclose too much here. But trust me... my experience was awful!!! And in response to WEGETABLE... haha... yes, this school does try to squeeze in as many people as they want... from my experience, for a classroom w/ an originial max capacity of 12, without any changes/expansion of the classroom, they could keep changing the max. capacity to 14, 16, to 18 gradually. Yes, it's that crazy!!

Another incident... as you may know, many schools would help you ordering Scholastics books, and I see the exchange rate (which includes shipping, handling, etc. etc. fee) for many schools are around $11.xx to $12.xx to US$ 1, but this school charges $14.xx, which is a total reap off!! And many many more... and most importantly, they don't offer the education with a heart... I mean... it's ok for them to be 'expensive' and to be 'commercialized', it's a 'free-trade', but at least they need to offer a proper and responsible service, but they don't... sigh...
 
To: nicolejoy... yes yes yes... I was talking about Tutor Time. Sorry about the confusion... I know nothing about ICMS. :-)
 
Agree with GoogleBaby on the comment about Tutor Times. My daughter spent about 6 months at their playgroup. It was extremely commercial! I felt that her English teacher, in particular, had no heart in teaching babies. Some teachers just followed all the "steps" the school required, such as "pretending" to talk to/ play with the babies and parents. Personally, I did not see the passion through their eyes and expressions.

The school organized a lot of activities to please the parents but some of them did not make sense. E.g. A talent show was organized for babies from Playgroups and other higher classes (participation was voluntarily) and some babies were so young that they couldn't even walk. The parent of a baby needed to pay for $500 for an ticket and a DVD. If you want to bring one more adult, you have to pay another $300. I think the idea of having babies less than 1.5-year-old for a Talent Show is too ridiculous and commercial.

To be fair, their administration is good, and parents get newsletters, emails, reports often. If you like these kind of updates, you may appreciate the school.

I'd like to know other parents' view on Island Children Montessori School (ICMS), Kornhill International and Discover Montessori School (Sheung Wan) as I am considering switching to another Playgroup.
 
Agree with GoogleBaby on the comment about Tutor Times. My daughter spent about 6 months at their playgroup. It was extremely commercial! I felt that her English teacher, in particular, had no heart in teaching babies. Some teachers just followed all the "steps" the school required, such as "pretending" to talk to/ play with the babies and parents. Personally, I did not see the passion through their eyes and expressions.

The school organized a lot of activities to please the parents but some of them did not make sense. E.g. A talent show was organized for babies from Playgroups and other higher classes (participation was voluntarily) and some babies were so young that they couldn't even walk. The parent of a baby needed to pay for $500 for an ticket and a DVD. If you want to bring one more adult, you have to pay another $300. I think the idea of having babies less than 1.5-year-old for a Talent Show is too ridiculous and commercial.

To be fair, their administration is good, and parents get newsletters, emails, reports often. If you like these kind of updates, you may appreciate the school.

I'd like to know other parents' view on Island Children Montessori School (ICMS), Kornhill International and Discover Montessori School (Sheung Wan) as I am considering switching to another Playgroup.
 
I posted 2 years ago about my then limited experience with ICMS. Since then, that daughter has graduated from casa and is off to primary this year. My 2nd daughter has a physical disability and has been with them for about 18 months - she will start Casa in September at the east campus. We've had a very positive experience with them with both of the kids - it's not a perfect school but no school is. Particularly for my 2nd daughter, they have been very understanding and flexible, willing to try to make it work when other schools couldn't be bothered even trying. We get online newsletters each week and the correspondence with the class teacher is pretty good too. The kids were super happy. The main criticism I've heard about the school is that it's not "true Montessori" but honestly I have them in the school because it's a good school, not because I have any allegiance to Montessori method specifically. I'm currently pregnant with my 3rd child and plan to put her through ICMS too if I can!

Can PM me for more specific questions, or I'm happy to answer here as well.
 
Different parents have different experiences at schools depending on the teacher I think. My experience with Tutortime for two kids at two different campuses (Caine Rd. and Braemar Hill) have been different. Is it expensive, yes, is it commercialized - to an extent yes. But all the teacher's that we have had (especially in Nursery and K1 class) have really cared a lot about my kids and totally taught with a heart. The maximum number of kids in a class is 20 to 2 teachers and 1 teaching assistant. The ratio is very good if you compare it to some local schools that have 30 kids in a class. My kids loved their teachers and the teachers were very thoughtful and cared about our kids. The talent show, though maybe not appreciated by playgroup parents as much is a highlight for nursery and K1 children. They practiced for months and my kids were soooo excited to get the chance to perform on stage. It was truly memorably for us even if the tickets were a few hundred each. As for the Scholastic books - yes, probably expensive - but not a requirement to buy. I've not once bought from the program. So for our family, I would say Tutortime really worked and now my son is happily at HKIS!
 
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