Any experience with Kiangsu Chekiang local kindergarten?

Estelle;

I suppose you have already had to make your decision on KCS as I am a little late. If you decided to enroll your daughter, have no fear, it's a good school.

Both my children (2 and 4) go to the Mandarin section there. For my son's class, there are two teachers for 29 students. My daughter is in the nursery and there are three teachers; I don't know how many students but it seems the ratio is 1:10-15. There is also always a helper in the classroom who takes the children to the washroom and cleans up.

Because of her age, my 2yo daughter doesn't speak or understand a lot of English or Mandarin, and even so she seems to enjoy school. I think the teachers are used to the different developmental stages the children go through.

The school is rather old and run-down, but the teachers are friendly and seem to be good with children. I can't speak for the English section, but in the Mandarin section, there seems to be a lot of dancing and music in the day.

Don't worry. If it turns out you and your daughter don't like it, you can always remove her and enroll her in another school.

Welcome to Hong Kong.
 
Hi Estelle,
My daughter is now studying in KCS local session nursery class. She will attend both international session and local session in coming September. Don't worry about the langauge ability of your child, they pick up so quickly. My 2 yr. 8 months girl can speak some mandarin (we don't speak Mandarin at all) after 3 months school in KCS. Also, there always foreigners in KCS and KCIS. Although the school seems to be a bit 'old' and the facilities is not very impressive but comments from many parents are very positive (especially for KCIS).
If you have enroll, 20/5 will be the parent day. Hope you will feel comfortable with the school.
 
We came from the US just a year ago, our son (4 now) is in KCIS's international section for the morning and main section for the afternoon.

We figured we ease the transition in, but have to say the main section has been more impressive. He's learning mandarin at an impressive rate.

We did 2 half days since we both work, but he had already been in a full day schedule for a year in the US prior to coming out.

PM if you want more info/reaction.
 
My son hate the KCS at first now start loving it. I love the school culture, no flashy cars parking outside the school like CIS.

Anyway, my son can speak Fluent Mandarin now. If it wasnt going to KCS, he will never be able to learn to speak Mandarin well. Now he have built an excellent foundation of Mandarin, sadly we are transferring him to IS this year. The IB diploma is important to go to a good US uni for us, hence we decided to switch him. If it wasnt for that, I think Kiangsu and Chiekang is the BEST Mandarin school in Hong Kong. CIS is second to K&C in terms of level of Mandarin and of course no tycoons in HK will be willing to send their kids to K&C.
 
I had a very bad experience with the Kiangsu school Bus. My son is in the afternoon nursery. The school bus collected him 30 minutes late and return him 1 hour late every day. They insisted us to wait for such a long time claiming the traffic jam. In fact, the school bus tried to run 3 school time tables (morning class, whole day class and afternoon class) and failed to be ready in school when afternoon class finishes. My son waited in the classroom for 1 good hour every day and waited for the school bus returned from the earlier shift. My son always returns home at 6pm instead of their promised time 5pm. They cannot improve the system but only let us refund. If I know the bus service is that bad, I would not consider this school. Too far from Macdonnell Road, Mid level.
 
My daughter also is also in the afternoon nursery. We chose KCS as it was highly recommended by my colleague. We are now terribly regretting that we chose the school. Bad experience also with the bus service. My daughter takes the F route, the one for central post office, the bus is always late, in the first week 50 minutes late! No seat belts. The lady on the bus and the bus driver totally uncaring! Said my girl was not seating down when in the bus! what do you expect from a 2 year old? That they'll seat still? Kidding! That's why I complained at first why they didn't have seat belts! The school said nothing and even said that's a new bus! My maid went to pick my daughter up at the bus stop last week and showed that lady the pass, she asked "There's no one left, there's still one?" questioning my maid, and then the bus driver said "is it that "THING" there (pointing to my daughter who fell asleep on the bus)?" They referred to my daughter as that "THING" and didn't even notice there was one child left there! They are hopeless! They don't count the children!

At the first week of school they spelt my daughters name wrong (both the english name and the chinese name) and they told me the wrong class name!

My daughter has been so unhappy at school and definitely not enjoying it! Totally heart broken as parents. Anyone who asks her or mentions about the word "school" she say immediately "don't like" in cantonese. Terribly terribly upset to see here like that. Same as above if I'd know they had such bad bus service and such uncaring staff I'de definitely not consider the school!
 
I can't comment on the school bus as I have opted to drive my daughter from mid-levels to KCS, predominantly for the reason I was worried about her safety and well-being on the school bus and I an fortunate enough to be a sahm to allow me to do this.

However, my concern before my daughter started was that the teachers wold lack compassion and understanding if my daughter was upset. From my experience, my daughter has been reluctant to say goodbye to mummy and there have been days with a few tears, but on each occasion I have left her being cuddled and spoken to by one of the teachers and every day I pick her up she is smiling and says she has had a good time and talks about what she has done. For a 'local' school they have exceeded my expectation of care and compassion. But this is only the classroom teachers, I don't know about other staff members.
 
There were numerous kids from my sister's building go to Kiangsu Chekiang morning section. My sister said the school bus seems always on time. Maybe the afternoon classes get the worse of it because of the snowball effect? I apply both of my kids for 2011 international section, if they don't get in the morning classes, maybe I won't consider this school, it won't fly well with me with the school bus being that late everyday.
 
We love this school! We had a place made available to us from an international school, but decided to stay at KCS instead. The school is unpretentious, the staff warm and dedicated and the culture strong. We didn't want our children to learn Mandarin as a subject, but as a language, which I think you can only do at KCS in HK. Our elder boy is currently in K3 and has been accepted to P1. Our younger will be applying to K1 this year.

As for the school bus, I know that the afternoon session buses are always late. That's why we opted to take our elder son by public transport from where we live in Mid-levels on minibus 56. However, once they're in full-day school, it should be much better as he will be start in the morning and end in the afternoon.
 
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