Choosing a school for your child

Recently, I went to attend a DSA briefing at a secondary school which has a great reputation. This was a school that we had initially thought would be a good choice for one of Lesley-Anne's DSA applications. To my own utter surprise, after the briefing and having walked around the school, I returned from the session with a 180 degree change of heart. In fact, I was pretty sure that I did not want my daughter to study there because its values were not quite in sync with ours.

Choosing a school is serious business. Whether it's a primary school, secondary school or higher, our kids will spend a good part of their waking hours there - it will influence their thoughts, their behaviour, greatly. Some parents think the school with the best academic results is automatically the best. Not true! You need to select a school that's best for your child.

A mum whose child will be entering p1 soon had written to me asking my views on choosing schools. Since it's time for p1 registration soon, I thought I'd share some of the thoughts I shared with her. These are based on my own experiences in choosing a primary school.

To me, there are three important aspects to consider: 1) distance 2) coed or single sex 3) culture.

No 1) is a practical reason. You really don’t want your kids spending so much time travelling. In lower primary, they’re entering the formal school system for the first time - it can be very tiring. If they have to spend an hour on the road travelling home, lunch (or dinner, depending on whether morning or afternoon session) will be very late and they’ll be ravenous by then. This can really wreak havoc to their systems. I know some parents resort to getting their kids to eat in the car.

In upper primary, the kids will usually have to stay back at school quite often, for remedial, extra lessons, CCAs etc. Again, it's not conducive to spend a lot of time travelling. This can really take a toll on the energy levels of the kids in the long run.

No 2) for me was also a practical reason. I chose a coed school to cut the hassle of registration for Andre since he would be a shoo-in following his sister's school. But pragmatics aside, I've come to notice that there are other pros and cons of coed vs single sex schools. I have relatives and friends with kids in single sex schools and the advantage is that the teachers tend to be more adept at catering to the learning styles of boys/girls (since boys and girls tend to learn and socialise differently). In a coed school, if the teacher is more suited to teach boys, the girls in the class will be disadvantaged and vice versa. I also find that if you have a very quiet girl content to be a wallflower, she might end up being overshadowed by her noisier, attention-seeking male classmates, so she might thrive better in a girls' school.

But what I like about a coed school is that being around boys has helped Lesley-Anne learn not to be so siao jie and being around girls has toned down Andre's boisterousness. Basically they balance each other out. Whereas I find that boys learn to be more aggressive and rowdy when they enter a boys' school (to keep up with the raging testosterone, I guess!) And some girls, when they go to a girls' school end up very "girly", if you know what I mean.

No 3) is very important. Eg if you are a very English educated family with questionable Chinese standards, doesn't take a genius to figure out that your child will probably be miserable in a SAP school where most of his classmates will be chattering away in Mandarin! If your child loves dance, for instance, it might make sense to join a school with dance as a niche activity.

Personally, we wanted a mission school as we’re Christians and we feel that mission schools place more focus on values. Since the Singapore system is already so academically-focused, we wanted a good balance. One of Lesley-Anne's teachers, during a DSA briefing, encouraged us to visit the schools we're interested in and walk around to get a feel of the school. I didn't realise how important this was until I visited the school I mentioned earlier. From walking around, reading the notice-boards, looking at the kids, you can actually get quite a good sense of the school's culture. If you can, visit the school you're interested in (some of them have open houses) before you decide. Trust your instincts - will you child fit in here? Or will she be like a fish out of water?

Notice that among my three criteria, I didn't include academic performance. Many parents want their kids to be in schools with top academic ratings because they think that their kids will perform better there. I don't subscribe to that. To me, it's cyclical - schools with high focus on academics attract high ability kids. These kids are bright to begin with, so they're more likely to do well in national exams, contributing to the high academic scores of the school.

If your child is not academically inclined to begin with, he might not thrive in an environment where everyone is a top scorer. In fact, I've heard that some of these so-called "top" schools do less teaching because they expect the kids to learn on their own and supplement with tuition at home. In contrast, neighbourhood schools tend to "teach" more, which benefits kids who need such nurturing. When you look at the national exams, you'll find that kids from neighbourhood schools can also churn out top scorers and there will be kids from "top" schools who don't do so well.

But having said that, I prefer my kids to go to schools with a reasonable academic standard (though not necessarily the top), not because I believe the teaching is superior in any way, but because my experience tells me that these schools tend to have fewer “pai kias” or kids who don’t like studying, and I don’t want my kids to be influenced or make wrong friends at this impressionable age. Of course this is a generalisation but when you're in a school/class where the kids are motivated to study, there's a higher chance you will be the same. Similarly, if your classmates treat school as a chore and are trying to play truant half the time, you might be influenced. Never underestimate peer pressure at this age.

I've been very, very pleased with Lesley-Anne and Andre's primary school - it has played an integral part in shaping their characters. I hope and pray that we can make an equally wise decision for their secondary schools.