Early childhood, Before high school : English language proficiency

When the time came for Rania to enter primary school, my husband and I chose to enroll her into Al Jabr Islamic School, a bilingual school (Indonesian - English) which adopts the IB curriculum.The school currently consists of Pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten, SD (Primary school) and SMP (Junior High School). Its location is in Pondok Labu, Jakarta Selatan.

Just in the first two months of school, I was already prompted twice with a question about my expectation with regard to Rania’s education.  On the first occasion, which was during the school admission interview with the school master, I answered  that I wanted my child to :

• be able to speak English fluently like her sister (Ninta) who sat in year 11 in an international school at that time 
• be a good moslem
• be a good child just like any other child who could play along with friends, obey rules, etc.

The second person who asked me similar question was the school owner (Mrs. Hjh Uchu Riza)  whom I met by chance while I was sitting in the school entrance area recently. I automatically answered to her that I wanted Rania to be able to speak English fluently.   

Why did I have to put emphasize on English language? Mrs Uchu herself spoke up for me. Later on that day, she confirmed to me that English language proficiency was essential so as to have a good career path in the future.

I had another chance to conclude goals for Rania. Yesterday, Rania - both of her class teachers – and I participated in a three way conference held in the school main hall. I listed four areas for Rania to put focus on for a year ahead :

• English daily conversation skill 
• Making up story skill in Bahasa Indonesia
• Memorizing one short surah every month
• Practicing the five-time prayers.

Al Jabar School is quite far from our house. In order to  get to there, Rania and I must start driving before 6.30 am and since the traffic around Pondok Labu is quite crowded (well…so is all around Jakarta, isn’t is?), I don’t return home after dropping Rania off. That means I have approximately seven hours before the school finishes at 2.00 pm. How do I spend my time aside from doing groceries and enjoying some rare occation like eating out with old friends ? I choose to :

• read various interesting books
• read and answer incoming emails
• do some crochet work 
• write blogs' posts
• and the most important task : prepare worksheets on numerous grade 1 and grade 6  subjects for Rania as well as Aqmal to do every night ........ especially on English subject !