Bali Expat Forum - Bali Travel Forum

Dear Roy,

It looks like you are quite well informed about things on Bali. Just like you say, if we should make the move to Bali and have the intention to stay and live there, we would like to have our son (4) and one of just 3 weeks go to a normal Indonesian school.

At home he still can learn the Dutch languages, at school the Indonesian one and also Englisch. At this age the still learn quickly.

Question: what does those schools costs per year ? and what lessons are there besides Englisch?

regards

Alfred.

Roy

Don't get me wrong, I'm not completely rulling out the local school, although it has to be one with international influence as you said. When in Bali next I will be visiting Sekolah Dyatmika - Sanur. Fees are way way cheaper and they follow some British curricullum as well!! So, yes a possibility indeed.

Alfred, if you want to find out more: http://www.dyatmika.org

Roy, can you suggest another similar school? What about the one your kids attending? Cheers!

Our two oldest boys are currently enrolled in the Denpasar Children’s Center. We’ve been very happy with this school. It has a mix of roughly 20% pure foreign kids, 50% mixed, and 30% pure Indonesian. I like the “mix” a lot. My oldest, Bima, who is almost six, has a wonderful little blue eyed blond Sweedish girl friend.

Rama, who is almost exactly a year younger than Bima, and Bima are both in pre-school. Bima will be advancing to primary school this July...the school choice is still uncertain.

It seems with most of the schools here, that the kids start out at about age three in playgroup, and then spend the next two years at various levels of pre-school. For example, at the Denpasar Children’s Center, there is a totally different class, and different curriculum, for pre-school juniors, usually around four years of age, and pre-school seniors, at five years of age.

Each class is staffed by a senior teacher, as well as a junior teacher. Class sizes average about 25 or so kids. The classes are well organized, and the teachers seem to have no problems keeping control.

Both Rama and Bima get four hours of English, as well as homework each week. In addition, they have various levels of math studies and problem work books, and vocabulary/picture association workbooks. They get complete evaluations by the senior teacher twice a year.

The school has a swimming pool as well as a fine play yard. Security is tight, and no adult enters the school without being recognized, or challenged. At the entrance there are two guards.

The cost there is an annual “building fee” (common here with all private schools) of Rp 3 million a year, plus a monthly cost of Rp 500.000 per child. As private schools go in Denpasar, that is quite reasonable, even at play, or pre-school levels. Since we live in Ubud, those fees are only part of the story. We have a daily commute of about two hours total round trip, and all the associated expenses and time associated with that.

Our youngest son, Komang (I Nyoman Ari) will be starting playgroup this July, Where that will be is not yet decided.

At some point, Eri and I both think it would be best for all of our boys to pull them out of the private sector, for at least a year, and put them in our village school. Our reasoning for this is totally based on community issues. Our banjar is small, and as much as we want to offer our sons the best education we can, the friendships and bonds they need to form with their own village peers is equally important.

Without doubt.... without ANY doubt, these issues, education and integration of our kids in their community, are the toughest issues any mixed Indonesian/Western couple will ever face in Bali. Each couple has to figure it out for themselves. There are no answers, no certain ways to go.

Dear Roy and Irma,

Thanks for your input.

Indeed Roy the most difficult choice is between education and integration of the kids. Thanks for giving your well apriciated and solid information
on this subject.

Irma, I have looked to the website of Dyatmika. Looks fine to me. Will
study it more when plans get more serious.

Thanks again and enjoy your day / afternoon

Greetings from Holland: Sunshine today and 20 degrees

Alfred, one more suggestion I’ll “throw into the pot” as you contemplate what to do about these very important issues.

As Eri and I explored various schools, on occasion, we left Bima, or Rama, and sometimes both, at one school for a while to “check it out” their own way. We would go off for an hour or two, shopping or having a bite to eat.

The staff at the schools embraced this 100%.

Eri and I both agree that one of the best things we can do as parents is to sometimes let our kids participate, or at least think they participate, in making the decisions. Even at such a young age as four or five, it’s amazing to us just how much they appreciate being consulted, and not always just being treated as kids.

Roy,

Good ideas! Thanks a lot for being so pro-active. You have been a great help. Is it okay with you that we give you a ring by the time we visit Bali to have a joined meal on our expanse?

greetings,

Selamat Siang!
Alfred.

We can "discuss" the expense, but sure, that would be very fine. I've already sent you our phone numbers by PM...private message.

One of Eri and my greatest pleasures on this forum is meeting many of the participants. Good fun always, and we always look forward to meeting more!

Alfred,

Sama sama. Happy to help.

Roy,

Did you ever check out Sekolah Dyatmika in north Sanur? Denpasa'r Children Center - what age range does it cover? Cheers!

matsaleh wrote:

irma1812 wrote: .... as I don't see other Indo fellows very often, my Bahasa has gone terrible!!

Two of Jimbo's "pet hates" in the one sentence!!

Irma, I think you're baiting our poor Jimbo.

Mats & all members, honest to God, I did the above posting BEFORE reading Jimbo's post about his pet hates. (I meant to post this yesterday but forgot!) Maaf ya Baaaa Pak Jimbo

Roy writes:

At some point, Eri and I both think it would be best for all of our boys to pull them out of the private sector, for at least a year, and put them in our village school. Our reasoning for this is totally based on community issues. Our banjar is small, and as much as we want to offer our sons the best education we can, the friendships and bonds they need to form with their own village peers is equally important.

Now that's a dilemma if I ever heard one. On one hand, there is no questions that from a community point of view, AND from your childrens perspective, having them attend the local school for at least one year makes lot of sense. But on the other hand, not to disparage the village's school, I am sure that the school your boys are now attending is better, for obvious reasons. Personally, I do not see a dilemma in having them attend the village's school for one or two years only. The problem comes after, don't you think? How will that look to the rest of the banjar? Will your boys go along willingly with papa's and mama's decision to take them away from their village buddies? For some reason, I feel that their bonding with the village's kids would be stronger than with the kids at the Denpasar Children's Center. The reason for my thinking such is that I would think the latter school is more of a "transient" school. But maybe not?

Best of luck with this difficult decision.

Wow, Daniel, what can I say? Well, I can, and most certainly should, start with thanking you for such an insightful and sensitive post.

I think all parents worry and stress the most over the earliest years of their children’s lives when they have little, or no opportunity to make their own decisions, or to take any self responsibility. That period starts right at conception, not only for the mother, but for the father too, as a nurturing husband, and of course goes on for quite a number of years.

I blew it completely with my first marriage, and first family in the US. I blew it because when my wife of that time decided she wanted a divorce, I allowed myself to be forcibly removed from being a father any longer, courtesy of the American family law system. I will always live with my own guilt for not fighting harder and not doing whatever it would have taken to prevent that.

This time around, I will not make the same mistakes. In all honesty, I will admit that I appreciate many (but not all) of the patriarchal aspects of Balinese culture. It’s rather more easy to be a father here, as in many respects, it is demanded or at least expected. Moreover, the community aspect of raising children is a wonderful element of adat. That aspect alone, despite any parenting flaws I have, delights me to raise our children here in Bali...fully integrated and fully Balinese.

Yes, as you point out, it is a dilemma. Thank you again for understanding that.

I gauge Eri’s and my success as parents from our boys. I ask myself every day....are they happy, healthy, strong, learning, asking questions, hugging and kissing, and growing? As long as I can keep saying yes, what else can I expect from myself or Eri?

Daniel, you are right of course that the school they now attend, and virtually all the international or Indonesian/international schools, are transient. There is no getting around that fact. Our children are not the only children that attend school outside of our village. So far, there does not seem to be any sort of “stigma” associated with that sort of thing. On the other hand, there are several men and women in our village, aside from my cousin (Brother Wayan), who have been able to be educated in universities in the US, Europe and Australia after having their basic and secondary education here in our village.

I sometimes wonder, “does the fact that we “export” our boys for their schooling send the wrong signal to others in our village?”

Every aspect of our village has improved rather dramatically in the years since I decided to call it home. Among these improvements is education. I am impressed when my boys are interacting with their many, many cousins, most all being educated here in our village schools. I honestly can see no difference in the skills (aside from English) these other children demonstrate from our own boys.

Sorry to ramble on. I guess you can see clearly that for me, I regard this issue as the most difficult challenge in my life. I think all parents struggle with this dilemma in one way or another. Jimbo, for one, has certainly described that here as he works at hell’s gate to see his own prosper.

If I can add a few more words about the bonding issue that I agree is so important, I would call to attention the pura. As you well know, the Balinese are at temple many, many times a month. While I cannot keep up with my wife in this regard, my boys do, and they love going to temple. These events are as much social as they are religious. The pura are the glue that truly bonds Balinese society. It is there, at temple, that the villagers come together, and it is there, more than any other aspect of Balinese life, where life long bonds, among themselves, and with their Gods, are formed.

Roy writes:

At some point, Eri and I both think it would be best for all of our boys to pull them out of the private sector, for at least a year, and put them in our village school.

tintin wrote:Will your boys go along willingly with papa's and mama's decision to take them away from their village buddies?

Tintin, you've definitely got a point there as recognised by Roy. My eldest son went to a private school for a few years to age 9, due to a house move we took him out and put him into a state school locally where he was actually bullied. After that he went to a good state high school 8 miles away, unfortunately due to family problems we moved away again, as it turned out only for 6 months, so he went to another school then went back to his original high school again where he stayed until finishing GCSE exams last year.

Instead of being used to making new friends & meeting new people at his new schools, unfortunately he became withdrawn and more interested in playing computer games than seeing his friends. It went on for 3-4 years gradually getting worse & worse, even abandoning his tennis training!

He is now almost 17 and started tennis again a year ago but only since before last Christmas he started going out with friends again. We are glad about that as long as he stays sensible about things. (The benefit about him not seeing his friends was that we always knew where he was - at home - unfortunately watching TV or on computer though!)

He was always quite a sociable boy and I do believe he became withdrawn & unsociable was not simply due to being a teenager, but also because he had to keep moving schools! He told me several times he resented that, but thankfully he doesn't hold it against us. (I hope )

So Roy, I'm sure you & Eri will always do your best for your boys, but be careful when you move them in/out schools. As you know I have another little one now to worry about as well about schooling, so you have my sympathy. It's not easy, is it?

Like all the posters here, schooling is definitely going to be an issue for us. Our plans are to build next year, then start to live part-time in Bali. So our five year olds' school year will be split.

One of the options we will look at is home-schooling in Bali, especially if it is just for a school term, which in the first year we think is likely. Lou is teacher trained, and we both have a strong theatre and arts background, so we think we can make an interesting home-school curriculum for that period of time. Constructing his social life may be a bit trickier I guess.

We are about to leave for Bali in a week, and will have Christmas and New Year there and looking forward to it very much. Have not been there at that time of year before; expecting high humidity, and thundery showers!

Grahame and Lou

Alfred appeared to ask:

...xvxvxvxvxvxvxvxv...

...which doesn't make any sense to me. How anybody could post responses to that baffles me.

I'm not sure where this question came from:

...Can somebody tell me then, if wages haven't increased, how on earth do the locals manage?!?...

Most don't, unless they were 'rich' in the first place, and even some of them are struggling to find more rice paddies to sell to support their life-styles.

Sanurian wrote:Alfred appeared to ask:

...xvxvxvxvxvxvxvxv...

...which doesn't make any sense to me. How anybody could post responses to that baffles me.

Sanurian, this was not the original message. The reason members can no longer edit their posts is because this person abused the privilege.

See here:
http://www.bali-information.com/expat_f ... hp?t=15016