France update – week 5

writing this, i am wondering whether to pollyanna, not sure. but i am hoping to look back from the future and see where we came from so i guess it is going to be honest . it is hard this en famille thing. i miss sb, particularly for the evening and day after our call. i worrit around the edges of conversations. but i can’t really alter anything. i believe that en famille are a good organisation and committed to matching well and making exchanges work. i think we have a lovely french family for SB to settle with. v also emailed us after the call this time to ensure we knew she was happy, which was lovely of her.

it is clear she gets on really we with her french sister which is excellent . but settling in at school is v hard for her, particularly as the 2 subjects she can understand – english and maths – she is ahead on, and she just doesnt understand the others. she is at the hard edge of the exchange, in that she is fed up of not really understanding, and desperate to make the transition into comprehension. so hoping that she uses that frustration to make a big push with french language. however, she has enjoyed orchestra again, only 2 clarinets but loads of saxophones, and played the tenor sax part. i’m not sure whether she has had a clarinet lesson out there yet, but is enjoying playing, and that is the main thing. she is still doing school choir taster, she thinks she has a head start as singing mama mia songs she also has been climbing at the club and playing wii just dance. she mostly sounded happy, and v said she was happy when she came off the phone so lots of positive too.

I remain proud of her for doing this, with not only the challenge of new language and new culture, but also school for the first time. V is hopefully going to send some photos to us, and when she does some will make it to the blog . unfortunately sb seems to be unable to connect with flickr and so can’t blog currently, so so is waiting for e to trouble shoot.
so there you go, a game of 2 halves