School Is Closed So Often

[Charly]

I live with my Thai wife and her nice (5 years old) in Udon Thani, She started to go to school 3 or 4 month ago. I noticed, that the school is closed 1 to 3 times every month during the normal school time (no vacation).

This month it was closed already on Friday the 17/09/2010, and this week the school is closed for 3 days on 22-23-24/09/2010. That is 25% no school. It is a small school with only 2 or 3 classes, but 7 teachers are employed. I wonder, why it is necessary, to closed the school so often. Maybe it is only an extended weekend for the teachers.

Some time ago I read in the Thailand Forum, that the average IQ of children in Isan is only 90%, and the reason for the low IQ is blamed on the lack of iodine in the water in Issan, and to correct the IQ, Iodized salt should be used.

I do not know, whether missing school days can influenced the IQ of a child, but it surely will reduced knowledge, which they could learn, when they have school every day, except of course during the vacations. I went into German Schools, and as far as I can remember, the school was only closed one day because of an emergency.

Edited September 22, 2010 by Rimmer
Personal details edited out for the posters personal safety

[bina]

just to put schooling in perspective although not in thailand, here, school started the first of september (no strikes this year!), then we had four day jewish new year holiday, then two weeks later, an other four days for yet an other holiday... then in december a week, then in march three days, then in april two weeks.... our kids have also two months of summer holiday, not to mention strikes.... and they still have high iq's although it means that for final testing they have to cram alot in to the last semesters of school.... its not the amount but the quality then affects the kids, adn anyhow, its not the school but the home envirnment including diet, extra curicular activites and genetics....

so just give more education of the good sort at home...

am moving this to family for good advice adn stuff....

bina

israel

[prakhonchai nick]

The Thai government schools -especially the junior village ones- seem to do as they want.

In my village the school is frequently closed, or the kids are sent home shortly after arriving in the morning. No explanations are forthcoming. Parents as usual adopt the "mai bpen rai" attitude.

In the local town, there is a semi private school -very low fees - where some 90% of the pupils are the children of government workers (Doctors, nurses, school teachers etc) Apparently government workers receive a small annual allowance to send their kids to private schools. If Teachers at government schools sent their kids to a private school, that tells you a lot!

Edited September 22, 2010 by prakhonchai nick

[Daffy D]

We had similar problem with or previous kids school.

Too many holidays for no reason and no notice of when the school would be closed, Some parents would somehow have been informed but many would turn up with the kids just to find that the school or maybe only their class was closed that day.

One time the whole school was closed because of the funeral of one of the teachers father.

The standard of education was also low. We did not realize this till we had trouble getting her into a new school as they didn't want to take her because of he being so far behind her age group.

We did eventually get her into a new school where she had to take extra tuition to bring her up to the level she should be.

The new school (also Government) is much more professional and informs us of any holidays or special events well in advance.

[MikeyIdea]

Thais aren't that disciplined and given a choice, that shows. Some governement schools are closed more often, others are not, some government schools are Good even though we wouldn't believe it, others fall far short of decent. I must also say that there are more real reasons for whole schools closing in Thailand than in Europe. Viruses come and go, these things tend to be nastier than in Europe and schools should and must close more often here.

Missing school doesn't influence IQ, in fact much more than what most people think regarding IQ is already set by the time a child reaches school age... A childs most important years developmental wise is before school starts, and that is much more important than knowledge too. IQ is less important and EQ is what is really important. That you can do as well if not even better than a Thai school does. How old is the child? Not saying that we can ignore knowledge of course but it is not the number one priority; Ability, self confidence, initiative, creativeness, willingness to think and act, what the Thais call bookalitt. As bina says - It's not the amount, it's the quality, great phrase

Development and knowledge starts at home - School is bad and the parents must step up even more - you and the mother can compensate to a certain degree. You should also check around for a better school, there are so many options here in Thailand, doesn't have to be expensive private one if the economy doesn't allow that, better government school would be a good positive step for your child too, there are cheap private schools, I recommend checking them. And remember - everything starts at home

Good Luck

[ilyelol]

Why would you make this topic?

You clearly know the problem is you are sending your kid to a free school in a third world country. What are you expecting? 99% of the people in small village, no matter their education, will end up working for maximum 10 000baht a month. Why would they care about school?

[Loz]

Wow, not one bad reply on this thread.

Don't concern yourself with the IQ can of worms. It will depress you. ANd education here is worth what you pay for it. Sadly this is a grossly exagerated mirror of the West. maybe 10 schools in England where the name and what you paid matter hugely. But here, they whittle that principle down to the village aunubaan.

Good luck with educating kids here. I think you'll need to manage your expectations downwards, a little.

Last year with H1N1 schools went nutz. Sport Day (which should be called parade day) means loads of classes cut.

At my school we have taken Wednesday and run friday's classes cos we missed too many fridays. We have taken 5 or 10 minutes off every class period to finish early so kids can practice their cheers for "sport day". I could go on...

get used to it.

[harrry]

In Australia they have teacher development days all the time.... I thought schools were about developing children and teachers could develop themselves in their own time like everyone else.

[MikeyIdea]

Wow, not one bad reply on this thread.

Don't concern yourself with the IQ can of worms. It will depress you. ANd education here is worth what you pay for it. Sadly this is a grossly exagerated mirror of the West. maybe 10 schools in England where the name and what you paid matter hugely. But here, they whittle that principle down to the village aunubaan.

Good luck with educating kids here. I think you'll need to manage your expectations downwards, a little.

Last year with H1N1 schools went nutz. Sport Day (which should be called parade day) means loads of classes cut.

At my school we have taken Wednesday and run friday's classes cos we missed too many fridays. We have taken 5 or 10 minutes off every class period to finish early so kids can practice their cheers for "sport day". I could go on...

get used to it.

Contradictions are a reason why it is so interesting to live in Thailand

Sure education in Thailand is not taken as seriously as in the West, especially at home where it all starts. Children are solidly behind western kids long before they start school. Thai kindergartens consistently start too early teaching stuff the kids aren't ready for and it takes weeks or months teaching them eg blending and segmenting when it would have taken 2-3 days had it been a year later. Schools are doing what they think the parents want them to do regardless of if it's good for the kids or not and the main goal of kindergarten is to teach the kids as much knowledge as possible so that they can pass a written exam in 2 languages to get in to a "good" school.

Yet I wouldn't want my daughter to be without the benefit of a part Asian education. I wouldn't want my daughter to be disadvantaged by having an only western education or only international school in Bangkok education. It is very possible to compensate for the above, it's just harder work on behalf of the parents. And the rewards are big

A young child today will finish university in 20 years time, she will then work for 40 years after that. Half way down this young childs working life, that's 40 (forty) years from now by the way, China will be the world leader economically, India will be second and America and the EU will have struggled to stand still economically for the last 20+ years. The Asian economies on overdrive driven by several billion diligent people who are pushed forward not only by the positive feeling of living in a country where things gets better every year, but also by an improved educational system will have taken over the world economy. America and the EU will still be powerful of course but it is going to be at the level of struggling to stand still.

Opportunities will be in Asia, Mandarin is the second language to speak. The door to the world will be more than half open for those who have this and more than half closed for those who haven't. The rest is up to EQ

Edit added link http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/313221-how-to-best-combine-schools-teaching-techniques-culture-and-tradition/ Interesting reading

Edited September 27, 2010 by MikeyIdea