HOLY GRACE KINDERGARTEN

[jerejoy]

KSmom8:

Probably a bit late in replying but thought I'd offer my 2 cents worth of comments.


I would recommend Holy Grace Kindergarten to any parent who wants their child to learn mandarin, especially if the family background is an english speaking one.

My child was monolingual when he entered the kindergarten. He didn't speak or understand a word of mandarin. The kindergarten has provided a good foundation in mandarin (and other subjects) and he did very well for chinese and other subjects in primary 1. He still attends chinese enrichment class but at least he does not dislike the chinese subject!!!

I did enrol him for weekly english enrichment class in K1 and K2 because I felt he was picking up too much singlish from his classmates! So if you are concerned about \"english being compromised\", you might want to consider this option.

Thanks for sharing. My cousin also recommended this kindergarten to me but they only accept kids from 4 yrs and above. Maybe her husband is an American and she was previously an English teacher so they have no issue on the \"english being compromised\". I asked ard friends whose kids are in this school and they told me exactly as wht u hv mentioned too.

Think I may hv to miss this school a miss cos I couldn't accept on the english being compromised.

[KSmom8]

My younger kid is now in prenursery in another kindergarten. Honestly, I don’t find the standard of english that fantastic though have no other complains.


If all goes well with the registration (heard that still very popular), intend to send him to Holy Grace Kindergarten next year. As we are a english speaking family, I feel it is vital for him to pick up and be familiar with the chinese language so that he is okay with chinese in primary school (like my elder child).

I know of parents who are now considering intensive chinese primary 1 preparatory course for their K1 / K2 kids. I did not need to worry about this for my elder kid who was in Holy Grace.

Heard that the principal of Holy Grace has changed. Don’t know whether there has been any major change in teaching methods / policies and management. Any comments? TIA

[Meg]

A very late reply (I just joined this forum), but hope it would be useful for future prospective students…


My younger DS is in Holy Grace. Started in Nursury this year. It’s a great school and we have no complaints. There hasn’t been any changes in teachers for the whole year. The teachers are caring (esp since DS had hard time adapting to school and was crying a lot for the first month!!).

We speak English at home, so we are not worried about English allegedly being compromised. At school, he learns phonics, and he has picked up reading as well. In that sense, I don’t think English is in fact compromised. I recall hearing a talk to parents telling us that they are modifying their curriculum, and putting more emphasis on English…

As for mandarin, he started off not knowing a single word. He now knows some, which is wonderful. He is also not adverse to the chinese language/culture.

Holy Grace has good enrichment programmes - Act 3, Music, gym, computer are offered albeit as ‘extras’. They also are implementing new programmes, including trips to china for some K2 students. They say this arises from the ministry’s new initiatives for pre-school education.

My experience with Holy Grace is to be contrasted with elder DS who went to different church based school. That school was good too (great teachers!), but the chinese standards were very low. Even with Tien Hsia and home tuition in K2, he still had problems being ready for Primary 1 chinese. For that reason, we enrolled DS 2 in Holy Grace. On a different note, after enrolling in Holy Grace, I noticed further that they have more field trips for the kids, compared with DS 1’s kindy, which is a plus for Holy Grace.

[chatelaine]

May I know where is Holy Grace located?

[Meg]

@Chatelaine: It is at Upper East Coast Road.

[chatelaine]

Thanks Meg

Meg:

@Chatelaine: It is at Upper East Coast Road.

[privatecadet]

This year alone, a handful of old teachers suddenly left the kindy. Ma laoshi, Miaoling laoshi, Mrs Koh, Chen laoshi and soon next year… some teachers are talking about leaving too. 2-3 teachers left within a single term (some within the month, and some within the week!). Chen laoshi is a pastor’s wife and cried when she heard the excuse given by the principal for letting her go.


Principal told us parents that all these teachers had issues…e.g. mental problem, quarrelsome, leaving to pursue studies, etc. But the thing is, all of them were teaching in HG before the current principal came in. They were excellent and very dedicated teachers. One or two of them went out of their way to do extra for the kids. One gave DVDs of the kids’ class-time at the end of the year free… at their own expense. Parents were pleasantly surprised to find it inside the kids’ bags.

When the old staff left, kids were stuck without proper relief teachers. Some days, they had an all-English day… some days an all-Chinese. These comments came fr the children themselves.

I understand from parents that all these teachers left due to bad blood with the current principal. Principal tells us that she is quite happy that these teachers had left so that she can bring in a new batch. Some of the new teachers are very young and inexperienced. 2 of them are pretty nice and seem serious in their jobs. One new laoshi looks exasperated all the time. Rumours had it that the principal was from NAFA and parents from NAFA kindergarten petitioned against her. One parent had her child labelled as autistic by the principal and he is not! The parents hit the roof! This year alone, many parents also took their kids out… which explains why there is no waiting list these days. Years ago, HG had parents queueing up from the night before registration day.

Academics - besides spoken Mandarin throughout the 3-hour, the rest of the subjects need home-support. This kindy is no doubt good for kids who do not speak a word of Mandarin at home… but be ready to supplement yr kids with extra enrichment outside. Gym lesson within school hrs must be paid separately, or else yr child will ‘do PE’ with their form teachers. 2 mothers told me that their kids who opted out of gym (by outside vendor BearyFun Gym) were simply sitting around watching ‘gym kids’ doing their exercise. I do not know how true this is as my child is a gym-kid, but these mothers are appalled. So please please do yr research and compare the work with other schools before deciding.

By the way, K2 kids hv the option to go to China for 1 week for cultural exchange. It started this year. Parents must go. Costs about $3k for parent-child pair. Those who opted to stay back… I do not know what they do for that week.

[privatecadet]

According to principal, these are the Mandarin - English weightage. It is based on the time spent being exposed to the languages during the 3-hour kindergarten session, including meal time.


Nursery 80:20
K1 K2 70:30

[ActiveMummy]

I am a parent with kids in HGK. I went on the China Immersion Program with the principal. First of all, it took us 18 hours to get to Guangzhou. And it was the middle of mid-autumn festival, and 1 day after we got there, there was a 3-day public holiday. So the kids have very little interaction time with the kids from China. The kids were made to practice a lot before the trip. But they only had an audience of 15 kids who took time from the holiday to return to the school. The school has over 200 kids. So, in terms of the program, it was an utter failure. The kids remember the excursions, but didn’t like the school or its program. There was very little Chinese spoken to the students on the trip. It became a holiday to them. Its a real waste of $3K.

[rainbowdove]

Sorry to be a bit kaypor here.... as what i know, there are lots of changes and complaints after the new principal took over! ! ! Some even changed school as they realised their kids learn nothing from this kinda.....so sad to know that many good teachers had left and now the teachers there are 'International'... Sad Sad and Sad.....

Meg:

A very late reply (I just joined this forum), but hope it would be useful for future prospective students...


My younger DS is in Holy Grace. Started in Nursury this year. It's a great school and we have no complaints. There hasn't been any changes in teachers for the whole year. The teachers are caring (esp since DS had hard time adapting to school and was crying a lot for the first month!!).

We speak English at home, so we are not worried about English allegedly being compromised. At school, he learns phonics, and he has picked up reading as well. In that sense, I don't think English is in fact compromised. I recall hearing a talk to parents telling us that they are modifying their curriculum, and putting more emphasis on English...

As for mandarin, he started off not knowing a single word. He now knows some, which is wonderful. He is also not adverse to the chinese language/culture.

Holy Grace has good enrichment programmes - Act 3, Music, gym, computer are offered albeit as 'extras'. They also are implementing new programmes, including trips to china for some K2 students. They say this arises from the ministry's new initiatives for pre-school education.

My experience with Holy Grace is to be contrasted with elder DS who went to different church based school. That school was good too (great teachers!), but the chinese standards were very low. Even with Tien Hsia and home tuition in K2, he still had problems being ready for Primary 1 chinese. For that reason, we enrolled DS 2 in Holy Grace. On a different note, after enrolling in Holy Grace, I noticed further that they have more field trips for the kids, compared with DS 1's kindy, which is a plus for Holy Grace.