Stahlke Adoption

First Day of School (Again)

Sarah, David, and Kola dressed up this morning in their colorful Ukrainian dress shirts. Their first day of school at the Ukrainian orthodox church featured an opening worship service, followed by classes in reading, religion, history, and music. The school day lasts from 9:00 until 1:15 every Saturday.

We've heard of Polish and Russian "Saturday" schools in other parts of Chicago. Most of the children are offspring of recent immigrants in whose home the native language is still spoken. Jonathan and I are outliers since we don't really speak the language--our Ukrainian is very "child-specific" and not useful with adults.

At our children's Ukrainian school, most of the flyers and homework assignments are written in Ukrainian with no English translation. This morning, Jonathan attended a parents' meeting for the first grade class in which only Ukrainian was spoken. Afterward, he asked for a translation. Not all of the teachers are comfortable in English, although they are very willing to try.

Once our children start sixth grade, we let them trade Ukrainian school for confirmation classes at our English church. Both Ukrainian school and confirmation training are major time commitments, and it seems like too much to ask the children to do both.

posted by Stahlkes @ 4:31 PM