14 điều khác biệt trong việc nuôi dạy con ở Pháp.

The difference in the culture and the way of raising children of the French. Experience of an American mother with two children.
This is a series of articles in the parenting series Journey around the world of cupofjo.com. 

Emilie Johnson and her French husband Xavier, living with two young daughters in a village in Provence, surrounded the house with a vineyard. Here are 14 things that made Emilie amazed at how to teach children in France.  

Something about Emilie: Emilie grew up in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Maine and Seattle, because her father often had to travel for work. "We are a family with eight children, and the home for us is together," she said. 

She met her now husband, Xavier, in New York and lived three years in Paris. After that, they returned to New York and welcomed their two daughters Colette and Romy. But both Emilie and Xavier do strong financial jobs, and they all feel they have an unequal balance between work and life.

 "So I looked at the world map and asked my husband: Where would I go if I could go around the world?" And the answer is Provence. 

Two years ago, they sold an apartment in New York and moved to a 400-year-old house in Provence and started a financial technology company there. The process of transition has no shortage of difficulties. Xavier always spoke French to his daughter, but in New York they always answered him in English. 

"My 4-year-old daughter was frightened when she saw me in a classroom where she couldn't say what she meant," Emilie said. In the early months, Colette was like an American child babbling in French, trying to overcome the chaos of the "r" sound in her throat. The transition is also not easy for Romy, who has never experienced in both languages. But now, after two years, they are completely French. 

1. More outdoor time
We live in a rural village, so I always want to take my children out whenever possible. We love this wild nature: talking to each other about the beds of barley fields, eating new hot eggs from the nest (still with some chicken feathers), the children inhale the scent of flowers. jasmine in the garden and play and run all day.  

Our house is on a farm, surrounded by a vineyard. Here, I saw potatoes from germination to harvest, and the maturation process of the vineyard. These are just ordinary things, but to me are the most precious things.

2. No longer feeling guilty.
When I was in New York, I went to work every morning before you got up, then came home late at night, always thinking about what to do in order to not miss anything. I was a mother like that, and was always immersed in guilt ... for a long time, before the change blotted out that feeling. 

In France, parents who are both working and raising children are very normal, most mothers are like that during the time when their children are young, without being accused by society in a negative way. This is why France is the country with the highest number of working women in Europe. Culture here supports the work of parents, especially those who often work away from home. 

3. School.
3. School, how to teach children, raise children, French people, different things, differences Children catch before the teacher's expression at school.
Here, children can go to school at age three. Kindergarten starts from 8:30 am to 4:30 pm, including naps. There are two teachers for 28 children. When I first arrived, I didn't think the teacher here was so strict, if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. My second daughter used to imitate her teacher when she was at home, I thought they were a bit harsh. "No, that's not right, come back to your place IMMEDIATELY!", The teacher often snapped them up with a serious face. Even so, both of them seemed very excited.

4. Culinary culture
 Romy, four years old, recently said, at school they talk to each other about snails, she also wants to eat it.
The culinary culture in France is very rich, and the etiquette in the meal is its origin as well as its preservation. 

When we first arrived, I was surprised to see 20 children in Romy's daycare, from 0 to 3 years old, sitting around the dining table for the afternoon and no children were allowed to move before all wore their bibs and finished the dishes. Such a thing only happens in a culture where meal rules are taught and practiced every day. In addition to the lunch, the children here do not eat anything between meals, as a rule. One of my French friends emphasized: a child should feel hungry every day, before the meal. She said, just a completely empty stomach knows how to appreciate food. 

5. School lunch.
What I brought back after a February fair. Each vegetable is labeled with each region where it is grown; most farms are very close.
One day, I saw a group of parents gathered around the school gate, and I came to see. As it turned out, they were looking at the menu for the children's week: sugar beets, goat cheese, lettuce, zucchini, veal and many more. The menu is divided into three meals: main, side and dessert. Heard, they were shocked to learn that the fruits of the season were served in the children's dessert. They will bring this issue up in the next parent meeting. 

Young children here often eat seasonal fruits. Strawberries in April, May and June, and if you eat outside those months, your child will ask why, how? I have seen people here refuse a melon because it is grown more than 15 kilometers from the village ... Here people are very wary of what's harmful to their health.

6. Doudou.
One thing that is very popular in French schools is doudou (derived from the French word doux, meaning soft, sweet). They are teddy bears, a toy or a baby's own blanket, they vote and help the children nap. At the girls' school, there is a separate doudou wall, where each child has a separate bag of toys like that.  

Some of them are very attached to their toys, sometimes making it difficult to wash and, if unfortunately lost, much more troublesome. So there is also a service called SOS Doudou, which specializes in finding lost items for young children. They also found the same item as the lost item and transported them to the house during the night

7. Do everything in French style.
 My husband, Xavier, made crepes for the kids.
There is always a way to do things the French way. When you first cook with your mother-in-law, specifically peeling potatoes. I did the way my mother-in-law sighed, as if she had never seen anything like that. I eagerly asked her and she said that she couldn't peel potatoes like that. 

This is an example similar to raising children, such as bathing them. I often bathe my child before going to bed, but most of the parents in France we know, bathe their children before dinner at 8 o'clock, while they wear pajamas and bathing suits. dinner table. The French paternal grandparents of the children found my way to be very paradoxical and strange. Sometimes when I see disagreements with them in many things, I want to work the way I know, instead of following the French way.

8. Language.
French children often pout when listening. When my girls do that, I ask them: "Why are you making that face?" And turning to look at my husband, he also has the same expression.
Watching my daughters become French, I was amazed; Actually, I was shocked. For some reason, I was worried that my children would lose the culture of their mother's homeland - a feeling I didn't expect. Looking at how they pronounce, expressions and gestures (bulging cheeks when angry or pouting when annoyed) ... they really became French. One day, I saw Colette doing a puffiness to tease me. I find it incredibly strange that my children have a cultural background that I never fully understand. I am an immigrant and they are indigenous people, a clear division.
In addition, I feel like I will never be humorous in French - cultural differences, times, etc. ... I can, in English, but not in another language. My sister-in-law doesn't speak English, and we communicate in French for 12 years. There's a part in me that I always wanted you to know.

9. Bugs.
In this rural Provence, there are many bugs, they crawl on the wall, on the trees - very terrorists. My children love them very much, whenever they see a striped beetle, they will say, "Watch this baby, or not!" But if in New York they will have to jump up and down. They also have a collection of bugs such as scorpions, cicadas, beetles or spiders. On my sycamore tree, there is a flock of bees that nest, they perforate in the trunk of themselves, and they fly out and fly every day. The night before, I had to send a bat into the house during the night, "Crazy really!"

10. Religion.
My husband grew up Christian, like every other French. But he said that he was atheist, and did not see any conflict. More than 5% of the French population are public atheists, and two-thirds of young people too. My parents are Mormon devotees, although I no longer follow, but there is a very interesting cultural difference between us. Sometimes Colette's daughter will ask me, "Do you want to know if God is there?" I think, you will have to find your answer.

The Provence family often goes out on Christmas Eve, there are many traditions here that do not exist anywhere in France. We ate 13 sweet treats in Provence, including olive oil cake, toffee (nougat), and callisson (like Italian almond cake) and many other things. Children put their best shoes under the pine tree for Santa to give candy. People eat grapes on this occasion, meaning they will go to the garden and eat the raisins left after harvest.

11. Encouraging words.
The French parents I know often don't praise their children. When I told my son, "Oh Romy, I did it beautifully!" Or "Good child Colette", they often stared at me strangely. Of course, I just want to praise and support my children, but then I read an article about children not doing the things they want to love, but because they want to be praised. I see it, even in my children. So I have to suppress my desire to praise, I want my children to swim because they like it, not because I encourage them.

12. Children's picture books.
French books often do not hesitate to mention heavy topics. They are not afraid to mention death, or something like that. Stories are not always happy. A few French books in the daughter room I found, including Peau d'ane (the story of a girl who had to hide her father under a donkey skin, who wanted an old wedding) or La Barbe Bleue (about Bluebeard, a murderous wife) and another book about a giant holding a knife. Images and how to tell naked stories for children of all ages are part of the culture here.

13. The concept of sex in adolescence.
When it comes to sex or menstruation, our French friends talk very openly with their children. They all have children who are in their teens, and they talk about condoms and contraception very comfortably, when kids want to. As for me, who grew up in a religious family, sex is something very embarrassing. In France, sex is not considered a sin. I admire this very much.

14. The close relationship between the community.
Whenever I go to the market, I often go to the village market - where shops like bread, cheese or meat are separated. But the shippers often talk to each other for a long time, even when there are five people queuing up behind me. The slow life here made me admire. Except that I had to get on an early flight and need bread. Intimate relationships are part of the village. The butcher said his son would take over the shop after he retired, and he was training his son on how to make sausages. When my family went on vacation, his son was watering plants and feeding my cat.

I hope my family will be here for a long time. We left New York when we didn't know what we were going to do. All friends thought we were crazy. But the balance that I found here and the way my children get along with the village, is what I always dreamed of.