Resources for bringing over stepchild?

[Martin B]

My wife and I have lived in the US with our 1-year old, and next month it's likely my wife's 10-year old daughter will be joining us once her CR1/IR1 visa is issued.

 

We're trying to plan things out to make her transition to the US as smooth as possible. Obviously we expect there to be some difficulty and are trying to prepare ourselves. I know her very well and she is a great girl and beyond thrilled to be coming to join us, but her academic performance in school in China has been so-so and her English isn't great.

 

Are there any resource, or stories of how people overcame this? I remember one of my old college study buddies immigrated from Korea at 14-years old speaking no English and got a BS in Engineering, so obviously it can be done.

 

Any stories you can remember on this forum that are relevant to our situation? Thanks.

[Greg.D.]

I remember a couple (researchers) who brought over their 6 year old and 8 year old who had no English. First day in her new school, the 8 your old girl is raising her hand to answer every question in her math class ... only she didn't know the numbers in English.

 

While not a story about Chinese kids relative math skills, I will always remember it as the spirit that kids can be fearless if you encourage them ahead of time, rather than instill a fear of failure in them. That was in Tucson where schools are ready to mainstream kids who can't speak English yet. Young kids (like 10 yo) can pick up the language very fast. By the end of the year, the kids were fluent and by the start of the next they had put them in a better suited school (taking all your classes in Spanish and English - bi-lingual school - wasn't what they were looking for).

 

I wouldn't try to over plan or over think it ... but would talk to the school ahead of time. She won't be the first student there with little or no English.

[Martin B]

I remember a couple (researchers) who brought over their 6 year old and 8 year old who had no English. First day in her new school, the 8 your old girl is raising her hand to answer every question in her math class ... only she didn't know the numbers in English.

 

While not a story about Chinese kids relative math skills, I will always remember it as the spirit that kids can be fearless if you encourage them ahead of time, rather than instill a fear of failure in them. That was in Tucson where schools are ready to mainstream kids who can't speak English yet. Young kids (like 10 yo) can pick up the language very fast. By the end of the year, the kids were fluent and by the start of the next they had put them in a better suited school (taking all your classes in Spanish and English - bi-lingual school - wasn't what they were looking for).

 

I wouldn't try to over plan or over think it ... but would talk to the school ahead of time. She won't be the first student there with little or no English.

 

Thanks Greg. You are the man when it comes to family advice.

 

I've already spoken to the school twice and they didn't even bat an eye when I mentioned her so-so English. There is a large community of immigrants (most Vietnamese and South American in our area). Apparently they have several full time ESL teachers and mentioned that most immigrants at the elementary/junior high level speak about 80-90% as good as a native within two years. We'll supplement this as well evenings/weekends.