I know and thanks to this I signed up my 6 year old on a Tuesday. My Gemeinde got so many requests that they had to open a 3rd Tageschule at the last minute.The one where my daughter goes. she gets free transportation from her kindy to the tageschule. She likes it there although at the moment it is very disorganised. They had not expected to have to open a 3rd Tageschule so don't have the budget for this. Despite what we pay, they have asked us to provide them with games and toys to fill up the room... I don't mind, they are very helpful and I'm sure it will get better and better. This year, it has become Emilie's highlight of the week.. going to eat with other kids and stay there all afternoon with them . What a treat!

Thanks to this new opportunity, I will be able to work every Tuesday afternoon. However, the fact is that the cost of the Kita + Tageschule and having moved up from tarif B to tarif C on the Quellensteuer ( despite my very low income) is costing more to us. We may be able to get some money back for child care since we are now both working but I work only 7 hours a week so I'm not sure. We will know more after my husband 's meeting with his tax man next Thursday.

I don't get this talk all about grades, but I take it it is the first year, second year etc.

Just to put my bit on top, I had four children, two step and the other two mine. My eldest is austistic so had special schooling. In Switzerland it is not easy and you get absolutely no help from anyone.

When they were all started kindergarten school, you were tied down and couldn't do anything without organising your day according to the school time tables. I had one at home, one in the first class, one in the second class, and a difficult autist who was being chauffered by a special pick up car to and fro to his special school. No-one had a regular time table, going at 8 perhaps 9 or 10 in the morning and coming home perhaps at 11 or 12. The afternoons were not much different. Oh and let's not forget Saturday morning, which at least has now been eliminated in Kanton Solothurn. You know the morning when most parents can actually not go to work and perhaps lay a little bit longer in bed. Oh, I am forgetting, we are in Switzerland where everyone arises at the crack of dawn for some unknown reason.

Anyhow as the years went on I could at last have my autist in a weekly school where he only came home at week-ends and even managed the busride all on his own. My two step kids eventually did their apprenticeship and moved out and I was left with my youngest who was then at the gym, with all sorts of strange times.

Then let us not forget the homework. A Swiss parent is expected to help the kids with the homework. I didn't mind, but it was a have to and not a choice. Try practicing french verbs when you are english to make sure your kids get it right. And the maths were all changing onto a sort of Algebra line. I did it all in my school time, but my brains had rusted up a bit.

I now have it all behind me. The step kids have been long gone with their own families and my two. My autist is still at home, but luckily has a job in a nearbye factory, after completing a special apprenticeship for the handicapped in metal work and my youngest, well he works for the Swiss government.

If anyone here has a handicapped child in the family and needs advice just ask, although I can assure you that you have to set things up on your own more or less. At least I did as I did not always agree with the Swiss way of doing things.

So will now get down off my soap box - this was based on 44 years of Swiss life. Am I now a Swiss - well my brain is going in that direction, but I not completely I hope.

I found the mad school hours easier to deal with when I made myself stop thinking about how annoying it was for me, and only thought of it in terms of how it was benefitting my kids, especially my daughter.

She's just finished two years of enfantine, going 4 mornings and initially 2 and then 3 afternoons a week. With, of course, 2 hours for lunch. And the whole of Wednesday off, like a mini midweek weekend break. It's been marvellous for her. She is always full of energy, bounces into and out of school, always enjoys going.

My son, on the other hand, did his first 3 years of education in the UK, where he started a full-time, 'sit at a desk and write' academic programme at aged 4. It was exhausting for him, and the others. Most Thursdays and Fridays at pick-up time there would be at least one kid from his class sobbing, overwhelmed at having held it together already for so many hours and only able to emotionally collapse now mum was here. Yet I have never, in two years, seen a child from my daughter's class come crying from school, barring the ones that fell over.

My son is by far the most energetic of my two. In hindsight, though, he... managed that first year of UK school. He... coped. My daughter, though - she has absolutely thrived under the part-time regime.

I appreciate it makes it almost impossible to work here. It's bad enough trying to fit in non-working tasks like shopping and other errands, as I don't even have a car to speed these things up. But I think the UK, with its full day school and wraparound breakfast and afterschool clubs covering 7.30am-6pm, have gone way too much the other way. I can't imagine in what state the 4 yr olds come out after more than 10 hours, 6 of which are demanding in terms of academics and restrained, orderly behaviour.

Swiss school hours - undeniably sucky for the parents. But terrific for the kids (mine, anyway). In the early days, it was a reprieve from the French for them. Now, it's a chance for them to play together for an hour or so - they are amazingly close, despite their 4 yr age gap - and occasionally do a little homeschooling for their English skills.

And the reduced hours, compared with the UK, don't seem to matter academically. UK schools spend an inordinate amount of the day doing assemblies, introducing government healthy eating initiatives and manipulating headteacher sticker award schemes to ensure all the kids get equal 'prizes' and recognition.

Here, they go in, shake the teacher's hand, sit down, and open their books. My impression is that the actual academic teaching hours are much of a muchness.

kodokan

I think the only solution being a working mum in Switzerland when you have school children is to put them in a Kinderkrippe or if you have a nice mother-in-law that looks after them. Of course you might find a child minder, but I settled for the Kinderkrippe and even had a job as a cook there for two years, so that solved a lot of my problems. I could even have my autistic son there in the school holidays. Later My mum-in-law fed them and looked after them in the holidays while I could at last go back to work doing what I learnt - I was an export clerk for many years afterwards.

Working in the Kinderkrippe opened my eyes to the problems many parents have in Switzerland. One wage is not enough and if the wife wants to earn, which was the case with many Gastarbeiter families (and also Swiss families for that matter), then they are glad for the support. My youngest were well looked after there. They didn't just sit there and play, but were encouraged to take part in projects.

The food was also quite good (after all I was the cook at the time) and in later life my son did very well. He was able to go to the normal Kindergarten when old enough and the Krippe looked after the rest. Although I am not a fan of Kindergartens it did no harm. I just refused to send him there on Saturday morning. It was too far away.

As far as UK schooling and swiss schooling is concerned, I cannot pass comment today, as I have been too long away from the UK and don't know the system any more. I had no problem, although our classes had an average of 40-50 kids, all being in the baby boom after the war. I think those not so academically talented did go down in the mass. I was lucky enough to get to grammar school and I was always interested in further education.

My youngest went through Gym in Switzerland. He transferred from our Bezirkschule and had to make up the two years he had lost in the Gym all on his own. he got no support. However, he did well and studied law afterwards.

Just wait, this is what they tell you today. Usually, say in Nov. they will tell you on a Friday afternoon that the whole timetable will change as of the next Monday. This leaves you the whole weekend to re-arrange all your schedule and everyone elses. If you are lucky this will only happen once per year, otherwise, be prepared for your life/schedule to be uprooted 2 or more times per year.

One dear friend decided after the second such 'adjustment' in one year, her children would be much better off in a private school with 'normal' hours.

Just for balance, so we don't frighten any would-be expats, I'm finding that block time works great in my kids' school.

Their primary hours are 08:30-12:00, then 14:00-15:30; secondary is exactly the same except for a 07:40 start each day. These hours are the same for the whole school, regardless of teacher, and are published on a flyer sent out to the parents each year (along with school vacations for the next decade; marvellously helpful).

Sure, there are some minor fluctuations: my daughter will finish at either 11:30 or 12:00 depending on whether she has appui (like a seminar group for a small number of kids). But I always know up to a week in advance which days are which.

And yes, there are other minor changes: dropping them off at the train station in a nearby town because they're going on a trip, having an afternoon off once a semester for a teachers' conference, etc. But no wholescale rewriting of the timetable, and certainly not even the most minor changes to these hours without at least a week's notice.

Not sure if we're just very lucky, or runningdeer has just been very unlucky!