OP, if you haven't found this list yet, it's seriously useful.

http://myasiankiddc.com/china.html

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for all your help!

OP, technically, a kid must speak, read and write decent immersion Mandarin (simplified characters, Pinyin) for their age to test into CI from 2nd grade on up. In reality, if a kid speaks another dialect well, and a bit of Mandarin, CI will usually take them as early as 1st grade, certainly by second. My kid got through the interview using a mix of Cantonese and Mandarin (more of the former, most testers understand both). Many of the parents do supplement outside the program (in English, math and Mandarin) but that's the dirty little secret for high-achieving public schools students in MoCo, particularly since the advent of Curriculum 2.0. Those coming from DC public schools (outside neighborhood schools in Upper NW) will find more challenge in MoCo, even in schools with high populations of low-income students.

Thank you for all your help!

http://myasiankiddc.com/china.html

Most Chinese families don't get into immersion and do Chinese school on the weekends. Here is a list.

Wow..seems very unlikely CGES would be running 6 months behind. That is more than 1/2 a school year. It would kill the PARCC scores.

We actually go to CGES (not immersion program though). They have Chinese as special once a week even for regular "in bound" kids. Also there is chinese afterschool program.
My neighborhood is walking distance to metro (about 20 min), so it should fit your bill there too.
As for curriculum differences, CGES is very humanities oriented and math is very lacking regardless of what everyone says about "same curriculum". My friend just transferred her DC in 5th grade and what they are learning at CGES now her DC learned half a year ago at Lakewood.

Two more notes..transportation is provided to College Gardens but not to Hoover for CI. They are building a 5th ES in the RM cluster. The CI program will likely relocate there in a few years.

Thanks for all your responses!
We have a native Chinese-speaking household, but are not very consistent and were hoping to get some help with being in the immersion school. But since College Gardens seems unlikely, and we don't want to live in the Potomac boundaries I think we'll just have to focus on the out-of-school time periods.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think CI program is a lot of hypes.

If I can redo, I would go to home school plus weekend Chinese school.

Right, but home-school is not an option some would like to entertain.

Can you expand on your experience with CI?

It's half immersion and it's Chinese (Mandarin), one of the most difficult language to learn. Math and science are thought in Chinese. It works fine for K and maybe 1st grade when math/science is easy. It doesn't work for higher grades. Teachers end up teaching in English so kids would understand or they may fail standardize tests.

So if you really want your kids to speak Chinese, you need to do much more outside school. This is especially true for parents who are non Chinese speakers. Sadly, many parents don't get this.

Immersion program stops at elementary school. They change to language class in middle school. And this is where most CI kids who don't have additional lessons outside will most likely fail. These kids learned very little writing or reading during elementary school.

But yes, if you are trying to escape your home school, immersion is a good choice. Both schools automatically feed to Hoover middle school. Keep in mind, they don't automatically go to Churchill.

Well- college gardens in Rockville is a lovely neighborhood- many areas in Rockville are that kind of "know your neighbors" place without the pressures of a Whitman or Churchill.

Anonymous wrote:I think CI program is a lot of hypes.

If I can redo, I would go to home school plus weekend Chinese school.

Right, but home-school is not an option some would like to entertain.

Can you expand on your experience with CI?

I think CI program is a lot of hypes.

If I can redo, I would go to home school plus weekend Chinese school.