kindergarten/pre-primary

I'm looking into kindergartens/pre-primary schools for my daughter who will be 4 yrs when we hope to return to Nairobi in January 2010. Any recommendations?

Thanks,
Jessica

Hi! I can't tell you from experience (we're still in the states), but my husband visited ISK (International School of Kenya) last week, and he was very impressed. The campus is beautiful and he said the vibe was very positive. Certainly worth looking into. I know they have some open spots for pre-k.

morikins

There are some really great pre primary/kindergartens in Nairobi. It just all depends where exactly you will be based. Some primary/secondary private schools have kindergartens attached to them. I have some recommendations - some may or may not have websites:

Independant Kindergartens:

Lower Kabete Kindergarten - Kabete area

Green Gates - Westlands

Kensington Kindergarten - Kileleshwa

Stepping Stones Kindergarten - Karen


Kindergartens attached to bigger schools are:

Pegasus - attached to Banda prep school

Forest Crest - attached to Hillcrest prep/secondary

Braeburn Kindergarten - attached to Braeburn prep/secondary


Hope this is of some help! Good luck with planning the move and do feel free to pick our brains!

In addition to what has been posted here, we were very impressed with Brookside in Bomas (I think...maybe Langata?) If we were going to stay longer, our daughter would be enrolled there.

Regardless, visit as many as you can. There is surely superior schooling located wherever you are looking to relocate to here in Nairobi...that is one thing we found we did not need to worry about. We had a friend here from the States that was a Kindergarten teacher at an expensive private school in the States...her opinion of the ones we visited was that the curriculum was equivalent or higher and the student-teacher ratio was better.

Hope that helps.

Texan Mzungu

thanks for the info! do you know if is there any preference for KG attached to primary schools or do these schools easily accept students who have attended independent KGs?

does anyone send their expat kids to local private schools? i.e. non-UK/US systems?

I think that there is a big advantage in choosing an independent kindergarten because this way, you are buying yourself time to look around at everything on offer, then decide on the best next step for your child for primary. Many people get pulled along with everybody else, then regret that they did no proper schools research later, especially when their children are older and up for entrance exams for secondary etc.

If you choose a Kindergarten that is attached to a primary then you are sort of tied in, as the majority of your child's piers will stay on at that school and to move your child away might be a wrench.

There is never any admission problem moving from an independent kindergarten to a primary school, and you will find that the parents of kids at the top of an independent kindergarten will choose various different options for primary.

Sadly, the list of primary schools I gave above, are all very expensive. Brookhouse/Hillcrest are slightly cheaper at 150,000-190,000 Kenya shillings per term - the others are around 250,000-300,000 per term. Somehow we have to dig deep and find that wedge as school fees are not included in our expat package - those who have that provision are extremely lucky nowadays!!

All the big primary schools that expats attend are mixed race (Asian, white, African): Peponi, ISK, Kenton, Hillcrest, Brookhouse, Braeburn, Banda, Pembroke etc. (some have better ratios than others, for instance Kenton has a strict 3rd, 3rd, 3rd ratio which is the school we chose 4 our kids as we really liked that).

Other schools (and there are hundreds in Nairobi ) are more exclusively Kenyan kids but I think almost all follow basically a British curriculum (a throwback to colonial times).

Hope this helps?!

thanks, again..so nice to have firsthand information and impressions. it definitely seems like an independent KG makes the most sense to start. of course money will be an issue in eventually choosing a primary school too since my husband is kenyan and i'm an american on a dependents pass with no work visa so no cushy expat packages for us..yet.