We had japanese students a couple times. It was fun. Our kids loved it.

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sometimes

I exchanged to the foreign country of Quebec ;) My niece spent a month in Tokyo on an exchange 2 years ago. It's interesting and certainly gives a different perspective on other ways of living.

My parents hosted international students from the time I was 10 until I graduated. We are on the west coast so we had students from Korea, Japan, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, etc. Only real issue was with mainland Chinese, as there were some pretty stark cultural hurdles to overcome. You won't get those with euros.

It was an awesome experience. You might consider older students, too. We had a few grad students come through, and they ended up being more older brother figures to me then room mates and we're all exceptionally mature (compared to Canadian 20 somethings) and great additions to the house hold. That, and they are far less work for the parents as they are generally independent.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

Wonderful idea. My daughter did her grade 10 as a foreign exchange in Belgium and returned home fully fluent in French. She's kept in touch with her host family and even went back over to visit them a few years ago.

I want to do this at some point.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

Exchange programs are excellent, especially for American children who see the world by watching shows like Amazing Race and Survivor. I was an exchange student in Japan and worked as an au-pair in Switzerland many years ago. Both gave great experiences and thought me to appreciate different cultures and way of life.

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DISH is how we do it.

I was an exchange student from Hungary just after the fall of communism, and then the American students spent a month with Hungarian families.
It was great.

It was wintertime. I will never forget the look on the faces of those Ivy league students when we took them to a village for a traditional pig slaughter.

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Two wheels good. Four wheels bad.

 Currently have 16 year old girl from France. Last year had girl from Austria for the year and girl from Australia for march to July because of conflict with her first host family. If you want your kids to learn German Austrians are an alternative. All the kids from Europe we met had English that was pretty good when they arrived

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They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

Good thought. With an Austrian kid what the kids would learn about Europeans would be pretty much the same. Germans and Austrians might not agree, but I'd call it close enough.

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Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

Austrians are 150% German.

We did that years ago when the Army had me going to grad school at Texas A&M. Wife and i discussed it and thought it would be fun. I voted for a teenage female from Sweden but that dog didn't hunt very well :-( So we ended up sponsoring a young German lad who lived with us for a year and went to US highschool. It was very interesting and we got lucky in getting such a squared away kid to practice parenting teenagers. He ended up coming back to the US after finished German HS and he graduated from a US college in TX and started up his own company in Austin, TX. We've staid in close touch for years; had big role in his wedding and visit them often. We basically refer to him as our "german son" and our kids look to him as a older brother. It was a real blessing in our life. I wish you all a equally lucky experience.

/r

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Steve

Make sure you pay the paperboy his $2 or you'll never get any peace.

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Take a short break from ST and read my blog:
http://tri-banter.blogspot.com/

Applications from students are starting to come in for review. We were told, in no uncertain terms, "don't pick the first kid. It's very tempting, but don't do it. Other great applicants will show up in your email too. Just be patient."

First kid looks like a perfect fit. Mrs. RG says he's "adorable".

It was not 24hrs ago we were told not to pick the first kid. So I'm sitting my hands. Judging from his activities and interests, the German kid looks to be a clone of our # 1 son. Except the German kid has a much better hair cut.

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Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

Do it. My wife's ex did it for years and her daughter still has several close friends as a result. You will hit some cultural differences. Drinking age in Germany is 16, and the American restrictions can be restrictive. Kids have a bit more freedom and latitude there. Regardless, it is good for your kids worldview.

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Jim
"In dog beers, I've only had one"
http://www.shakercolonial.com/
Creating custom made furnishing to your requirements

I want my two dollars.

When I was in Germany 90-94, I was late 20's/early 30's. My genuinely fabulous German GF was 10yrs younger. I hung around with her, older brother, and their whole crowd a lot. It was a lot of fun. The difference in patriotism and, well, jingoism, between them and me often made me chuckle. The post WW2 Germans apparently had enough of that sort of thing.

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Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

Most people we know who have done it have had good experiences. One couple did not, ended up with an Italian kid who wouldn't stop banging his girlfriend (loudly) in the house even when asked. So he got kicked out. I think some other family took him, so he didn't have to go back to Italy.

We hosted German exchange student for about 2 weeks. 2 weeks because that is how this program works. My son will go for 2 weeks this summer. 2 stories about his visit.

1. The student had the option of going to all classes with my son or going the cafeteria or library. He chose to go to all the classes. The exchange student got kicked out of Global Studies for "flipping my son the bird" I got a nice long nasty gram from the teacher over that one. When they got home from school, I asked them what went on. The basically said just what the teacher described. I explained to the student that that means a very bad word here in the US and is inappropriate. He said he wouldn't do it again. Then both boys said they thought the teacher was completely over reacting, I suspected this as well... Its some thing 14 year old boys would do... Anyway, the student told me they use that gesture in Germany as if to say "your being stupid" or something like that. Later on that evening, The exchange students teacher did in fact that they use that gesture all the time in Germany and its not that big of a deal. Cultural differences learned..

2. One of the female students that was here apparently wanted the whole "American Boyfriend" treatment. I guess she had to be told that going to a drive in movie with boy and jumping in back seat would be inappropriate for the host family to let her do. She then described how back in Germany her parents let she would go on Holiday over a weekend or 2 with her 23 year old boyfriend. She was 15...

Anywho.. go for it. I was hesitant at first but it was a really rewarding experience for my family and my son.

Shit.

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DISH is how we do it.

I imagine it totally depends on the kid(s) and their culture:


Some close friends of ours recently hosted two 10-year old Chinese girls for about six weeks. (I was surprised by their youth but was told that in their culture it's not unheard of to ship young kids off to boarding schools so 10-year olds on an international trip is not uncommon). The husband, who's almost never home, loved it because in his short interactions with them (mainly driving them to school in the mornings) he got to practice his Mandarin. The wife, who was the one carrying 95% of the burden, hated it and will never do it again. The girls ignored her, never tried to engage anyone but the husband, never tried to engage in English, and were basically "all cost, no benefit" to her. They were even brusque with the couple's six-year old son.

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War is god

Ja, tiefe Liebe! Ich selber bin stolzer Schluchtenkacker, die Marmeladingern koennen mir den Buckel runterrutschen. ;^>

Screw 'em damn foreigners! 'Murika!

Get a kid from Cheeseeantingsurrendermonkeyland. From Paris. That way you'll learn that Paris is the center of the universe.

Update. Exchange student arrives in late July. I've been talking to him and his dad via email for a while now. Will be a mindblower for our boys, a 9th and 2x 7th graders. At least I hope it will. German boy is same age as #1 son.

Family is headed for a trip to Europe a month prior. First week of trip will be in Germany so we'll meet the boy and his family. I'm working hard to bring my German back up to "somewhat useful". I've got the kids working on German each night too. The kids will have much more fun in Germany if they speak just a little bit of the lingo. In 2wks we have to shift to Italian.

My grasp of Italian is limited to bikes and cars so that will be rough going.

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Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

Cool. We picked up a girl from Finland about two months ago as things were not working out with her host family. We are learning alot about sauna. Our other girl is from Versailles just on the doorstep from Paris.

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They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

Where in Germany is he coming from? Different regions can have thick accents compared to “high German”, which might make your efforts to communicate in German even more difficult.

If you are looking to get some German practice in, you might see if there is a German Meetup in your area. I was an exchange student in Germany for a year ( many years ago and also studied it at Uni) i go to a German Meetup in my town whenever I’m not flying and it really helps to keep it up. http://www.meetup.com

That sounds awesome!

Re: Italian. Use your hands a lot. Add vowels at the end of everything. Speak loudly. You'll be fine.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

 I'm working hard to bring my German back up "somewhat useful"//

Congratulations on getting to this point, should be a blast for your kids. And dont worry about speaking German, virtually everyone there speaks a little English, and a lot are quite fluent. Italy on the other hand is a lot like France, not quite as bad, but a lot of people dont speak English. Usually they have some French or German, so maybe brushing up on German wouldn't be completely wasted. When I raced there for 3 years I took one of those business language school courses. Super accelerated and only dealt with speaking, no reading. 3 months of that twice a week and I was going pretty good. Of course didn't need it at all, and they all wanted to practice their English on me!!

1) brits, and i think Americans as well, language abilities are an embarrassment - In general

2) we put both our kids in French nurseries and now school. My daughter constantly embarrasses us with her French. She will be fluent, and learn colloquialisms but she does miss out on language kids get at home if their parents are native speakers but I figure if she can even get 95% of the way there its a massive advantage

3) this is a really crass generalisation but my experience of France and the French is that they are super patriotic and really believe it is the Best, even when sometimes that belief is slightly misplaced......

4) i would really recommend having kids in language classes outside of school. It will pay dividends in the long run

That's generalizing a lot: look, I'm American and I'm fluent in both French and Spanish, and my German isn't terrible ;-)

The plural or anecdote is not data ;)

My thesis stands most English speakers are quite lazy ;)

I’m American and speak German and my Spanish is still pretty good.( I was an exchange student in Mexico as well) I do agree that a lot of Americans are lazy about other languages. ( and geography) Years ago I was London based and took a transfer to Hong Kong on a whim. My roommates decided to transfer as well. One of my roommates boyfriend (American, at university) gave her a book on how to learn Japanese. When we asked him why a book on Japanese, he said to help us learn Japanese because moving to Japan it would be helpful. When we pointed out that Hong Kong wasn’t in Japan and that they speak Cantonese he said aren’t Japanese and Cantonese the same?

I just got back from HK last night.

First time there having been to Guangzhou and Shenzhen this week

I am back there in 2 weeks

Based on 6 hours there I'd move there and i have moved to other places with out even visiting

Its pretty amazing. Never seen so many tesla's in one place and there is so much cash

It’s a pretty fun place. I moved there without ever having visited. Met my husband there, got married there. I’m not there full time anymore, which kind of suits me at the moment. My commuter place is out in a village on South Lantau. We have cows and water buffalo wandering around. We are minutes from the beach. There is fantastic hiking and trail running. I like being able to get away from the crowds of HK. It looks like you had fantastic weather.

I hope you noticed I was being facetious ;)

You're spot on about how the French perceive France though.

I did. You are not representative ;)

I can't believe you just called me a biased sample. Brits are so rude. That's why we got our independence from you guys (says the guy who has yet to celebrate his first year as a seppo...ah crap...can't say that anymore, can I?)

Little Francois is arriving in 12 weeks and we are reading all we can so that he picks up french from me, Spanish from his mum, and English.

We've decided that the easiest way to learn French is to adopt a French baby

Lol you'll never know where to put your euh if you adopt a French baby.

Just don't teach him Australian. Please god no.

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Proud member of the MSF (Maple Syrup Mafia)