What's it like to grow up overseas?

I recently read an article called,

My Familiy's Experiment in Extreme Schooling in the NYtimes. (Video on the link too!)

It talks about an expat family (from New York) living in Moscow and the experience their children had being immersed in a Russian speaking school.  It gives an interesting picture of what school is like for students learning in their 2nd or 3rd language.  Some lessons in the article are applicable to missionary kids, cross-cultural kids, as well as second language learners in the states.  The challenges of adapting, learning the unspoken rules, and finding ways to feel you can survive and even thrive.  One paragraph that stood out to me was . . .

In those first months, our kids found themselves bewildered and isolated. Danya was a typical oldest child, a coper who rarely lost control. At night, though, she had insomnia. In class, she braced herself for that moment when she was asked for homework. She sometimes did not know whether it had been assigned. During Russian grammar, the words on the blackboard looked like hieroglyphics. She tried to soothe herself by repeating a mantra: “It’s O.K. to feel like an idiot. This is going to take time.” But she felt betrayed. We had assured her that children grasp language effortlessly, and there she was, the dumb foreigner.

The school where I teach has students from MANY different cultures and heart languages. But the language of education is English.  Japanese is taught 2 hours a week starting in first grade. My class of native Japanese speakers become chatterboxes when their Japanese teacher enters the classroom to start Japanese class.  Sometimes I stay in the classroom to listen and learn more about my own students who are so quiet during English instruction.

As my students are all Japanese children - living in Japan, they are not true third culture kids - seeing as though they live in their passport culture.  However, because of the international environment in which they attend school they definitely fit the cross-cultural kids category. Their parents have taken a bold step in enlisting their children in "Extreme Schooling" in English in their own country.

 When I think about  the fact that my students do/or at some point did look at the white board and not understand the meaning of the English I've written up there -  I also reminding myself - that even though this student is not answering me, "It's O.K. this is going to take time."

 But good things come to those who press on toward the goal.  I find myself cheering with the students as they decode the sounds of letters and create a word. I'm rejoicing when I realize they can now ask, "May I go to the bathroom please?" in a complete sentence rather than just look at me with panic in their faces and say "Toilet?"

Today the rejoicing came when the Bells, former KCS teachers from Australia, came to visit and all 7 students greeted the guests with a smile and handshake saying in English, "My name is  ---------.  Nice to meet you."