Paluumuuttaja Soumi born in England

[Johannaikavalko]

Born to Finnish mother in England who’s only birth line is Finnish. The only one of 10 siblings to leave Finland and marry abroad. My mum returned with me to Finland when I was 8mths old, I went to nursery while she worked. She bought me and my brother back to England 2yrs later. Deciding that having mixed race children in 1980s in Finland would be a struggle for us in school. I was raised in the culture as she knew no different, shoes off indoors, Finnish church. All my memories of summers spent there running in the forests, skiing to the shops are hard to explain the sheer contrast.
I am mid 40s now with an 8yr old and my mother and brother are only family in England. In Finland we have a huge family with my grandmother still alive. Over 12 adult cousins with my child having 2nd cousins in plenty. It’s now or never to decide to apply for residence permit and my mother would like to return home to be with her sisters. She has never wanted to give up her Finnish passport. My only question is with understanding so little language would my daughter quickly pick it up in school with her 2nd cousins. Or would I find an international school. My only worry with international school is would we then be in a community where the traditional s and Finnish way of life is lost?? My family are in lahti, kouvula, Helsinki, Jouensu xx

[FinlandGirl]

I am mid 40s now
...
My family are in lahti, kouvula, Helsinki, Jouensu

How fluent is your Finnish?
In what profession are you working?
These would be my main worries.

with an 8yr old
...
My only question is with understanding so little language would my daughter quickly pick it up in school

Yes.

Or would I find an international school. My only worry with international school is would we then be in a community where the traditional s and Finnish way of life is lost??

The traditional Finnish way of life is what happens at home, not what happens at school.

Since the plan is for her to grow up and study in Finland she really needs the language.
And learning languages only gets harder when she gets older.

[Johannaikavalko]

My Finnish is my first language has continued as my mother spoke no English to us during growing up. My spelling is not great as was never formally schooled.
By culture loss.. I mean by the majority of people living in the community attending an English speaking school would be in the town. I have worked in Finland before while I younger as a nanny and in pre school. The difficult choice would be to choose where most of our family are or Espoo where the international speaking schools are. Has any 2nd generation Finns with children opted first for English speaking then made a transition to main stream any experiences good or bad please

[FinlandGirl]

The difficult choice would be to choose where most of our family are or Espoo where the international speaking schools are.

I fail to see any rationale for an English language school for your daughter.

There are plenty of people in Finland who came her age as refugee from places like Somalia or Syria and who managed fine in Finnish schools.

When someone moves for a job with family from a country like India and plans to stay permanently in Finland, the recommendation for an 8yo daughter would also be to go to a Finnish school since switching schooling language later will only make it harder.

And these children do not have the luxury of being surrounded by Finnish speakers in their family who can help them with the language.

COVID-19 makes everything more difficult, but in general I would recommend you look at what kind of summer camps or language course options are available for her before she enters school.

[FinlandGirl]

Born to Finnish mother in England who’s only birth line is Finnish.
...
It’s now or never to decide to apply for residence permit

Unrelated to the question, you should check whether you might qualify for citizenship as former citizen.

If you want to find out whether you are or formerly have been a Finnish citizen, you can request the Finnish Immigration Service to determine your citizenship status.

https://migri.fi/en/determination-of-citizenship

[Johannaikavalko]

Kiitos paljon next June is the planned move. She has been on WhatsApp with my cousins children who are in grade 3 they have been teaching sentences and she can now roll her ‘r’
Local school will be best, yes. It makes mire sense to be around her family who will be in the same school. She is shy to speak but what she says has a lovely accent. Once the world re opens from COVID we are hoping to spend July and August in home town on holiday. I think my language only kept strong as my mum made sure long summers and winters were spent in Finland. I should have been firmer with her dad who stopped me from speaking Finnish with her as a toddler, saying learning English was more important. It’s very important to me that our language and connection is not lost in this generation. I’m proud to be half Finnish and will now not just at home use every occasion when in shops, park to communicate with her in Finnish. We have some toddler books at home too which I’m enjoying reading to her Panic over. Kiitos

[browndude]

With regards to your 8 year old, she will most likely pick the language up failry quickly. Also, if you want your child to integrate into Finnish society better, an international school might not be the best option-kids in those schools essentially tend to live in their own bubble with not as much interaction with the local culture. At any rate, in Helsinki at least, there are school programs that offer bilingual Finnish/English education (my child is in a 75% English 25% Finnish class).