Daily advice for HK immigrants to the West:
Regarding parenting, you’ll want to exercise judgment regarding putting your kids in Chinese school on weekends. If they enjoy Chinese school and if the school teaches well, by all means let them enjoy the ride. You also need to balance their needs to socialize in sports while getting educated in Chinese school. A lot of sports events happen on weekends too. When my son was wrestling from junior high to high school (i.e. throughout secondary school), I was his taxi driver all over the state for all competitions not only on most weekends but often on weekdays. Even during off-season, we would look for tournaments to go to in order to get him to the state-ranked level of excellence. None of that includes endless hours in wrestling gyms to train with top coaches. Let me be frank. I’m in favor of being multilingual, but not all Chinese schools are run well. If bad teachers teach them, they’ll learn to hate Chinese school and maybe even their own culture. You’ll have to ask yourself whether that’s worth it. For me, sports (or other after school activities) and grades would take priority to help my kids assimilate. As long as you speak your mother tongue to your kids, that may be good enough. They’re smart. They’ll retain more than you can imagine. One day, they’ll remember all the stuff you taught them at home and explore their culture and language further on their own. Let your kids own their own culture, not YOUR culture.
