Spanish-language day-care centre attracts children even from far away
<a href=www.helsinki-hs.net>Helsengin Sanomat Metro - Thursday 24.4.2003
Vantaa family drives over one hundred kilometres daily to take children to school and day-care
By Jaana Savolainen
It says "Guarderia española" on the door of a yellow wooden house on Toinen linja in Helsinki's Kallio district. Inside, three Cuban teachers guide the merry group of children to the table with their colouring books.
"What is the capital of Venezuela?" Rayza Reguera asks.
"Caracas!" the children yell out in unison.
"How many stars are there on the Venezuelan flag?"
"Seven!" the children answer in Spanish, without a moment's hesitation.
Nearly half of the children who spend their days at the Mi Casita day-care centre have at least a part of their roots in Spain or in Latin America. A group of parents established the private day-care centre nine years ago, when there was no Spanish-language day-care available in Helsinki.
A part of the 22 children come from entirely Finnish families. Some of them have wound up at Mi Casita purely by coincidence. The reputation of the day-care centre is so good that children even from Vantaa and Kerava have been driven over daily.
"A warm day-care place, we are very thankful", says Vantaa resident Marita Asplund, whose three children have all gone to Mi Casita.
Teacher Magalys Marin lifts the youngest children into her lap every so often, gives them hugs and kisses. One-year-old Disa Dahlström squeezes her tightly around the neck.
The Asplund family heard about the Spanish-language day-care alternative by chance on the radio at the time when they were seeking a place for their oldest child. "We did not receive a day-care place from Vantaa at the time."
Since then, the family has driven from the Vantaanlaakso district to Kallio every weekday morning, with the parents then driving back to Vantaa's Heikinlaakso for work. Now, in addition, they drop the two older children off at the Taivallahti school in Helsinki's Töölö district, where the children are taught in Spanish for a few hours a week.
In the afternoon, they first pick up 11-year-old Dan and 8-year-old Maximilian from school, and later pick up 6-year-old Cecil from the day-care centre. All the driving amounts to over 100 kilometres each day.
"It is not a problem", Asplund assures. "Entrepreneurs can manage this."
The parents in the family had not studied Spanish before, but now they have learned a bit as well. The family has also vacationed twice in Cuba, to take advantage of the children's language skills.
Pernaja resident Marjo Vartiainen had received a Mi Casita brochure from a colleague, and decided to place her two children there. The family lived in Kerava at the time, but Kallio was along the way to work for the mother.
"Even from Pernaja, it only takes 45 minutes to drive here along the freeway."
She is very pleased with the language skills of her children, who are now both in school. "Spanish is easy to pronounce for Finns."
When son Hugo, then aged three, was asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, the answer was a matador, a bullfighter. Wiliina, who still goes to Mi Casita for a while in the afternoons, is now excited about the rhythms in Latin music.
Many of the children speak no Spanish when they first start at Mi Casita, but especially the more talkative children learn the language fast. "In four months, they begin to understand, and in six months, they are already quite fluent", explains Rayza Reguera.
Among themselves the children speak Finnish.
Lilian Snellman's daughter Rosalia started going to Mi Casita when she was slightly under two years old, and the next time Christmas came around, she sung all the Christmas songs in Spanish. "There is no need for any intensive teaching, children have the capacity to learn", observes Snellman, who teaches Spanish for a living herself.
It takes some effort to maintain the acquired language skills. At school, the children have only two extra hours of Spanish classes a week. In fact, Magalys Marin has already formed a group with six former day-care children who are now in school, and she teaches them Spanish for a couple of hours every Saturday.
FACTFILE: Nineteen foreign-language day-care centres
There are nineteen private, foreign-language day-care centres in Helsinki: eleven in English, two in French, two in Russian, one in German, one in Arabic, and one in Spanish.
In addition to Helsinki, there is a Spanish-language day-care centre in Espoo.
Full-day care at Mi Casita costs 500 euros per month for one child, and 430 euros per month for siblings. The Social Insurance Institution of Finland (KELA) assists private day-care expenses with 117.3 euros per month. Additional grants can be received depending on the municipality of residence, and the parents' income level.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 17.4.2003