Central London has long attracted a substantial French population. Going back as far as the period of the French Revolution, settling in London has served a purpose for the French, although today the reasons for coming to London are perhaps not the same as they might have been then! 

London, today, boasts a French population of over 300,000 from all walks of life, many of them families with children, and many Francophiles. Historically the French community has tended to gather around its Consulate and its main base of education, the Lycée Francais Charles de Gaulle, both in south Kensington. 

The French Lycée system is perhaps the best known national educational system that has created a worldwide network of high standing and with an international emphasis. The London Lycée was created in 1915 at the time of the First World War with 120 pupils and has been based in the Cromwell Road, opposite the Victoria and Albert Museum, since 1920. It has more recently established two annexes, Wix in Clapham and L’Ecole André Malraux in Ealing. A third is due to open this September (2008) near Parsons Green, Fulham. 

London, today, boasts a French population of over 300,000 from all walks of life ... 

The Lycée caters for children from nursery age up to school leaving age. All lessons up until the end of the primary section are given in French and follow the French curriculum. On entering the secondary section, children have a choice to continue with the French Baccalaureate, or to move into the English section to do GCSEs and A levels. This is a demanding transition, but it provides a great opportunity for children to become truly bilingual, which is one of the main attractions for an English family to send their children into the French system. Being a day school in London, its appeal tends to be to Londoners, and to families who like to have their children at home, as against sending them to boarding school. Of course this is a question of choice, but I do believe that the French system does encourage a pastoral education and a closer family unit than the English boarding school approach. 

The London Lycée has expanded greatly over the years, and now caters for around 3500 children. Demand for places is high, both from the French community and from English families, and as such it is harder today for families to enrol their children than it was a few years ago as space for the increased demand is limited to the confines of the existing buildings. Priority is given to French children and at present 76% of the children enrolled are French, 12% British and 12% of various other nationalities. Educational exam results from the Lycée in both its French and English sections regularly place it near the top of the tree in standards achieved. 

Although an integrated part of the French National Education system, controlled via L’AEFE (Agence pour l’Enseignement du Francais à l’Etranger) the International Lycées are fee paying, albeit at a rate subsidised by the French Government, which from a financial perspective makes the cost considerably less than an English fee paying private school. 

In more recent years there has been a trend to establish a number of smaller private French and French/English bilingual schools in London. Most of these schools cover the pre-primary group up until age six (école maternelle), whilst a few take their children through until the end of primary stage. These schools work closely with the French Education Authority, which inspects them annually, and they are also subject to OFSTED inspections. As a result of this close scrutiny from both systems the standard of education, care and facilities tends to be high. 
The first of these private schools to be established was L’Ecole des Petits, Fulham, in 1977 to which was later added L’Ecole de Battersea in 2005. At that time, the owner, who is still the Principal, was unable to find any such school to teach in on her arrival in London, so she set her own school up in a rented hall with just five children attending. This school has set the trend in providing a bilingual education based on the French curriculum at an early age for Londoners, be they French, English or of any other extraction. In recent years the Lycée annexe at Wix in Clapham has also established a small bilingual section in its school, which was feted at the time as the first example of a state school formally introducing bilingualism to its classes. 

L’Ecole des Petits was the first private school in the UK to be officially recognised by the AEFE as an Ecole Homologuée in 1995. This means that it was judged as providing an education that follows the National French Curriculum, being of a sufficiently high quality to be considered as Lycée standard, and of meeting all the inspection requirements of the AEFE.  There are now three other private schools in London that have achieved this status. The accreditation of being an Ecole Homologuée provides reassurance for English parents who wish to try out the French system in London. These schools are also given priority places at the Lycée Francais for their pupils moving onto primary at age six or onto secondary at age 11.  

The London Lycée has expanded greatly over the years, and now caters for around 3500 children. 

The educational philosophy of providing a bilingual environment from this early age (three years) has now been taken up by another of these London schools, and in the case of L’Ecole des Petits was prompted by the desire to allow children to benefit from being immersed in two cultures at an early age. At this stage of a child’s life, the mind is extremely receptive to new information, just like a sponge, and there is no doubt in my view that this approach helps to produce children who are full of confidence, who are receptive and understanding of other cultures, who are enquiring of mind, and who will be able throughout their lives to communicate clearly and fluently in more than one language. This aspect of providing a broad bilingual and bicultural start to the educational life of small children is something I feel worthy of encouragement, as well as for this to be continued after primary stage. It is not easy for a school to manage, but the benefits for the children are very apparent in my experience. In today’s international world this provides a great advantage to the children of Londoners attending such a school. 

These schools provide an education based primarily on the French curriculum and interspersed with aspects of the English curriculum on a daily basis. In other words they try to take the best of both systems to achieve a balanced bicultural education, with the result that children can follow either the French Baccalaureate, the International Baccalaureate or English GCSEs and A levels when they move on to their secondary stage, either at the French Lycée or at an English school. 

The Principal, L’Ecole des Petits & L’Ecole de Battersea