In my previous entry about learning Mandarin, I mentioned that Smart Little Beans Reading Center is not so “smart”. Reader Kathleen asked to share the story about Smart Little Beans and this is what I replied to her comment:

I feel that Smart Little Beans (SLB) is a bit too “academic” for my son’s liking. Little J is 5+ and he has short attention span. He learns faster through fun and play. SLB’s concept incorporate a lot of readings and no play and lots of words actually put him off. The concept may work on certain child but not my Little J.

And also 3 languages at one time does not work for him either. Our main focus is Mandarin because he is relatively good in BM and English. In SLB, the teacher who teaches Mandarin and BM tends to explain and communicate with him in English, as such he is not picking up much Mandarin compare to Bao Bei where Mandarin is strictly used. The teacher actually says that because he speaks English at home, therefore it will be easier for him to understand if she explains in English. That defeats our purpose of sending him to the center to learn Mandarin.

Oh yes, do be aware that if you choose to send your child to Smart Little Beans, your deposit which they collected from you is NOT refundable. I was not informed of their refund policy until I told them that Little J will stop end of this month. They said that it was mentioned in the terms and condition which I signed upon registration and Little J has to stay till end of August. My point is if we have no confidence in their programmes, why should we waste another one month in the center?

Till now, I am still baffled as to why the center needs a child to give one month notice to stop lesson. Common understanding of the purpose of deposit is in case parents do not pay up the fee for a particular month, then the deposit will be forfeited. I was wondering if the center needs the one month notice to get a replacement student.. strange policy! Lesson learnt, signing without reading what I signed, I am actually signing my life away, haha.. luckily it is only a RM300 deposit and not my life!