Metaphor Russian Language School

Great School! We attended several concert programs and it was awesome. Kids performed beautiful, thank you to all the teachers who put their efforts. Looking forward for next one.
Also, when I enrolled my kids in the school, they couldn’t speak Russian, but with very friendly staff and interacting with Russian children made the difference. Now they speak very good Russian. I like to see the progress in my kids. Thank you. Definitely will recommend that school to all the parents, come and try.

Metaphor
If you are looking for a Russian community in which to educate and develop your child, Metaphor is one of the few choices available
in Fairfax county and as such, it is recommended.
Things I did not like. Concerts.
Metaphor has an older performance group, and likes to push concerts. It basically uses its daycare/​school and other programs as a recruiting basis for its performance group. So, in a calendar year expect your child to perform in about 8 concerts (more if five or six years old). Concerts are held on Fridays at noon. And since your child will be expecting you to go to these concerts, try to schedule 8 Fridays off a year so you can attend (my office hated me). Next, Metaphor does not believe in equal opportunity. In each class they pick whomever they believe is the best speaker/​performer and give them 80% of the recital, while the other children are left to remember one line. For three years, I saw the same children in all of their classes do 80% of the performance 8 times a year, while the other 7 children in each class always got their one line to recite.
They seem very concerned about what your child eats. They record what they eat at every snack time and meal. Our child was a picky eater and did not like most of their food. So daily we got a report about what she did not eat. And Even though I told them to leave my child alone and let her eat what she wanted. I got repeated reports from my child that they would threaten her with nap time if she did not eat her lunch. My child was ⁵⁄₆ at the time and had long since quit napping.
At age 5 my child was forced to take a nap that she did not want. (some kids napped while others did not) When my child who did not want this nap was not quiet in the nap room, They threatened her again, if you were not quiet they would make you wear a diaper in front of the other children.
Every day I sent my child to Metaphor clean. Almost every day she came home dirty. Most particularly, she had dirty socks and feet and fingernails. I was always finding dirt/​grass and mulch from the playground on the inside of her socks. Meaning, she was taking her shoes and socks of daily while
outside.
Metaphor also has an after school program for older kids. My daughter always referred to the older kids as the English speakers since they almost never spoke Russian.
Summers are a little crowded at Metaphor. Last summer they went from around 80 students in May to 130 in June. My daughter used to complain because she wished she could watch cartoons like the big kids did.

The head of the school is the biggest liar. When first time we visited them she lied to us about 3 children from her kindergarten class went to advance classes. We found out later, classes like that do not exist in elementary school. The logoped in school is very horrible and unprofessional. All she does is scans a page and sends it home for 30 dollars a class. So you are stuck up with doing logoped exercises by yourself and not knowing if you are doing it right. After 1.5 years with Metaphor’s Logoped, we had to go to another Logoped. They are incapable to teach children how to speak or read. Since age 4 they teach one letter of the alphabet a week, without telling them how to read syllables. After a year, they still can’t read even syllables. And from age 5 to 6 they repeat the same alphabet making it last the whole year. So in the end your child will not learn to read and speak in Russian unless you teach them yourself at home. They keep giving homework and forcing to do that. This homework is a hodge podge of print outs from many different books that doesn’t make sense (no clear teaching path).
Once we got a phone call telling us to pick up our child because they found lice. We were told
to keep our child home for three days of lice shampoo treatment before sending her back to school. I asked who did this check. The head of the school told us she had a nurse coming every morning to check for lice. Thirty minutes later, we drove to school and found a queue of 20 children being inspected for lice by one of their teachers. We asked where the nurse was.
They told us they never had any nurse, they were checking by themselves. So, we went immediately to INOVA Hospital and had a doctor examine our child. The doctor wrote a note
indicating that our child had dandruff, but no lice and could come back to school. We came back 30 minutes later with the paper from the doctor. I asked the teacher who was doing the inspections to stop sending my child home because she has dandruff and no lice. She got hysterical without apologizing and another teacher took me in a different room and said. It wasn’t just one teacher who checked my child, a second had checked her to and they were both certified to find lice (no such certificate exists). She said she did not care about the doctors note and that we must lice treatment. She was very rude and impolite when I mentioned they are not medical experts and are not allowed to force children to have treatment prescribed by them. She told us she would send the child home again if she thought she saw lice again. And any doctors notice is not important to her. When We came home we had a phone call from Inova Hospital telling us that Metaphor had questioned them several times and asked if they knew how to diagnose lice (the hospital was very annoyed at this). After this incident, Metphor started checking all the children for lice three times a day. Some children were sent home twice, after Metaphor found lice a second time, even after treatment. Meanwhile none of the children had any symptoms of lice. It is quite probable that up to 10 healthy children were sent home and forced to treat dandruff with very toxic lice shampoo.
One day we were called to pick up our child from school because a cut to the head that ended up requiring 5 Stitches. By the time we came to pick up our child, her teacher had already left for home (2pm). No one had any explanation for the injury. Though, the head of the school suggested that it was minor and that we need not go to the doctor (we needed 5 stitches).
They scare children into eating their food. When our child did not eat, she threatened with taking a nap that she did not want or need. We asked them specifically not to do this. yet they continued.
Children are not watched very closely outside. So they end up taking the shoes and socks off outside and coming home extremely dirty.
Without outside help, after attending Metaphor, your child will speak Russian very badly and have a very bad American accent.
I had big relief after quitting this school and wish I had done so earlier.

Metaphor is the most amazing preschool that we have encountered. Our daughter has thrived in it immensely for the past 3 years. She came in knowing barely any Russian or English, and has fully thrived in her linguistic and other development. We are leaving the area and were hoping to send our son there as well. It really is the most amazing educational Russian immersion program for young children. Zhanna and the teachers are simply amazing. more like family. Our daughter has gotten very close to her teachers, and it saddens us that we can’t take them with us. Anyone would be lucky to be part of the Metaphor community.

My son is in his 3^rd year going to Metaphor and we are so pleased. We visited 8 schools before picking this school and we are very grateful that we did.
Pros:
(1) Russian full immersion: There are even parents from non-​Russian speaking homes that enroll their children here, because they want their children to learn a foreign language. It’s also perfect for families where 1 parent only speaks Russian— it gives the child that extra exposure to become fluent.
(2) Flexible schedule and pricing: Flexible drop off and pick up times and different pricing and programs offered. You can drop off 8am or 9am, and pick up at 1pm, 3pm, 4pm, or 6pm. Each is at a different rate and compared to other schools of this quality, the price is fair. Even though you have your standard drop off and pick up times, I’m just an email away on my iphone from requesting that I drop off early or pick up late (for a small hourly rate). They also have a summer program, a Saturday program, winter break camps, and for kids that are already in public schools, they can go back to Metaphor on e.g. teacher’s work days just for the day. One of my son’s friends who is now in public school kindergarten goes to Metaphor;s Saturday school as well as any days when FCPS is closed and her parents have to go to work.
(3) The WOW factor: This school has demonstrated the WOW factor on a number of different occasions. A good example is when my son just turned 5 and for his birthday, we dropped of a small homemade cake (nut free, dairy free) and a candle. While at work, my husband and I got an email with high resolution photos of a birthday party the school had thrown for my son– complete with party hats, multiple games, group photos, and of course the cake. When I picked him up, his folder had a present and a handwritten personalized card from the teacher. Another example is when they were preparing their quarterly school play and my son was in a skit called «Who I want to be when I grow up.» The skit was pre-​written, and they assigned him the role of a firefighter and he told the teacher that he didn’t want to be a firefighter and that he wants to be an astronaut. The teachers rewrote the entire skit to make him as astronaut, and made custom props and music to go with the change– it was a big hit and my son was so proud and happy. These are just two examples of how they go above and beyond.
(4) Relationships: His teachers care about him– he isn’t a headcount. They provide abundant feedback and they go out of their way to communicate with parents, not just on the daily report sheet but also face to face. If my son has a conflict with another child, they inform us about it and we all work together to resolve… it’s not brushed under the rug. Very professional.
I feel that my son is really being nurtured in this school intellectually, physically and emotionally. We are very happy parents and recommend this school to anybody looking for this type of school.

This school really tries to be a good alternative to local Montessori schools, but it really lacks simple respect and appreciation of the kids. Very Soviet style approach of teaching, old facilities, always hot and stuffy and food is terrible. Teachers are fakely polite and if you raise a concern they become very snappy. Instead of understanding parents’ needs the attitude in this school is that you are WRONG for being concerned or raising issues and we will prove it to you. The only good thing about the school is that its program is fully immersed in Russian.

Love how my son learns a lot and the staff is friendly. Creative atmosphere! I love the small class sizes and the individual attention each child gets. The curriculum is impressive and rigorous. Each week has a specific theme: Transportation, Clothing, Nature, Vegetables, etc. Sometimes we get some homework and my son gets excited to do it. The best thing is that my son has so much friends, and as soon as I wake him up and tell him he is going to school he gets so happy and excited. It makes me happy! Love how he loves his school and how he is learning!

When we were considering this school for our then 2.5 year-​old son, we were concerned because we couldn’t find any reviews for Metaphor. We ultimately signed up and were actually very happy with the school! Within just the first month, our son has picked up so much Russian.
This is an excellent school because it offers:
— Great teachers
— Spacious venues and an outdoor playground
— Four meals/​snacks a day
— A separate quite room for nap time
— Professional preschool program
— Russian language proficiency
— Regular concerts to develop a child’s public speaking skills
We were also concerned about our son’s transition to the preschool, but the teachers and the school director made it very smooth. Within a week and a half, our son was no longer crying when we left him at the school in the mornings, instead he was waving good bye hands with a smile. :)
Highly recommended!