French language-related stuff - Page 4

someone123 · #61 Posted **Mar 9, 2013, 7:08 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hali87

I'd kind of hoped that the Ravines might develop along these lines (since they have the two Francophone schools) but the opportunity is probably long gone by now.

Like I said, I'd be interested to see what it's like now. My experience was that the French schools in Halifax seemed insular -- as if they were built as entitlements for one specific local group. I think this a completely wrongheaded approach to preserving French in the Maritimes. One of the better things you can do for French in Canada is to encourage its use in places like Halifax (or Ottawa etc.) where people are actually receptive to the idea of learning it. If everybody in the city hated French, places like the Acadian shore would likely be much worse off.

One of the worries was that English-speaking kids would flood the system, diluting the level of French of students and in turn creating pressure to water down the curriculum. I don't think this is a very real concern as long as kids are started as early as possible.

RyeJay · #62 Posted **Mar 9, 2013, 10:35 AM**

Any attempt to preserve and expand French in Atlantic Canada (yes, Newfoundland and Labrador: I'm taking note of your francophone population as well) would require multiple approaches, even though I've found people focus on French schools from the get-go. French schools are only good for protecting the language for francophones. I want to expand the language in anglophone populations.

The most immediate, most effective (I believe) approach would be to simply expand French classes as mandatory for high school graduation. Students dropping out of the subject upon grade 9 is a wasted investment.

Anglophones are required to obtain grade 12 English. The same should be required for French. Is grade 4 waiting too long to begin French instruction?

Outside of the scholastic environment, museums and festivals are an opportunity to include French. Business owners and operaters may be encouraged to carry bilingual signs. Public spaces may also comply with this. The more French Haligonians see, the more inclusive it will eventually become.

Given how academically inclined people in Halifax tend to be, I suspect they would welcome this, as it's enabling the city to express itself as a multi-lingual, regional capital embracing both of the country's official languages.

Acajack · #63 Posted **Mar 9, 2013, 11:52 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by someone123

Like I said, I'd be interested to see what it's like now. My experience was that the French schools in Halifax seemed insular -- as if they were built as entitlements for one specific local group. I think this a completely wrongheaded approach to preserving French in the Maritimes. One of the better things you can do for French in Canada is to encourage its use in places like Halifax (or Ottawa etc.) where people are actually receptive to the idea of learning it. If everybody in the city hated French, places like the Acadian shore would likely be much worse off.

One of the worries was that English-speaking kids would flood the system, diluting the level of French of students and in turn creating pressure to water down the curriculum. I don't think this is a very real concern as long as kids are started as early as possible.

The general view among francophone minority communities in Canada is that having wide (or even wider) access to French first schools may offer better French instruction to anglos than immersion does, but on the other hand greatly weakens the French of native francophones and even hastens their assimilation.

Even those anglo kids who start in French first school very young do tend to speak English in the schoolyard and the hallways for most of their schooling. Kids who have one anglo and one franco parent also often do this. When these two groups tend to make up a large chunk of your student population they then draw the kids with two francophone parents towards English as well and the result is that everyone is speaking in English all the time except for in the classroom.

Of course, many schools have reacted to this by imposing a punishable ban on kids speaking anything other than French on school property. You sometimes hear parents complaining about this alleged infringement on their kids' rights, but they never get very far.

On a personal note, I went to French first schools outside Quebec for quite a few years. I would add to the discussion that I can't recall any of the truly anglo kids who went to school with us naturally speaking in French with their friends during the free time at school. Almost all of them learned decent French it is true, but they reverted back to English only every chance they got outside the classroom.

Acajack · #64 Posted **Mar 9, 2013, 11:55 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by RyeJay

Any attempt to preserve and expand French in Atlantic Canada (yes, Newfoundland and Labrador: I'm taking note of your francophone population as well) would require multiple approaches, even though I've found people focus on French schools from the get-go. French schools are only good for protecting the language for francophones. I want to expand the language in anglophone populations.

.

I think you are probably right. French first schools are already pretty weak in most of the region (outside of NE and NW and some parts of SE NB) and any further weakening of them would jeopardize the already fragile future of native francophone communities.

There need to be solutions to boost French among anglos that do not weaken francophone communities.

someone123 · #65 Posted **Mar 9, 2013, 6:54 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Acajack

On a personal note, I went to French first schools outside Quebec for quite a few years. I would add to the discussion that I can't recall any of the truly anglo kids who went to school with us naturally speaking in French with their friends during the free time at school. Almost all of them learned decent French it is true, but they reverted back to English only every chance they got outside the classroom.

I've seen this go different ways depending on the involvement of the parents. Some Anglo parents definitely see French immersion as a kind of freebie private school that costs nothing but has better students. Other parents are very invested in the idea of their kids learning French (more frequently this is when there is at least 1 Francophone parent). I have seen kids in Vancouver with one Anglophone and one Francophone parent who preferred to speak French in social settings. The parents were actually worried the kids weren't learning enough English -- they were still at the age where their whole life was pretty much their parents and school. Maybe that changes with teenagers.

Another useful thing seems to be programs like Katimavik. I know a few people from BC who did trips to Quebec. Personally, I think Canada could stand to see a lot more of this. Many Canadians are extremely ignorant of other parts of their country (even though they often think they have it all figured out).

Acajack · #66 Posted **Mar 10, 2013, 3:45 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by someone123

I've seen this go different ways depending on the involvement of the parents. Some Anglo parents definitely see French immersion as a kind of freebie private school that costs nothing but has better students. Other parents are very invested in the idea of their kids learning French (more frequently this is when there is at least 1 Francophone parent). I have seen kids in Vancouver with one Anglophone and one Francophone parent who preferred to speak French in social settings. The parents were actually worried the kids weren't learning enough English -- they were still at the age where their whole life was pretty much their parents and school. Maybe that changes with teenagers.

Another useful thing seems to be programs like Katimavik. I know a few people from BC who did trips to Quebec. Personally, I think Canada could stand to see a lot more of this. Many Canadians are extremely ignorant of other parts of their country (even though they often think they have it all figured out).

Unfortunately, producing graduates who speak, read and especially write decent French is an extremely difficult challenge for French first schools outside Quebec (outside of a handful of regions). The presence of kids who display no interest in speaking ir (regardless of whether they have a francophone parent or parents or not - they can be equally bad) only makes things more difficult.

I agree with you that there are many anglophone parents who are of good faith and are fully on board for the goals of French immersion but as for the French first schools their focus should be on solidifying and expanding the native francophone community, and not be super-immersion schools for non-francophone kids whose parents think immersion isn't good enough and that you don't get the right accent from immersion.

someone123 · #67 Posted **Mar 10, 2013, 7:39 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Acajack

I agree with you that there are many anglophone parents who are of good faith and are fully on board for the goals of French immersion but as for the French first schools their focus should be on solidifying and expanding the native francophone community, and not be super-immersion schools for non-francophone kids whose parents think immersion isn't good enough and that you don't get the right accent from immersion.

Part of the trade-off is that by admitting more students you can have a better school system. My guess is that the larger number of better students would also have a positive effect over the long run.

In Halifax there are about 14,000 Francophones. Only a fraction of those are school-aged children. Apparently that's enough for 2 secondary schools and 2 primary schools though (probably with some serious subsidies compared to English schools -- this is the kind of thing that requires some goodwill from the general population), so that's not so bad. When I was in school the options were more limited and the bus rides were potentially really long.

Acajack · #68 Posted **Mar 10, 2013, 12:12 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by someone123

Part of the trade-off is that by admitting more students you can have a better school system. My guess is that the larger number of better students would also have a positive effect over the long run.

In Halifax there are about 14,000 Francophones. Only a fraction of those are school-aged children. Apparently that's enough for 2 secondary schools and 2 primary schools though (probably with some serious subsidies compared to English schools -- this is the kind of thing that requires some goodwill from the general population), so that's not so bad. When I was in school the options were more limited and the bus rides were potentially really long.

Francophone communities that are very small are in a bit of a catch-22 when it comes to their schools. In many areas the doors are wider open for the reasons you cited above: strengthening the system through enrolment numbers, regardless of proficiency and sometimes even interest in French.

In places like Ottawa and Eastern Ontario where they have higher demographics the general practice is to keep out kids who don't already have at least a basic knowledge of French.

RyeJay · #69 Posted **Mar 10, 2013, 9:14 PM**

The Protection and Expansion of French in Nova Scotia:

1. Francophone schools, for francophone students only, with no English being permitted on school grounds outside of English classes.

2. Anglophone schools shall commence French class as early as grade Primary -- no later than grade 4 -- which shall followthrough to the end of grade 12.

*Some studies show that learning a second language has the potential for causing confusion in a young child's grasp of their first language in terms of the differences in grammar and sentence structure. For this reason, initial second language instruction would be limited to word-to-word translation, with grammar and sentence structure lessons beginning very gradually in grade 2.

*Both francophone and anglophone schools may offer language classes at varying strengths (i.e.: Basic/Academic, Advanced, and Immersion); however, I don't see this as affordable since, at least in anglophone schools in Nova Scotia, French classes exist beginning in grade 4 with a significant number of students dropping out in grade 9. Expanding French instruction throughout all of grade school may imply the reduction of language tiers to a single Basic/Academic level for all students. For learning languages, a long-term moderate duration of instruction is more effective than high intensity in the short-term, so the elimination of French Immersion and/or Advanced level classes would be acceptable.

*History classes throughout grade school should also stress the amount of time 'the English' and 'the French' have associated, not merely just within the time frame of Canada, but during instances going back through the Dark Ages. The two languages have evolved with each other for many centuries, even before the New World had been discovered. Canada is a remarkable example of these two blood rivals working together to form a nation. Anglophone students need to see the reasons behind learning French other than the typical reasons that French is one of Canada's official languages and learning French will help you get a job. French is a major part of the English language, and learning it will bring more versatility to how anglophones utilise their speech.

3. Areas of society in which television broadcasts are displayed (department stores, restaurants, food courts in malls, libraries, airports, etc...) would be asked to display French subtitles concurrently with the English subtitles.

4. Bilingual signage.

5. Incentives to encourage French services in local businesses.

6. The promotion of Acadian/francophone festivals in Halifax.

Coming from New Brunswick, Canada's only officially bilingual province, I can say with certainty that this province is conducting its bilingualism horribly, for the main reason of not addressing the French language in anglophone populations. New Brunswick's public school system is similar to Nova Scotia's: Anglophones may drop out of French upon the beginning of high school. This has resulted in large pockets of anglophones that do not speak French, as well as a rather vocal minority of anglophones that are bigoted toward francophones. The Acadians and Brayons often are scapegoats for unilingual anglophones who cannot find jobs.

The expansion of French in Nova Scotia will be unsuccessful until we address the abilities of anglophones to speak it.

Acajack · #70 Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 1:57 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by RyeJay

The Protection and Expansion of French in Nova Scotia:

1. Francophone schools, for francophone students only, with no English being permitted on school grounds outside of English classes.

2. Anglophone schools shall commence French class as early as grade Primary -- no later than grade 4 -- which shall followthrough to the end of grade 12.

.

Seems quite sensible to me.

worldlyhaligonian · #71 Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 6:01 PM**

You guys talk about the various groups as if there is not grey area, like they are literally different races.

I guess I'm a mutt... but all this concern about protecting and assimiliation is passe in my opinion.

Please, go to France and see what the culture is now. Aside from language, a significant portion of the populous is walking around in US brands, listening to US music and worshipping US culture.

I'm not making this up. Many of you seem very stuck in your Canadian outlook... hence my avatar.

worldlyhaligonian · #72 Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 6:04 PM**

Spanish would be a valuable option if students were required to take another language (and did not choose French) for Canadian high schools. It is much more useful in terms of number of speakers.

I don't know why they ever offered german.

RyeJay · #73 Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 6:39 PM**

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