French Immersion Homeschooling

How I Taught my Kids French (In an English Family and English Community)/ Comment j’ai enseigné le français à mes enfants

(no links in this post are affiliate)

When I first started homeschooling, I wanted to teach my children French. Since I had been to France, studied French in university, had a master’s degree, and had my C1 level bilingual certificate, I figure I could do it, no problem.

But wow, it is not that easy! I speak the language but didn’t know how to teach it to my children. I know I am not alone in this, because Talk Box Mom discusses this same problem, and I’ve had friends who were bilingual and also struggled to transmit their native language to their children when the culture they live in is entirely Anglophone.

We live in an entirely English-speaking area (it’s true there are some Acadians here, but a) I don’t understand a word they are saying and b) none of them really interact with my children.) Church, friends, family, community….all English. So it fell almost entirely to me to teach my children French (thankfully, due to the Acadian influence, our library has a lot of French children’s books).

We are not perfect in French. Far from it. BUT, we have made vast improvements from when we started learning. When I first decided I need to be speaking in French frequently to my children, there was a lot of complaining and whining! They would get exasperated and demand I repeat myself in English. They would moan and groan when I wanted to read to them in French. When we started reading books in French I had to translate every single word! Now, when I speak to them in French, they almost always understand, even if they respond in English. When I read books to them, even chapter books and novels, I hardly need to translate anything!

It wasn’t easy. I did a lot of research into French teaching programs and there aren’t any that will make it quick and easy to become bilingual. Many programs will advertise themselves as such, but it simply isn’t true, and I never found a program that I felt was comprehensive enough. What you really need is consistency and tenacity. But I will also recommend a few resources that helped me (none of these links are affiliate).

Step 1: You need to start speaking to them in French (or whatever minority language you are trying to transmit). It may sound obvious, but in the busy rush of day-to-day life with children, it had simply slipped my mind until my oldest children started kindergarten. I implemented a daily French lesson as part of their homeschool, but it simply wasn’t enough. Half an hour a few times per week is not enough exposure.  

Start with simple daily commands and act it out with them. This is the François Gouin approach of linking language with actions, which helps cement it in your brain. I had a little book that was actually quite helpful called L’Enseignement par le mouvement by Nancy Marquez and my kids loved it! I would make them run all around the house and they thought it was too funny, especially when I shrieked at them to go to their room. I also used a book called TPR Storytelling by Todd McKay. I would act out stories with little toys, or scribbles on paper if I didn’t have an appropriate toy. After making the kids listen to the story several times I would change details in it to see if they were paying attention. Then I would start changing things outrageously, and the kids thought it was so fun that they would actually grab the props for me in order to start re-telling the story themselves, in French! Although I had a bad experience ordering from Sky Oaks Production (long story short, they charged my credit card twice and refused to refund me!), I have to admit that their books have been very helpful to me.

I also have the book Speaking French with Miss Mason, but didn’t actually use it. I had it on the shelf with the intention of using it, but then my children’s French level soared way beyond the level of the book. It also follows the Gouin method of memorizing and performing sequences of actions.

If it all sounds a bit overwhelming, just start small. Teach them commands for putting on their clothes and shoes, for putting things on the supper table, finding things outside, etc.

Step 2: Read, read, read. At first this step was hard because I wasn’t sure what books French children read. It turns out that my library has a fairly good French children’s section, so start there and browse (most every book suggested here we were able to get at our library). Simplified fairy tales are a good place to start. Don’t feel bad about translating everything at first. Eventually you won’t need to. Some good publishers of French children’s books are: éditions scholastic, Bayard Jeunesse, J’aime Lire by Bayard Poche, Folio Junior, Fleurus Enfants, Deux Coqs d’Or, Gallimard-Jeunesse, Milan Cadet and for the Catholics there is also Éditions du Triomphe, Pierre Téqui, and Éditions de l’Emmanuel.

Here are some suggestions for easy French books:

Mes petits livres et petites BD. There is also Je lis mes mots utiles, out of print now, but may be at your library.

Mes premiers contes by Fleurus are quite good as well. Some are on Amazon. One of the great things about reading classic fairy tales, is that there is almost always a video available on YouTube as well.

For older children, or children with a more advanced level, here are some recommendations:

Boukili is a free website where your child can practice reading short books, and then can listen to the audio, either sentence by sentence, or page by page. It’s really fun and my kids enjoy it.

Step 3: utilize the internet. We are a family that is normally quite restrictive about screens, but I am not a native French speaker and so I speak with an accent. Allowing my children to watch French cartoons exposes them to native speaker French and to words and phrases beyond what I use in our home. We started with Petit Ours Brun and Contes de fées. At the beginning, before the homeschooling became intense, I would actually prepare vocabulary to review with them before watching the videos. I don’t have time for that now, and my kids don’t need it anyways. They have long since graduated from Petit Ours Brun. Some other cartoons they have enjoyed are Les Malheurs de Sophie (a French classic), Spirit, Yakari, SamSam, Tom Tom et Nana, and Kid Lucky. We have also occasionally watched Disney movies in French. The great thing is that, since they aren’t normally allowed to watch TV, French cartoons are really special for them! They enjoy it and don’t even know they are learning *wink*. So don’t let your kids watch TV in English!!

Bayam also made a huge difference in my oldest children’s French level (they would go on it after the littles were in bed). Because my kids have never had video games or been allowed to play willy-nilly on screens, Bayam became a very special thing for them. If you decide to get Bayam and tell them that Leila Chandler sent you, we will both get a bonus. As it happens, we recently discovered that you can get even more content on Bayam if it thinks your computer is in France *wink* (je dis ça, je dis rien…)

Step 4: keep improving your own French, if you are not already perfectly bilingual or a native speaker. For a while I used Frantastique, but after a year I found it too easy. I then used Lingopie, which was pretty cool because you can watch French television with French subtitles, and you can click on the subtitles for a translation. I enjoyed watching Fais pas ci, fais pas ça because it is about family life and so had a lot of useful vocabulary and phrases (I’m on the second season right now and it is hilarious). Unfortunately, the translations given on Lingopie are often wrong or overly literal, but it’s ok for me since I am an advanced French speaker. Some other French television series I have enjoyed are Un village français (my all-time favourite, but not child-friendly), OPJ, Kaamelott, Paris enquêtes criminelles, Accusé, and La forêt (most of those are NOT on Lingopie). I am also interested in someday finally getting around to watching Engrenages, Lupin, and the new mini-series Germinale. There is another show about family life available on YouTube called Parents mode d’emploi.

There are also some podcasts I listen to when I go for a walk. I enjoy HugoDécrypte, Academia Christiana, Chroniques Criminelles, and Learning French by Accident. Hot Girls Only is good for learning slang, but it’s a bit vapid and very feminist.

Step 5: incorporate some music. I don’t think music is necessarily the best way to teach French, because it often uses poetic language and says things you wouldn’t necessarily say in your day-to-day life. However, there is some music out there specifically for learning French, such as Whistlefritz, which has really catchy tunes for learning everyday vocabulary. We have also really enjoyed song books by Henriette Major, which contain a lot of classic French folk songs, and they come with a CD, so you can learn the music and have a convenient book with the lyrics. For Christmas I have been enjoying the Christmas album by Marie-Michèle Desrosiers. She sings in a very clear way, so that you can actually hear the words quite clearly. The YouTube channel Comptines et Chansons also has a lot of great French children’s classics.

Some other tips: for listening to French audio in the car, I have discovered that Les malheurs de Sophie, le Petit Nicolas, et Anatole Latuile have audio versions. Petit Ours Brun has audio books too! We also found a podcast called Histoires Faciles which my children really liked because they said it was very easy to understand. We also like to listen to Radio Canada in the car (rather, I force them to listen to it). But you have to watch out because they frequently discuss things inappropriate for children and sometimes play songs with swearing in it. Sometimes at home I listen to France Inter, which is international French radio. They now have one just for kids called Mon petit France Inter. There is also RCF Radio which is a French Catholic radio station. Of course all of these can be listened to on your web browser.

Memorization can also be quite helpful. In Speaking French with Miss Mason, memorization is part of the program. I had good success with the catechism program Les trois blancheurs by the FSSP. Each chapter has a question and answer section to be memorized (I don’t bother with the cahiers d’exercices). We started the program last year when we were only doing about half French, before I decided on full French immersion. I give one chocolate chip for a semi-right answer, and two chocolate chips for a perfect answer. Everyone did the same catechism last year, which was #2, and it was just the perfect French level for my kids. If you are not Catholic, another idea is to do mini pièces de théâtre. My kids loved that and it forced them to have to memorize their lines.

As for actual French as a foreign language curricula, I don’t have many good suggestions. Most of the programs I looked at did not have nearly enough comprehensible input, and many of them are just about memorizing lists of words. I have never used Talk Box Mom, because it is quite expensive, but from what I have seen of it, it looks like the best way to get started because it focuses on using useful sentences right from the start. It also comes with an app that has native speaker audio, and it emphasizes repetition.

Lastly, I will say to persevere and don’t focus on perfection. The other day I was reading a book about French immersion schools in Canada, and the authors said that we must forget the idea of becoming “perfect” in French, and instead focus on learning different skills, which the students can build on in the future. Even if your French is not perfect, any foundation you can give your kids to build on will be helpful to them. I used to get anxious quite a bit that I was wasting my time in trying to teach my children French, because my own French is not 100% PERFECT (I do have an anxiety disorder). Guess what? Even French people don’t speak 100% perfect Académie française French, and there are dozens of different types of accents. I can also assure you that French immersion public schools do not teach perfect French (I actually find their accent kind of strange, and they use a lot of anglicisms). You can give your kids something that many French immersion students don’t have, which is French speaking at home and out on the town, not confined to the four walls of the classroom. Don’t worry if you’ve only just started and your children don’t speak French right away. The need a large amount of audio input before they begin trying to speak it.

Finally, if you decide to do French immersion homeschooling, don’t fear! Teaching to read and write in French is actually not too hard, because the level of language is quite formal and follows basic rules. I find it easier to teach school in French than to use French in an informal, every day casual kind of way.