French Immersion

BC Curriculum Goals and Rationale

Français langue seconde - immersion. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/curriculum/fral/core/goals-and-rationale

Rationale

Language is a communication and learning tool through which students create their identity and shape their perception of reality. Language influences how students think, reflect, and reason. Acquiring a new language helps students to develop intellectual tools, enabling them to face reality and the unknown, and to gain a different perspective of the world.

British Columbia’s French Immersion Language Arts (FILA) curriculum is at the core of the immersion program. Its objective is to place students in learning situations in a Francophone context. Through these situations, students acquire the competencies, knowledge, and strategies needed to effectively and confidently communicate and interact in French. Students are guided to develop their French-language competencies and discover the richness and diversity of Francophone cultures and French-language writings. Throughout the program, students follow a continuous-progress approach, a continuum that enables them to benefit from the learning acquired in previous years.

The cultural dimension plays an important role in learning because it offers students the opportunity to explore and better understand the realities of their culture and those of the French-speaking world. By interpreting and analyzing French-language text of different genres written by Francophones in British Columbia, the rest of Canada and the world, students practice critical thinking and reflect on how language and culture influence personal perceptions and values. By self-identifying as students in a bilingual learning environment, they become aware of how acquiring a new language helps to develop their Canadian identity and contributes to their personal and social development.

The First Peoples Principles of Learning and perspectives are embedded in the French Immersion Language Arts curriculum, recognizing that learning is a holistic process of self-discovery by students. Integrating these principles encourages students to understand and respect the traditional cultures and values of First Peoples, as well as the role that community plays in learning and personal development.

This curriculum seeks to awaken the curiosity of students by encouraging them to look critically at the world around them. It is designed to enable students to use the French language as a cognitive development tool to build their knowledge through observation, exploration, inquiry, and the integration of newly acquired knowledge about the world. French Immersion Language Arts is a core program that provides students with the language and literacy competencies they will need to succeed at school, in the community, and in their personal and work life.

Goals

The French Immersion Language Arts (FILA) curriculum aims to ensure that students are able to:

  • communicate effectively and independently, both orally and in writing

  • develop linguistic competencies through observation, inquiry, critical and creative thinking, and problem solving

  • understand and appreciate a variety of French-language texts that reflect Francophone and First Peoples perspectives

  • understand and appreciate Francophone cultures as well as their own culture and those of others

  • acquire an openness toward interculturality, by belonging to a minority community in a multicultural context

  • deepen their knowledge of themselves and others in a changing world

  • forge their identity as Francophiles and integrate French into their personal and work life


SKSS BREAKDOWN OF COURSES

GRADE 8

Beginning in grade 8, student will have 50 % of their classes taught in French. Currently, the courses offered include in French:

  • Français Langue 8

  • Sciences Humaines 8

  • Sciences 8

  • Mathématiques 8


GRADE 9

Beginning in grade 9, student will have 50 % of their classes taught in French. Currently, the courses offered include in French:

  • Français Langue 9

  • Sciences Humaines 9

  • Sciences 9

  • Mathématiques 9


GRADE 10

In Grade 10, the French classes offered are:

  • Français Langue 10

  • Sciences Humaines 10

  • Sciences 10

GRADE 11

Beginning in grade 11, the amount instruction in French is reduced to a minimum of 25% and includes the following academic courses .​​​

GRADE 12

By grade 12, Français Langue 12 gives French Immersion students the opportunity to maintain their French proficiency in their final year of school while enabling them to pursue a variety of specialized courses to meet post-secondary requirements.