Les Petits Anglophones

November 3, 2010

Dear Parents,

I am happy to introduce myself as your child’s French teacher for the “Petits
Anglophones” class in Alameda.

I have had a long love affair with French language and culture beginning when I was 13 and I was an exchange student in England. My host family took me for a 24-hour trip to Cherbourg where all I can remember is spending most of the day in a huge two-storied grocery store and loving every minute of it. That was when I decided I would someday be a French speaker. My childhood dream was to be the ambassador to France until my 9th grade French teacher told me that was highly unlikely. I did however get to be a sort of an ambassador, living cross-culturally in France for several years while my husband did his graduate studies in Paris. I quickly picked up the language and found I had a natural affinity for it. I decided to go to graduate school myself, studying the teaching of French as a Foreign Language at L’Institut Catholique de Paris (the Catholic University of Paris).

We returned home to our native Bay Area in 2001 and I have been teaching French to children in the East Bay ever since, except for the past year when we lived in France once again and I taught English to young French children. We are happy to be back in California and I am thrilled to be teaching in Alameda with EFBA.

My teaching style follows the “natural approach” which is the belief that children (and adults!) can learn a second language much in the same way they leaned their first language. That is by repetitions, repetitions and repetitions in a comprehensible setting. What this means for our class is that we will sing and play and make up stories all in French and in a way that the children will understand and enjoy doing. They will understand first, and begin speaking later, just like a baby does when learning to talk.

My goal for our class is that each day each student will have fun, feel safe, play and learn, ultimately building a foundation for a lifelong love of language and culture.

I look forward to getting to know you and your child. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you would like to.

A bientôt!

Madame Kristy
kparsonsmcclain@gmail.com