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French immersion is a form of bilingual education in which students who do not speak
French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
as a first language will receive instruction in French. In most French-immersion schools, students will learn to speak French and learn most subjects such as history, music, geography, math, art, physical education and science in French. This type of education, in which most of the students are from the majority language community but are voluntarily immersed in the
minority language A minority language is a language spoken by a minority of the population of a territory. Such people are termed linguistic minorities or language minorities. With a total number of 196 sovereign states recognized internationally (as of 2019) ...
is atypical of most language learning around the world, and was developed in Canada as a result of political and social changes in the 1960s (notably the '' Official Languages Act, 1969'' which led many
Anglophones Speakers of English are also known as Anglophones, and the countries where English is natively spoken by the majority of the population are termed the ''Anglosphere''. Over two billion people speak English , making English the largest language ...
(primarily urban or suburban and
middle class The middle class refers to a class of people in the middle of a social hierarchy, often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status. The term has historically been associated with modernity, capitalism and political debate. C ...
) to put their children in to French programs to ensure they could succeed in the increasing number of jobs in the
federal government A federation (also known as a federal state) is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a central federal government ( federalism). In a federation, the self-gover ...
and private sector that required personal bilingualism. Most school boards in Canada offer French immersion starting in
grade one Grade 1 may refer to: *First grade, the first school year of primary education. *A Grade 1 Graded stakes race horse race * ''Grade One'' (TV series), a 2014 Chinese TV variety show *Grade 1 listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed b ...
and others start as early as kindergarten. At the primary level, students may receive instructions in French at or near a hundred percent of their instructional day, called "total immersion", or some smaller part of the day ("partial immersion"). In the case of total immersion, English instruction is introduced in perhaps grade three (
Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest T ...
) or grade four (
Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
), and the minutes of English instruction will increase throughout their educational career with up to fifty percent of English/French instruction daily. As of 2020, 46% of all Canadian students (excluding Quebec) were enrolled in a French immersion (12%) or core French (34%) program. As of 2021, 483,000 students were enrolled in French immersion programs only in public elementary and secondary schools in Canada outside Quebec and Nunavut.


Background


Canadian context

In many countries around the world, students are educated in two or more languages: often all students learn at least one foreign language, perhaps the language of a former colonizer (e.g. French in West Africa, English in South Asia, etc.); commonly minorities learn the majority language, often this is required by law or is simply thought of as an economic necessity; and occasionally two or more language communities in the same country learn each others' languages. The Canadian model differs from most countries in that it is a wealthy and politically influential sub-set of the majority language community that has voluntarily decided to demand that local governments offer their children an intensive immersion in the language of a minority. This would have been unthinkable before the constitutional and societal consequences of the Quiet Revolution (circa 1960s) in Quebec, and the passage of the '' Official Languages Act, 1969'' by the federal parliament and the ''Official Language Act'' (Bill 22) in Quebec in 1974, which together mandated that tens of thousands of jobs in government and industry including high-paying professional and managerial work now required French. The idea of using immersion as a language-learning tool is not a new one globally. However, it needed influential English-Canadian champions who were able to convince others both that French was worth learning and that immersion was the correct method before it spread in Canada. The
University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a public research university in London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by residential neighbourhoods and the Thames R ...
began offering a language home-stay program for young adults in
Trois-Pistoles Trois-Pistoles is a city in Les Basques Regional County Municipality in the Bas-Saint-Laurent region of Quebec, Canada. It is also the county seat. The town is located on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River. A ferry crosses the river ...
1933, for example, because of the advocacy of Western's president, Dr. William Sherwood Fox, who had learned French by traveling in Quebec in 1900. The "founding mothers" of early (elementary school) French immersion in Canada are generally cited as Olga Melikoff, Valerie Neale, and Murielle Parkes from Saint-Lambert, Quebec, three English-speaking housewives who wanted to see their children learn French to a higher standard than was usually achieved in the English schools in Quebec at the time. Unable to convince the school authorities, they hired a teacher and ran their own kindergarten on the principals of early immersion. The promising results of the experiment in Saint-Lambert were studied and endorsed by researchers at
McGill University McGill University (french: link=no, Université McGill) is an English-language public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter granted by King George IV,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill Univer ...
, Wallace E. Lambert and Wilder Penfield. After this endorsement, the school board adopted the program and it was quickly copied by other boards across Canada. As the number of French immersion schools grew, larger academic studies showed the students had very good, though not native-level French, and had no major delay in English. The founding of the advocacy group Canadian Parents for French in 1977 represented the mainstreaming of the program across Canada.


Design of the earliest school programs

French immersion in the Canadian context differs markedly from other language programs aimed at teaching minorities the language of the majority (sometimes called "submersion" instead of immersion by critics). Researcher Marjorie Bingham Wesche offers the following contextual characteristics of the original Canadian model: # Learners were majority language speakers, and there was no sense of "threat" against the status of English in their home communities. # Learners were all in the "same boat" all learning French as true beginners, so teachers adjusted to their level (i.e. used
Comprehensible Input The input hypothesis, also known as the monitor model, is a group of five hypotheses of second-language acquisition developed by the linguist Stephen Krashen in the 1970s and 1980s. Krashen originally formulated the input hypothesis as just on ...
) # The program was optional, and learners were thus "volunteers" whose parents enthusiastically encouraged their learning. # Both languages were valued by parents, the immediate community, and the larger society. # The two languages were related, and have many cognates and loanwords. # School funding and decision making was under local political control, so the parents could pressure the board to take up their ideas. # Native speaker teachers of the immersion language were widely available and were willing to teach to children from the other language community. # Source material was easily accessible. French-medium textbooks and other materials were already available in Canada in a way that would have been very different for any other target language. Besides these contextual factors, the program's design also had a few key features: # The earliest possible school starting age (
Kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cen ...
or Grade 1, aged four to six years). # Intensive L2 exposure over an extended period. # Use of the L2 to teach the entire school curriculum. Many variations have emerged since the earlier programs were designed, however the original model (now called "early immersion") has produced good results and is still one of the most popular in Canada.


Typical features

French immersion education remains optional and not compulsory; parents have the choice of sending their children to schools that offer such programming. Students are encouraged to begin communicating in French as consistently as possible. Teachers in French immersion schools are competent in speaking French, either having acquired specific French as a Second Language qualifications or already being fluent in French and having a
teaching certification A certified teacher is an educator who has earned credentials from an authoritative source, such as the government, a higher education institution or a private body or source. This teacher qualification gives a teacher authorization to teach and ...
. Classroom communication of French in French immersion programs is meaningful and authentic for students. Learning French becomes subconscious and there is a strong focus on understanding before speaking. Most students that enrol in French immersion programs are not experts in French and lack experience in it. Students in French immersion programs complete the same core curriculum subjects as students in the English-language program. The French immersion concept was designed to: (a) capitalize on children's ability to learn language naturally and effortlessly; (b) take advantage of their social ability and open attitudes to language and culture; (c) reflect on the building blocks of language by emphasizing the use of languages for communication and (d) not stopping the children from participating in native language development, academic achievement or general cognitive development.


Formats


Programs

* ''French Immersion'': French as the language of instruction * ''Extended French'': available only in Ontario,
Newfoundland and Labrador Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
, and
Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...
; French as the language of instruction for one or two core subjects in addition to French Language Arts * ''Intensive French'': a more recent program which started in 1998 in Newfoundland and Labrador and branched out to six other provinces and the
Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal territory of Canada. ...
; intensive period of French instruction for one-half of the school year (70% of school day in French)


Age

The age an individual begins the French Immersion program varies: * ''Early Immersion'': Kindergarten or Grade One * ''Middle Immersion'': Grade Four or Five * ''Late Immersion'': Grade Six, Seven, or Eight


Time

The amount of time French Immersion students spend in immersion varies: * ''Total'': commences with 100% immersion in the second language and continually decreases to 50% * ''Partial'': commences with close to 50% immersion and remains at this level


Benefits

A study shows that French immersion might improve academic performance. Students participate in French immersion programs to gain employability-related skills and to increase job opportunities. Students in French immersion demonstrate a superior level of mental flexibility, which is an ability to think more independently of words and to have a higher awareness of concept formation as well as a more diversified intelligence than students in the regular program. Data illustrates that students in French immersion programs also have a linguistic advantage as they are able to adopt two different perspectives, offering alternative ways to look at the same information. French immersion students also have a deeper appreciation and respect for various cultures. In addition, they also gain more fulfillment in learning a new language. Students in French immersion programs also have greater opportunity to understand their own culture or their own nation. For example, Canada's identity is based on the fact that it holds two official languages, English and French. French immersion students have the opportunity to gain a greater understanding of what it means to be Canadian through the French Immersion program.


Challenges

Many challenges in participating in French Immersion programs persist. For example, many French immersion students do not reach native-like language proficiency in French. This could be due, in part, to the fact that there is a lack of willingness on the part of French immersion students to communicate in French outside of the classroom. This lack of willingness may stem from students not feeling prepared or equipped to practice the language. Access to
special education Special education (known as special-needs education, aided education, exceptional education, alternative provision, exceptional student education, special ed., SDC, or SPED) is the practice of educating students in a way that accommodates th ...
resources is often restricted to students in French immersion and as such, it is often suggested to parents that they switch their children to a regular English stream in order to access the support that their child requires. Suggesting that exceptional students would be better off without the French immersion program and that resources are not available in the program would be ignorant and misinformed. French immersion teachers could go through professional development training and courses about special education integration into their programs, all while creating referral processes for special education in French Immersion with parent involvement as an aim. When the rights of children to special education are overlooked, consequences can be costly to students' futures. French immersion students from elementary schools often experience difficulties when entering a high school which provides the full curriculum in English only. This often leads to problems with "both language and subject matter gaps in their learning", according to a
Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and par ...
report. Students who do have access to a high school with French instruction may feel overwhelmed with having to learn heavy content in mathematics and science in their second language. Teachers in such schools can be equally overwhelmed with being restricted to using only French in these contexts, and may experience guilt when English is used in their classrooms to reinforce vocabulary and complex concepts. Some experts recommend debate within school boards and ministries about allowing the use of English in French Immersion contexts when teaching complex concepts in mathematics and science. It is extremely difficult for school boards in Canada to hire teachers who are fully fluent in French and also have experience and evidence of excellent teaching skills in the various subjects that they must teach in elementary schools, for example. As early as 1982 school boards in Winnipeg had to cap enrollment in French immersion due to high demand. A school board in the Greater Toronto Area reported in 2017 that 80% of principals recently reported finding it extremely difficult to hire French-speaking teachers of the same calibre as the English-speaking staff. In fact, in November 2017, the
Halton Catholic District School Board The Halton Catholic District School Board (HCDSB) serves over 37,000 students at its 46 elementary schools, 9 secondary schools and 3 continuing education facilities. The HCDSB serves the communities of Burlington, Halton Hills, Milton, and Oakvi ...
was considering an end to their French immersion program for this reason. Some experts have suggested that research be conducted to seek strategies for French teacher recruitment to alleviate staff shortages in Canadian schools. Scholarship and bursary programs for prospective Bachelor of Education students to gain French teaching qualifications are also suggested to alleviate these shortages. The province of Ontario planned to open its first university where classes will be taught exclusively in French and this may alleviate the staffing problems eventually. By late 2017, the final recommendations from a planning board had been submitted to the government. The Université de l'Ontario français began accepting students in 2021. A report, by a PhD candidate scholar in educational policy at the University of Toronto, also discussed concerns about French immersion creating a dual track academic stream in many schools. She referred to a system "where the smart, motivated kids are funnelled into French, and everyone else gets left behind in English" which can become viewed as the "de facto low track stream". The author discussed a study at a Vancouver school, published in the ''
British Journal of Sociology of Education The ''British Journal of Sociology of Education'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal in the fields of education and sociology. According to the ''Journal Citation Reports'', the journal has a 2016 impact factor of 1.324. References External li ...
'', which concluded that "French immersion programmes operate as a 'cream-skimming' phenomenon … hatallows white, middle class parents to access markers of higher social status and prestige." Similarly, a 2019 report from the Toronto District School Board found that French immersion programs had a higher percentage of students who have parents with a very high socio-economic status, raising fears of a two-tier school system. A report by the Canadian Council on Learning spoke on the failure of many students to learn French: "Although most Canadian school children are taught English or French as a second language in school, these lessons often fail to yield functional bilingualism. For example, New Brunswick's French Second Language Commission recently reported that fewer than 1% of the students who enrolled in "core French" in 1994 had met the provincial minimum goal by 2007. And fewer than 10% of students who enrolled in early-French immersion in 1995 had attained the provincial goal by 2007."


Use of French immersion programs

French immersion programs were introduced into Canadian schools in the 1960s to encourage bilingualism across the country. Now immersion programs provide an alternative education stream for many students. Since their implementation, French immersion programs have become increasingly popular across Canada and school districts have seen significant increased enrolment in their French immersion student population over the years.


K–12 education

French immersion programs are offered in most Anglophone public school districts. French immersion is also done in some
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s and
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s.


Higher education

Generally, colleges and universities in Canada teach in only one of the two official languages. Students must pass linguistic entrance exams to study in a language they did not complete their schooling in. All universities and many colleges will offer traditional language learning in the other official language, however these are not immersion in the sense used in schools. A few institutions have both French and English faculties in the same university, but admission to individual courses still requires preexisting language skills. The University of Ottawa briefly offered specialized science classes for students studying in their second language during the 1980s, but these was phased out in favour of traditional language courses. True immersion occurs at summer programs that are part of the
Explore Exploration refers to the historical practice of discovering remote lands. It is studied by geographers and historians. Two major eras of exploration occurred in human history: one of convergence, and one of divergence. The first, covering most ...
program funded by the federal government, based on the Trois-Pistoles program at Western founded in 1933 (see above).


Regional discrepancies

French-immersion programs were offered in all ten Canadian provinces until 2022 when New Brunwick announced plans to abolish the program. The popularity of French immersion and "core French" differ by province and region. Note that these numbers refers to ''anglophone'' and ''allophone'' pupils: it does not include ''francophone'' mother-tongue students, who are enrolled in a separate school system altogether. Historically, enrolment in French immersion was proportionally highest in
Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirte ...
and
New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
, both provinces that have their own provincial language laws, above and beyond the federal Official Languages Act, which made knowledge of French even more valuable in the local job markets. French immersion enrolment in lowest in
Western Canada Western Canada, also referred to as the Western provinces, Canadian West or the Western provinces of Canada, and commonly known within Canada as the West, is a Canadian region that includes the four western provinces just north of the Canada� ...
and the North, where job requiring French are more rare. However all regions except
New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
(where the rules on eligibility were changed) experienced growth in proportionate and absolute terms between 2000 and 2012.


Core French


Controversy

Often, because French immersion is a "program of choice" and not a required part of the curriculum, school boards charge parents busing fees to have their children attend a school other than the one in their own neighbourhood. This is a financial barrier of a kind that is usually not acceptable in Canada's culture of universal, public education. Since French immersion was designed for anglophone children learning French as a second language, it did not meet the needs of francophone children living in minority communities outside of Quebec. This problem was addressed by the creation of separate francophone school systems in the 1990s. In 2008, an editorial in the ''
Vancouver Sun The ''Vancouver Sun'', also known as the ''Sun'', is a daily broadsheet newspaper based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The newspaper is currently published by the Pacific Newspaper Group, a division of Postmedia Network. Published s ...
'' criticized French immersion programs for having become a way for higher socioeconomic groups to obtain a publicly funded elite track education. Since lower socioeconomic groups and children with learning and behavioral problems have lower rates of participation in French immersion, a situation has developed in which ambitious families might prefer French immersion more for its effective
streaming Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content i ...
than for the bilingual skills it gives to students. Enrollment in French Immersion programs has become difficult for immigrants to Canada, because it is argued by school administrators and board professionals that learning English as a second language presents enough of a challenge for students. The lack of accessibility to French Immersion programs for English Language Learners is very similar to that for students with special needs. As a result, the media places blame on Canada's immigrants for the declining number of Canadians who are able to speak English and French, while the immigrant community continues to pursue opportunities to become fluent in both official languages of Canada. It is suggested that Canada's education system provide more opportunities to immigrants to become proficient in English and French in order to increase the number of Canadians who have knowledge of both official languages.


Abolishment in New Brunswick

Critics argued that success of French immersion programs gave an unfair advantage to those students over other Anglophone students who only took "core French" (non-immersion, traditional language courses). This led to several attempts at reforms. In 2008, the government announced that the earliest possible starting year for full immersion to grade 6, but in the face of protests and court challenges moved this to grade 3. Then in 2017 immersion starting in grade 1 was brought back. New Brunswick is the only province with constitutionally-enshired official bilingualism based on a model of perfect equality between the languages. Evey ten years, the government of New Brunswick commissions a report on the status of bilingualism in that province. The 2022 report written by provincial court Judge Yvette Finn and former deputy education minister John McLaughlin found that while 90% of French of immersion students were conversant in French, less than 10% of students in the regular English stream were. This was considered a major problem by Premier
Blaine Higgs Blaine Myron Higgs (born March 1, 1954) is a Canadian politician who is the 34th and current premier of New Brunswick since 2018 and leader of the New Brunswick Progressive Conservative Party (PC Party) since 2016. Higgs graduated from the Un ...
as he has stated personal bilingualism for all New Brunswickers should be the goal of the education system. The report summarized its recommendations on the topic thusly:
Our consultation and research have led us to one overwhelming conclusion: New Brunswick needs one strong, authentic, and engaging French second-language program of studies for all students in the Anglophone sector.
As a result Premier Higgs announced that while existing student in French immersion would be able to continue, new intakes of French Immersion would cease in 2023 to be replaced by a yet-to-be-designed French curriculum for all non-Francophone students. Subsequently the education minister resigned and the teachers' union protested that the timeline was much too quick for such a radical change.


Outside Canada

The '' Agence pour l'enseignement français à l'étranger'' (AEFE) runs or funds 470 schools worldwide, with French as the primary language of instruction in most schools.


Australia

French immersion is used in
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...
n schools such as Benowa State High School and The Southport School; teaching
mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...
, SOSE,
science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence ...
and French, entirely in French. There is also a French immersion program offered at Methodist Ladies' College and
Mansfield State High School Mansfield State High School is an independent public, co-educational secondary school of approximately 3300 students located in Mansfield, a suburb in Brisbane, Australia. The school was established and opened in 1974. In recent years, the schoo ...
teaching a variety of subjects over three years in French. Telopea Park School in
Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...
is a bilingual French-English school. The program is also offered at
The Glennie School The Glennie School (formerly the Glennie Memorial School) is a girls' school in Newtown, Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia. It caters for primary and secondary schooling from K-12. It has boarding house facilities and is owned and operated by th ...
in Toowoomba,
Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , establishe ...
. Lycée Condorcet in Maroubra,
Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mounta ...
teaches almost entirely in French and conforms to the French government system, enabling students to easily transition to and from France to the school.


United Kingdom

Walker Road Primary School, Aberdeen, Scotland started an early partial immersion program in 2000. Also,
Judgemeadow Community College Judgemeadow Community College is a mixed secondary school located in the Evington area of Leicester in the English county of Leicestershire. History The school was established in 1973, and moved into a new building on the same site in June ...
, Evington, in Leicester, has been using a French Immersion course in one form group a year for the last four years. Pupils answer the register in French, and their French, IT and PHSE lessons are all in French. The
Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle The Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle, usually referred to as the Lycée or the French Lycée, is a French co-educational primary and secondary independent day school, situated in South Kensington in the Royal Borough of Kensington and ...
(originally Lycée Français de Londres) is a French school transported to England and as such the vast majority of the teaching is in French and caters to French curricula and indeed, as far as quatrième (at the age of 13-14), all pupils are taught entirely in French.


United States

Private French language immersion schools in the
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
have existed since at least the 1950s. Most of these schools receive help from the AEFE. There are currently almost 40 of these schools in the United States. Public school districts have run French immersion programs since 1974. *
Montgomery County, Maryland Montgomery County is the most populous county in the state of Maryland. As of the 2020 census, the county's population was 1,062,061, increasing by 9.3% from 2010. The county seat and largest municipality is Rockville, although the census-design ...
(since 1974) * Milwaukee French Immersion School (since 1978) *
Holliston, Massachusetts Holliston is a New England town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States in the Greater Boston area. The population was 14,996 at the 2020 census. It is located in MetroWest, a Massachusetts region that is west of Boston. Holliston i ...
(since 1979) *
Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is bord ...
(since 1984) - 26 immersion programs in 9 parishes, supported by CODOFIL, a department of Louisiana's government that preserves Louisiana French culture within the state. * Prince George's County, Maryland (since 1984) *
Eugene, Oregon Eugene ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Oregon. It is located at the southern end of the Willamette Valley, near the confluence of the McKenzie and Willamette rivers, about east of the Oregon Coast. As of the 2020 United States Census, ...
(since 1984) *
Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous ...
(since 1979) *
Lake Charles, Louisiana Lake Charles (French: ''Lac Charles'') is the fifth-largest incorporated city in the U.S. state of Louisiana, and the parish seat of Calcasieu Parish, located on Lake Charles, Prien Lake, and the Calcasieu River. Founded in 1861 in Calcas ...
(since 1985) *
Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...
(since 1986) *
Kansas City, Missouri Kansas City (abbreviated KC or KCMO) is the largest city in Missouri by population and area. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city had a population of 508,090 in 2020, making it the List of United States cities by populat ...
* Milton, Massachusetts (since 1987) *
Columbus, Ohio Columbus () is the state capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the 14th-most populous city in the U.S., the second-most populous city in the Midwest, after Chicago, an ...
(since 1987) *
Edina, Minnesota Edina ( ) is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States and a first-ring suburb of Minneapolis. The population was 53,494 at the 2020 census, making it the 18th most populous city in Minnesota. Edina began as a small farming and mi ...
(since 1991) *
San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United Stat ...
(since 1994) * Madawaska, Maine (since 1995) *
St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. Situated on high bluffs overlooking a bend in the Mississippi River, Saint Paul is a regional business hub and the center o ...
(since 1996) * New York (since 2007) * Fairfax County, Virginia * Henrico County, Virginia - High school French immersion program *
Santa Rosa, California Santa Rosa ( Spanish for " Saint Rose") is a city and the county seat of Sonoma County, in the North Bay region of the Bay Area in California. Its estimated 2019 population was 178,127. It is the largest city in California's Wine Country and ...
(since 2012) * Frank D. Parent Elementary School - French Immersion Program, West LA, Inglewood, California (since 2017) The southern part of Louisiana has a strong French heritage extending back to colonial times. During the mid-twentieth century, however, the number of native French speakers plunged as French was banned in public schools and children punished for speaking it. The social stigma associated with speaking French was sufficiently strong that many parents did not speak the language to their children, so generations born in the second half of the century rarely spoke French in the home. As a result, French immersion is today viewed by parents and educators as a way to save the French language in Louisiana, where there are more French immersion programs than in any other state.


See also

* Language immersion *
Structured English Immersion Structured English Immersion (SEI) is a total immersion bilingual education technique for rapidly teaching English to English Language Learners English-Language Learner (often abbreviated as ELL) is a term used in some English-speaking countrie ...


Notes and references


External links


Canadian Parents for French



Summer Camp in France
{{DEFAULTSORT:French Immersion French-language education in Canada Language immersion English-Canadian culture