Immersion comes in many forms

Parents at a public meeting Monday night to discuss strategies to bring back French Immersion in Fort Frances considered several options to make the program a success here.
Immersion programs can be run with an early, middle, or late entry, and with multiple entry points.
The program offered here by the Northwest Catholic District School Board was an early immersion program that began in senior kindergarten.
One alternative to that would be to maintain an early immersion, but allow students to enter the program in JK, SK, or Grade 1.
Marie Brady, president of the local chapter of Canadian Parents for French, said this gives parents the option of starting their child in FI right away, or taking a year or two in the English program first before beginning in French.
Another option is to offer middle immersion, which would begin in Grade 4 or 5, or a late immersion beginning in Grade 7 or 8.
The final option to be considered is an intensive French program, which is only a pilot program in Ontario for now.
The program involves a literacy-based approach to learning French for students in the Core French program.
Students in Grade 5 or 6 take all their courses in French, with the exception of math, for a period of six months. After that, they go back to their regular Core French program, with one additional subject taught in French.
The goal is to make students capable of speaking French in a short, intensive amount of time.
The program already is running successfully in other provinces, including Alberta and British Columbia.
This September, eight classrooms in Ontario will run the pilot program. The nearest board participating in the program is the Thunder Bay Catholic District School Board.
In her research, Brady found a Catholic board in Peace River, Alta. that has no minimum enrolment for French Immersion. “The board is very dedicated to the program and it runs no matter what,” she explained.
Remarkably, in a town of only 6,400 people, the public school board also offers the FI program.
Parents at Monday night’s meeting noted more local parents need to be educated on the benefits of bilingualism.
“If we could put together a French Immersion hockey team, we’d be set for life,” Brady said to laughs from the parents on hand.