CM French curriculum?

[Rose-Roget]

I'm just beginning my research for hs'ing.  I like much of the CM philosophy  (what I've read so far, although I do not have a full understanding of it yet).  We live in America, and dh is French.  Ds is bilingual, although English is dominant.  I have a hard time finding a curriculum for French for him because he already speaks the language.  It needs some refining and vocabulary building, as we do for English.  I was thinking that I could incorporate some living books in French into his learning and use them in the same way we would in English to build his narration and understanding.  Is that a bad idea?  Would anyone have a better idea?  Any recs for books?

[tankgirl73]

I can't imagine why that would be a bad idea.  After all, how would francophones do CM?  Not with english books for sure.  ;)

It could even be completely integrated... like, not "these books are for french studies" and all the books for other areas -- like living science books or whatever -- all in english.  You could have french AND english books across the board.  If you're doing ancient egyptian history, for instance, maybe you'd have a spine in english and various story books in french and in english.

I think that would be just SO cool.  I'm bilingual myself and want my kids to be, but 12yo son is reluctant... well he's reluctant about everything heh.  He's actually doing pretty well in french, he can now read k-level french readers easily.  But his french will probably always be considerably behind his english, so we probably won't be able to use french materials much for *learning* materials... only for "learning french", as it were.  At least not for several more years.

I don't have a LOT of suggestions for books, but maybe something like Les malheurs de Sophie?  Apres le pluie, le beau temps?  They're classics, not 'fluff', have some challenging language but not overly so, and they're just excellent stories to boot.  He's maybe a bit young yet for Bonheur d'occasion... ;)  There's always Tintin for comic books... I always loved the Dinomir stories but they're harder to find (our local francophone library has a few) these days... Let's see, I'm trying to remember what I read in elementary school.  And I'm mostly just remembering the english books!  Frustrating...

[Rose-Roget]

Thanks for that information!  I'll look up some of those books.  French texts do not come cheap in the US, unfortunately.  Grandparents may be able to help, though. :)

Also, I was just thinking that De La Fontaine wrote his versions of Aesop's Fables in French.  Those shouldn't be hard to find. This could be a fun little project to find books and stories!

[Brisen]

amazon.ca ships to the US, and they have French books here.  chapters.ca  also ships to the US and they seem to have French books, but I couldn't find a separate section like they do at amazon.ca.  You'll pay more for shipping, but the cost of the actual books shouldn't be too bad.  You could also try looking at French homeschooling groups in Canada, like a yahoo group, to find where French Canadian homeschoolers are buying their material.   There must be bookstores in Quebec that will ship to the US.    

[Rose-Roget]

Thanks for those tips.  I haven't browsed on amazon.ca in a while, and for some reason I hadn't considered looking at Canadian homeschool groups. :)

[heatherdeg]

We've bought from amazon.fr but so help me I'm not sure why we didn't think of amazon.ca because shipping would've undoubtedly been cheaper.  :/

And I found a few books for refining (for myself) that might work for you depending on how old and advanced your ds is.  They are:

The Ultimate French Review and Practice: Mastering French Grammar for Confident Communication

French Verb Drills, Fourth Edition (Drills Series)  (I'm noticing they have a grammar version, too)

Both are available through the US Amazon.  I think I may have actually bought them at my local Borders.

[kittywitty]

The US Amazon does have a decent selection. We have many French kids books I bought used on there for good prices. Here are some on my wish list that I plan on buying when we get our tax returns.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1452845743/ref=ord_cart_shr?ie=UTF8&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0844211087/ref=ord_cart_shr?ie=UTF8&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER
http://www.amazon.com/Nouveaux-Contes-Fées-Petits-Enfants/dp/1452847266/ref=pd_sim_sbs_b_1

[tankgirl73]

I've ordered materials directly from the publishers before.  They're Canadian and I don't know their shipping regs, but it's worth looking into.  

www.passetemps.com is one, can't think of the other off the top of my head but if I find it I'll pass it along as well.  We got some of the "Lire-tôt" sets which are intended to be early reading books for francophone kids -- like, kindergarten reading level or so.  We're using them for my older son, he doesn't mind that they're "young"... they're different than things intended for FSL readers.  It's a good equivalence, I think, for a 12yo anglophone studying french for a couple of years to be able to independently read books intended for 6-7yo francophones.  

[tankgirl73]

Yay, just got an email newsletter from the other company, good timing!

http://www.envolee.com/

They have tons of stuff too.  We've gotten some of their early reading books, but also some worksheets intended for FSL students.  :)

[Rose-Roget]

Wow - I'm loving these resources!  Thank you!