Resources for keeping up the French side - our experiences

[internationalbeeboo]

I posted here a while back as we were going to be leaving France and I wanted some tips on resources for keeping up DD's interest in French.
I got some really helpful advice here and after scouring the car boot sales before we left, I found that there are some books that have gone down a storm with both DD and DH (he's the one reading them).

So, if you have a small child and are looking for some good books in French, here's a few suggestions:

Caca Boudin - Stephanie Blake (DD knows this one by heart)
Aboie, Georges ! - Jules Feiffer
Pique gratte et grogne - Michel Backès
Tarte à tout - Audrey Poussier et Matthieu Sylvander
Tout en haut - Mario Ramos
Le Monde a l'envers- Mario Ramos (pretty much anything by him is a safe bet)
Mariette, Soupir et crotte de bique - Irène Schwartz et Frédéric Stehr
Papa! - Philippe Corentin
N'oublie pas de te laver les dents - Philippe Corentin (another safe bet, plus even I find this book hilarious)
Ma culotte - Alan Mets
Les fantômes au Loch-Ness - Jacques Duquennoy
Roule galette - Natha Caputo et Pierre Belvès
La véritable histoire de la galette des rois - Marie-Anne Boucher et Rémi Hamoir

Series of books:
Penelope - Anne Gutman et Georg Hallensleben
Martine - my sister-in-law gave us her copies and DD loves them - Martine has done everything from chef's school to hot-air ballooning, so there's lots of vocab!
Caroline - again, an old series, but DD seems to enjoy it

We have also found these CD's to be a really good source of French kids' songs and not too grating that they can be played on long car journeys for (what feels like) hours on end:

80 Comptines à mimer & jeux de doigts - Eveil et découvertes
Les Après-midi des petites canailles - Naive Enfant

In terms of DVD's, we're struggling a bit:
Kirikou et la sorcière
La Fée Coquillette
Peppa Le Cochon (yep)

Anyway, hope this helps anybody who's in a similar situation...

Great list. For DVDs I would add Bali; Trotro; Casimir et l'Ile aux Enfants; Elliott (Canadian?); Petit Ours Brun; Leo et Popi (for under 3s, there is also Popi magazine for this age range), Mila raconte 1001 Histoires (3+).

Also worth knowing that Maisy DVDs bought in England often come with a French soundtrack as standard; as do some Disney DVDs, including most Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (also muppets' Christmas Carol, Fox and Hound, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang ...) I know that this solution is not for everyone, but if you like Disney anyway then this is a cheap way to expand your Francophone collection.

"mon imagier de l'alphabet" is very popular in this flat (me and DD (2.5) esp love the track for "C"! :D ), we have another from the series that we also listen to a lot.

is "Ma culotte" a potty training book, by any chance...?

Also worth noting: Peppa Couchon is on You Tube ;-) Also, there are a lot of fun comptines on there, and a lot of Barbapapa, and Oui Oui [Noddy].

Barbapapa, of course! Excellent DVDs! My children both love Bumba, as well, which is Belgian - as an adult I find it insane but kids lap it up (prob up to 4). You can watch the Flemish edition on YouTube - but, beleive me, understanding what is being said does not normally make it any less bizarre. A telephone appearing from beneath a badly animated snail's shell is odd in any language.

My elder daughter (nearly 4) also loves Dorothee et le jardin des chansons ad has started joining in! (lot of this on YouTube too.)

BTW Peppa is now apparently called Peppa Pig in French, though early trailers on other DVDs tried to call it Peppa Cochon. Fascinating trivia, non?

ha, that's reassuring! I was convinced I'd heard a Peppa Cochon on Youtube, but couldn't find it again, so thought I'd been dreaming!
MIFLAW, always appreciate your suggestions, esp re: the DVD's and doubly so for the soundtracks on the Disneys!
In a bid to find other sources of French, DH let DD hear Vanessa Paradis singing Emilie Jolie on Youtube, so we now have a Vanessa Paradis fixation...DD asked DH for Vanessa's phone number yesterday so she could call her for a chat...so if anyone has Vanessa and Johnny's number...?!

My daughter has suddenly started finding Claude Francois hilarious - fair enough, you migt say, but it is a specific line in "C'est La Meme Chanson", when he says "cette melodie" she cracks up and is always asking for "cette menonie" in the car! She also loves Nana Miskouri's "O Soleil Soleil" - a child with taste ...

I would guess that "Peppa Cochon" didn't scan very well when they sang the theme tune ...

Although they're more expensive, if you buy disney movies in France they almost always have both French and English.

Children's DVDs are so much more expensive in France though :( 10 euros for Petit Ours Brun or Trotro compared to £3 here for Maisie.

Spongebob Squarepants series box sets here come with French (also Spanish and German).

Has anyone found any good audiobooks in French? I don't know what the market for them is like there, there are such good ones in English.

We've got a good one for the Three Little Pigs, part of a series of fairy stories - will look it up in amazon if you want.

Don't know about other books though.

I did get some v cheap DVDs in a Belgian toy shop - Pablo le renard rouge, Hopital Hilltop (v. good) and 64 rue du zoo - perhaps a part of the price difference is where you're buing, i.e. Amazon is bound to be dearer than a hypermarket but the choice is much better? May be talking thorugh my hat, but I do find Amazon dear, I shop there for things I know I want and in hypermarkets etc for things on a whim - ditto books and games.

If you don't mind MIFLAW, that would be great. Thank you :)

I find amazon.fr really expensive, yes. I try not to buy on there if I can avoid it. But I've yet to find any really good bargains in shops. We don't have a hypermarket near us though, so perhaps if we went to one it would be better.

www.amazon.fr/Trois-Petits-Cochons-1CD-audio/dp/2723462552/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322218579&sr=8-1

This is the one, but there's a series of others too.

My daughter doesn't understand it all yet, of course, but still likes it.

Hypermarket is maybe an exaggeration but you know the big supermarkets in shopping centres, big enough to have a clothing section, toy section, load of books and so on? The equivalent of a big Sainsbury over here. That sort of place often has good special offers, though of course you have to be lucky unless you're in there every week.

Super, thanks very much.

There's a really big Carrefour like that, about 30 mins from us, so next time we're heading that way I'll have a look and hope there's something. Thanks :)

Don't forget Tintin and Asterix for older dc. They were all my Lycee teachers could get me to read.

Also, my experience of French public libraries is that they're even better than the British ones for contemporary fiction, for adults and children - and a lot les snobby about graphic novels, audio visual etc. I take it you are already an active member at your local (or, in London, Edinburgh etc, the nearest Institut Francais or Alliance Francaise)?

Trois Petits Cochons is on Amazon Uk as well

www.amazon.co.uk/Trois-Petits-Cochons-1CD-audio/dp/2723462552/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1322226948&sr=8-6.

We have a few audio books, 3 histoires pour mes 3 ans (they have every age), le roi lion, winnie l'ourson - but they are mostly a bit more complicated than those I have found in English and seem to be aimed at an older children - there are just more words and fewer pictures. Oh, also Antoon Krings, there is a series which come with audio CD and which are a bit simpler than the above ones- works fine for my 3.5 year old.

www.amazon.co.uk/Histoires-Lorette-P%C3%A2querette-Mille-Pattes-audio/dp/2070621715/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322227359&sr=8-1

We also have Petits Einsteins and Dora and Go Diego Go which all come with French soundtracks in the UK, can't say I'm mad about Disney but they cost about £4 each as opposed to £10 for the French ones and so needs must.

My son (aged 3.5) loves them all.

From France, we have la Petite Princesse, Peppa Pig, Trotro, T'Choupi, Petit et Costaud - I would love to find Numberjacks or equivalent in French but I don't think it exists.

Where do you get Petits Einsteins in the UK? I never see this but know my daughter would love it and it would be a plus for me if it was in French (I absolutely hate it but that's what unconditional love means, I guess!)

www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=little+einsteins&x=0&y=0

The three that I know for sure have French as an option are

Mission Celebration
Team up for Adventure and
A Christmas Wish - my son adores this one, there is an episode with music from the Nutcracker Suite which he sings all the time.

Our Huge Adventure definitely DOESN'T come with French.

Personally I find all these things much much more acceptable in French - I absolutely can't tolerate Little Einsteins with American accents and out of tune singing, but in French it is far less grating. Same with Dora and Diego, if we watched TV in English I wouldn't have them in the house but in French they are far less frenetic and they sing in tune. Even my dh who doesn't speak much French prefers them in French...

There is a wonderful little book called Conversation avec un gateau au chocolat by Martin Page. I don't know if it's English translated into French but it's wonderful, funny & the language is interesting & stretching for my 7 yr old. We also just borrowed some editions of Mes Premiers j'aime lire which come with a CD. They are a monthly publication with stories & what not.
Thanks for recommendations above. We moved back to UK after nearly 4 years in France & are trying hard to not let our daughter lose her French.

Thanks for that, Chocolate.

Do you (or does anyone) know if there is a French soundtrack on Handy Manny? By far my favourite of the millions of Disney series ...

And does anyone else use the BayardKids website/app? Made by the same people as the Popi and Pomme D'Api magazines, has stories, games, nursery rhymes, activities, a few episodes of Babar, Leo et Popi, Samsam and others, suitable for French speaking 3-7 year olds, there is also a older version for 7-11 year olds. You have to pay for the Premium version but it was only about 30 euros a year and well worth it. New things appear every week to keep it interesting, for a while we did it every day, now down to a couple of times a week. My son aged 3.5 can almost navigate it by himself now he has learnt to use the mouse.

We have a couple of Handy Manny, am pretty sure he is in French as well although we watch in Spanish, will check for you.

Thanks!

Yes handy manny is in French too,at least Happy Birthday and Green Team. Can I ask, miflaw, how you know so much about preschool Disney shows if you hate them this much?

Does anyone have any recommendations for good Christmas books in French, suitable for a 4 year old? Things that are wintery/Christmasy, that would be a good read for the time of year we're heading in to...I'm constantly disappointed at how poor Amazon FR is for giving Product Descriptions. It's highly unlikely that people would buy a book online based on the cover alone, esp given how expensive the books are in the first place!