French for children

[MrsWobbleTheWaitress]

My DD1 (7) is really enjoying learning french so I thought I'd see if I could find her a french penfriend. Can anyone advise me as to where to start?

And what about hosting a french exchange student - has anyone done that before? Are there particularly reputable companies to use?

good luck with it Mrs W. Hope little Miss W finds a nice penpal or two.

Maybe she'd enjoy baking with some Frnech recipes? (If it cools down a bit)

we had some nice famous people biographies - Florence Nightingale etc. I thought they went down quite well and you can talk around the topic, reinforce new vocab, learn a bit about history at the same time.

I'm always in "teacher mummy" mode I'm afriad. Seem unable to switch it off.

Just been looking over the penpal website. Is there any way at all I can make sure that whoever she starts corresponding with is a bona fide 7yo girl?

And, just to take more part in the hijack, my DDs will watch The Railway Children and Swallows and Amazons etc. over and over - they only want to watch new Disney films a couple of times. No room for imagination watching those I think.

And DD1 got obsessed by those rainbow magic books, but I got her a load of books from the library and guess who she's got keen on now? Only Anne Fine and Dick King Smith

Years ago you could order the french versions of magazines from smiths. Does anybody know if that is still possible? Could you order the french versions of childrens magazines ?

it's true, isn't it, children do respond to good writing? I don't why they get force-fed such a load of junk. A bit of it is ok but not as a full diet.

No, you cannot really guarantee it is a 7 year old girl but you can post something and see the tone that comes up in reply. I never felt that any of the correspondents my dd had were not children. If you don't give your email, they can only respond to your mailbox anyway and I would post for a bit before exchanging addresses.

think you're right about the Disney films. Also too quick and too much happening at once. Gives you no time to really digest it.

Bayard Jeunesse provide French children's magazines though they are aimed at native speakers so you might want to go an age bracket younger than normal if your child is not a native speaker.

"I don't why they get force-fed such a load of junk."

Commercial imperatives, managed by philistines.

Up to us as parents to resist it!

films, a lot of the magazines, books, comics - yes just about money. Like most things aimed at parents

I wonder about the quality of books chosen by schools at times though.

Or to teach our children how to self-regulate their intake of junk in terms of everything. We all like reading crap from time to time, but we know that we'll get fed up of it eventually and return to more highbrow stuff. I think children will do the same as long as they have access to the good stuff too.

Good ideas about the magazines

And ZZZen - will definitely register then, and get a more anonymous mailbox - I thought you had to go straight to emailing.

you can but you need not. We did give an email but most replies were to the box, you just get an email notification of new messages. If you don't give an email, I suppose they can't notify you, so you'd need to check now and again.

We did this about 2 years ago, so bit rusty on the whole process, sorry. My dd is still communicating with her penpals 2 years on btw

I am a great believer in forming children's taste in the early years by exposing them to as little junk as possible. A healthy, consistent diet of quality is the greatest defence against excessive consumption of junk, IMVHO.

MrsW - just seen this.

If your DD wouldn't mind an older penpal, my 10yo DD2 loves writing. We live in France (DH is French) and she is bilingual so could write to your DD in simple French.

Any use?

Ooh yes, Castille. I'm sure she wouldn't mind an older penpal! Can you CAT me your details? We're going camping until the middle of next week, but I know she'd love to get writing soon

Thank you.

Don't have CAT, but you can email me on castille 211 at hot mail dot com (no spaces, obv)

Great! It'll give her something to do in the hols!

I've emailed

You can also try www.echangedecorrespondant.com for a French penpal, a French website created by a French teacher from Lyon.