Any experience with language camps in France?

[SometimesYouWinSometimesYouLearn]

I’d really like to strengthen my child’s French, as I feel the amount of French taught at secondary school isn’t enough to build real fluency or confidence in the language.

I’m considering private lessons with a native speaker (e.g. twice a week),
and sending my child to French language camps during school holidays — ideally with accommodation and full language immersion.

Has anyone here had experience with such camps or residential courses in France?
Can you recommend any reliable organisations that offer high-quality language trips for children around the age of 12?

Any suggestions or reviews would be greatly appreciated!

Graduate of BA French here and immersion in the language is absolutely the best way to develop it!

I attended a language camp in my first summer of uni so not age appropriate for your 12yo but it was in Montpellier and the first morning was intensive assessment to sort into ability groups. It was also about 20 years ago now so may no longer exist but it was excellent. Sorry that’s not much help for you in this specific case but they are absolutely worth investigating!

my family live on the south coast and get a lot of language students in the area - I’d suggest at 12 your child may prefer forming a more natural relationship and chats with someone close to their own age. Their language teacher at school may be able to make introductions with penpal type agency or a partner school to make introductions with too!

my parents also used to take in language students as we lived near Windsor so there was lots of interest there for them and they got to practice English at home with us but had I been a little older and realised my passion for languages I’d have definitely asked them to talk with me in their native tongues!

Graduate of BA French here and immersion in the language is absolutely the best way to develop it!
I don’t agree with that. It’s better to study something that leads to job opportunities. I speak English fluently yet have studied totally different subjects.
It makes sense to study French BA if you plan to become a teacher or translating

My child went to Centre International d’Antibes for two weeks of intensive French last summer and enjoyed it.

@SometimesYouWinSometimesYouLearn I think @WingingIt101 was supporting your intention to arrange an immersive experience for your DC, not suggesting that they study BA French.

Oh in that case sorry for misunderstanding

Thank you. Did he/she stayed with a French family? What was the accommodation like?

Try Inlingua inlingua-france.fr - they do full immersion with students in host families.

If your child is Black or Brown, I would avoid the Province and Tours areas. We have never before encountered racism as overt and persistent as we experienced it there. This wasn't about subtle microaggressions, this was overt racism. Many interactions we had were marked by hostility and aggression. It was shocking.

Last year, I spent two weeks in La Rochelle with one of my daughters during which she attended Inlingua. We very much enjoyed our time there. However, my older daughter can pass as white, so I can’t speak to how much racism someone might encounter there.

For goodness sake, in France there are many people of colour, more than in UK even and they were there for generations. Surely your kid just had a bad luck.
I get that people may not like religious extremists but I really don't understand the politics of the skin pigment in the XXI century. So wrong.

We are all in my family blond blue eyes pale types.

What an odd response towards someone just offering some advice…. Lucky you to be privileged enough never to have to experienced racism but maybe don’t just just be really dismissive of someone who has.

Both my daughters did FIL (fil-ado.com/en/) 10 years ago when 15 and 13. My eldest made a couple of life long friends (from Sweden) and my youngest went on to do a french degree. Looks like FIL is still going

@SometimesYouWinSometimesYouLearn Like you, I am White and had never encountered racism in France before. No surprise there. If your entire family is White, why do you think you can comment on experiences of racism? What qualifies you?

My children encountered racism everywhere we went to on those two holidays. They were followed in every shop they entered, were accused of theft even though I was standing right behind them and could see that they had done nothing wrong (the shop assistant hadn't realised that I was their mother), shouted at, told to go away when they sat down on a chair in front of a restaurant, told "there is nothing to see here" when they were browsing in a shop with my husband, I could go on. We had never experienced anything like this before. It was relentless and disgusting, and we will never visit those areas again.

The amount of Brown or Black people says nothing about how racist a country is, see South Africa during the Apartheid era.

In case you are French, instead of claiming "there is nothing to see here", how about you do something about the racism in your country?

What a load of nonsense - never said anything like that. I am reporting you offensive and racist post

@SometimesYouWinSometimesYouLearn Good luck.

Go on holiday to Club Med and put them in children's club! Very French.

Thank you. How do I find information a about Club Med

Club Med is a holiday company @SometimesYouWinSometimesYouLearn

https://www.clubmed.co.uk/

I was interested in this thread as MFL is my subject. I'm sorry that you don’t rate the quality of secondary language teaching (of course it is stretched in every direction, like so many things at schools, but there are still some amazing teachers).

I agree with @WingingIt101 that immersion is a great way to learn a language. The trouble is that you need to keep it going – one of my DC spent some time in another country and got pretty good at the language, but has struggled to keep it up. Perhaps easier for a child – but if you want anything approaching fluency you need to be speaking French to them at home. You’ve not said if you are French? would that be a possibility?

I must say that I have found some of your comments a tad surprising – but it is sometimes hard to judge tone on a forum like this.

@clary

I was interested in this thread as MFL is my subject. I'm sorry that you don’t rate the quality of secondary language teaching (of course it is stretched in every direction, like so many things at schools, but there are still some amazing teachers).

I don’t think there’s an issue with the teacher’s dedication in 99 percent of cases. I have no doubt many teachers are great. In my opinion, there are two main problems:

1. There aren’t enough hours of language instruction at school.

1. In most schools, languages are not taught in sets but in mixed-ability groups, which often include noisy and disruptive students.

I certainly agree with you about the number of lessons in school – that's partly what I meant by stretched I guess; there are so many other subjects that need to be covered (quite rightly! I am not suggesting studying French at the expense of biology!) that it's hard to squeeze in more than 2 or three hours a week, even at KS4.

Wrt noisy and disruptive students, they exist across the ability level I'm afraid, tho it's true that less-able students are more likely to be disengaged. A good teacher will manage that tho.

But tbh even with an hour of French lessons a day in a class of 30, no student is going to be close to fluent, unless they do a good deal of work outside as well.

All the best to your child – I love that you want to increase their confidence in MFL.

lass of 30, no student is going to be close to fluent, unless they do a good deal of work outside as well.

Absolutely.

Wrt noisy and disruptive students, they exist across the ability level I'm afraid, tho it's true that less-able students are more likely to be disengaged.

My son keeps saying it to me that in the top sets there are also disruptive kids but just fewer of them: "mum they are just more capable but some are still naughty! "

All the best to your child – I love that you want to increase their confidence in MFL.

Thank you:) and all the best to you too

Ah and I forgot to say, no, I am not French. I only speak a bit of French

I did a French degree

def lots of good language courses out there but I came on loads as a teenager by spending two weeks with a (lovely) host family. Friends of friends of my French teacher I think. The mother was an English teacher but other than translating the odd work was amazing at speaking French at me the whole time!

However i think host family arrangements are very hit or miss and can be distressing for the children (or amazing). Def best if you have some connections.

This might be of interest to you:

https://www.lingoo.com/en/search/profile/results?profile_search_lang=310&profile_search_type=0&profile_search_stay=1&profile_search_loc=0

In quite a few of the families the (usually) mother is a lanuage teacher, so your child could have some 1 on 1 sessions on top of the immersion.

My DD went to French summer camp at Alpine French School in Morzine in her early teens, and this summer (end of Y12) is going to one of the Montpellier language schools.

This might not have been your intention but this comment is rude and dismissive of the posters experiences with racism.