DCHP-2

core French DCHP-2 (October 2016)

• n. — Education

  a program in schools to teach French as a second language with fewer contact hours than French immersion.

  Type: 1. Origin — This is a program that is offered by most Canadian school boards in regions where English is the primary medium of instruction. The goals of the program are to acquire basic communication skills in French as well as cultural knowledge. In Canada's bilingual set-up, the program has at times been exposed to political interference at the height of English-French tensions (see the 1986 quotation). The learning outcomes, given the considerable number of contact hours, have not always been as expected (see the 1978 and 2007 quotations). Core French is usually started in grade 4.
  See also COD-2, s.v. "core French", which is marked "Cdn".

  See also: French immersion  early immersion  late immersion  

  • 1974  CORE FRENCH PROGRAM K-6 [Advertisement] 
  • 1978  If trustees adopt the policy, the core French program would be expanded from the current 840 hours - accumulated from 20 minutes daily in Grades 5 and 6 and 40 minutes daily from Grades 7 to 13 - to 1,200 hours or 40 minutes daily in Grades 4 to 13. 
  • 1985  Most of those who favored core French also said they would enrol a child of theirs in early immersion if it were available. 
  • 1986  During the 1970s, the ministry of education and compliant school boards, given the political climate and tensions with Quebec, extended the hours of teaching for the regular core French program so that they would appear to be meeting the needs of a bilingual Canada. 
  • 1990  Core French refers to the teaching of French as a second language in Quebec's English schools, according to the Education Department's compulsory provincial curriculum. 
  • 1998  This institute, which will be taught in French, is designed to provide Elementary teachers with the theory and practice necessary to teach the Grades 4, 5, and 6 Core French programme. 
  • 2002  Run by the department of Canadian Heritage, the second language education program provides funding to the provinces to support such programs as French immersion and core French outside Quebec, as well as secondary language programs within Quebec. 
  • 2007  According to the latest test results, only 38 per cent of students enrolled in core French programs meet their targets for French proficiency. Students in the core program receive 30 minutes of French instruction per day. 
  • 2015  Finally, not dividing children into French immersion and core French streams in senior kindergarten will mean they do not have to be separated from the friends they made in junior kindergarten.