Our team has been quietly working on this project since July 2020 and we’re so happy to announce the completion of our very first French children’s book called Chez Mamie! It is part of our new levelled French reader series based on real stories by real people, called Nos Histories (Our Stories).
While this was a project born during the pandemic, it had been something we had been dreaming of for many years. From tutoring and teaching students since 2009, we have worked with so many different French
learning tools helping students to succeed in French. From these experiences, we developed a vision for exactly what we would like to see in the second language learning space.
The purpose of our book series is two-fold:
- To provide an excellent French language learning resource for FSL students
- To present stories that are diverse, inclusive and increase visibility for underrepresented communities.
Representation matters. Research shows that students who are exposed to more diversity are more likely to achieve success in life, work, and as leaders. We envisioned a learning tool that reflects a fuller spectrum of stories from gender, race, physical ability, religion, age, family structures, culture, socioeconomic status, and more.
We also recognized that these are not our stories to tell which is why in July 2020 we put out a call for people from a variety of communities who were interested in helping create a positive, inclusive, diverse educational tool. We invited them to share their stories with us and from there we performed over 20 interviews over zoom. This is where the stories came from and Chez Mamie is the first of more to come.