For many students coming to McGill from across Canada and other countries around the globe, one of the many advantages of pursuing a degree at McGill is that students are immersed in Montreal’s unique bilingual culture.
McGill’s French Language Centre is one of the university’s best assets in promoting learning opportunities for students in any academic program throughout the university with its course offerings of credited and non-credited courses that encompass writing and oral communication.
Students from McGill’s various professional schools, such as the School of Social Work, and the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, turn to the FLC for crucial French language training that will benefit them not only during their time at McGill but beyond when they leave to pursue professional careers in Quebec.
Beginner Level Courses for All McGill Students
For students across academic disciplines, from the Faculty of Arts to the Faculty of Engineering, the FLC offers placement tests to ascertain a student’s level of comprehension and skill in the French language and offers 5 different levels of courses, which follows the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, a global standard for grading language proficiency. The levels on offer range from level A1, absolute beginner, to level C1, which is a full command of the language.
Alida Soucé has been a Faculty Lecturer at the French Language Centre for close to ten years now, and, along with the Centre's other instructors, is responsible for creating, coordinating, and teaching beginner level French courses at the FLC. Alida currently coordinates and teaches the near beginner course, FRSL 103 and the elementary French course, FRSL 206/207.
“These courses are built and based on research in applied didactics,” says Alida. “Most of our instructors are constantly reflecting on improving course offerings so that students have access to the most innovative academic courses in the field of French as a Second Language.”
Living and learning in a bilingual city such as Montreal gives students the opportunity to use their newly acquired French skills in a multitude of settings on and off campus.
“We equip students with solid, academic French courses that are centered in a Montreal context” says Alida. “Thanks to our exceptional setting in Quebec, the courses we teach can help students whose goal is to become bilingual.”
“We also organize many extracurricular activities in which students can further strengthen the skills we teach in the classroom,” says Alida.
The FLC organizes a series of cultural outings such as a historical and cultural tour of popular Montreal neighborhoods like the Mile End and Old Montreal, and events such as a French Improv Night, conversation workshops and a series focusing on French in the workplace, all of which give students the opportunity to develop their oral skills in informal settings with other students enrolled in FLC courses.
Alida prides herself on being able to offer her students a personalized approach to learning and her courses are often filled with a strong sense of community.
In some anonymous student feedback received by Alida, many students attest to the excellent learning environments they experienced in her classroom.
“It’s always been one of my goals to speak French, and it’s in part why I moved to Montreal,” says one student who took a FLC course this winter. “My anxiety always got in the way, and it wasn’t until [Alida’s] class that I was able to work through that productively, something I'll be taking with me when I move to London this fall and continue working towards fluency.”
Another student noted how thankful they were for the extra time Alida devoted to providing detailed feedback on tests and writing/oral practice. “[Alida’s] encouragement and support [inspired] me to keep participating and improving my French skills in my daily life.”
Teaching French for Specific Purposes
Ariel Mercado came to McGill with over 20 years of experience teaching French and English as a second language in Spain. It was in Spain that Ariel developed his interest in teaching language for a specific purpose, such as teaching English and French for the tourism industry and in the healthcare sector.
Ariel later moved to Quebec to pursue his studies, and it was during his PhD in Linguistics that Ariel’s interest in healthcare and languages solidified.
Working closely with the administration of the FLC, Ariel created French courses for health sciences and social work, which are offered during both Fall and Winter semesters, as well as a May intensive course. The courses are designed to give written and oral communication skills to students from a variety of disciplines in the health and social work sectors, as well as French skills for students studying dietetics and nutrition.
These courses are offered through a partnership with Dialogue McGill, which is funded by Health Canada under the Action Plan for Official Languages, which aimed to “build and maintain the capacity of bilingual health and social services professionals in Quebec.”
“My focus in these courses is especially oral communication with patients, with caregivers and with other professionals, and to prepare students for that,” says Ariel. “Writing skills are also important- students have to know how to write a chart for another professional or in layman’s terms for the patient.”
The Centre works closely with the Professional Schools Committee, which includes representatives from the various McGill schools in healthcare. The courses are formulated with the feedback of doctors, social workers and dieticians so that the courses are tailored to specific skills and requirements students will encounter in their future professions.
“We have around two meetings per semester in which I participate,” says Ariel. “I have had ideas for courses from these meetings. For example, they tell me we need our students to know how to write a chart in French, I ask for material that they can share (without personal identification details) so that the examples we give students are accurate and can be adapted to their learning levels and needs.”
Focusing on real tasks that they will have in their professional lives is an important objective in Ariel’s courses. In order to pass the courses and to be able to work in their respective fields in Québec, students must pass the French exam for their discipline which is designed and administered by the Office Québécois de la langue française ( OQLF).
“I know the OQLF exam very well and I try to integrate in-class activities for the exam,” says Ariel. Ariel runs around 2 or 3 dedicated workshops to prepare his students for the OQLF exam.
“I tell students that this or that in-class activity is similar to a section of the OQLF exam so they know what to prepare for,” says Ariel.
To learn more about course offerings at the FLC and its event programming, you can consult their website and follow them on Facebook.
