Below is a list of resources available to parents, teachers and students across the province, particularly during the pandemic. The list covers the following headings: Camps, Online Learning Classes, At-Home Learning Tools and Reading. For a list of Canada-wide resources click here.
Online Learning Classes
Camp Tournesol🌻 & Brouillet Academy
Camp Tournesol is well known around the Greater Toronto Area for its fun-filled French Summer Camps, their team worked tirelessly to move quickly and begin offering virtual camps as early as March 16th to provide families in the area with quality content for their children during the pandemic.
Camp Tournesol’s sister company, Brouillet Academy, offers a variety of Virtual French Classes that can boost your child’s bilingual skills, using their Zoom platform so that families can receive high-quality French content from the comfort and safety of their own homes! Their Virtual French Classes range from lighter academic- and fun-focused classes for youngsters to more rigorous offerings for teen and tweens. They also offer flexible 1-on-1 online tutoring as well!
At-Home Learning Tools
Subscribe to IDÉLLO for free to discover every day a new selection of educational activities to do with your children between two and seventeen. You can also browse among 10,000 educational resources including thematic folders, games and videos to support your kids’ learning.
Le Camp TFO en Famille is an initiative implemented by Groupe Média TFO to support parents during this time spent at home with their families. Made for Francophones and Francophiles across Ontario, it gives them tools to help plan their days with kids.
TFO – À l’Écoute Another available educational tool you can include in your at-home learning program is the guide À L’Écoute. It includes several activities parents can do with their children, from four to eight years old, learning French as a second language.
At Language and Fun (LAF), children get to practice their French conversations through play – games, arts, crafts, music and dance.
French for the Future has opened a special Franconnexion Session registration form, making it easier for parents to gain free access to our toolkit of educational resources; the same toolkit used by schools, educators and teachers every year! Equipped with many educational resources, this toolkit contains, among other things, several activities, games, and educational videos – making it easy to learn while having fun! Receiving this toolkit is as easy as signing up and downloading the e-toolkit through the link provided.
Learn French for Kids – This YouTube video helps beginners learn useful phrases.
Netmath is a great online resource aligned with the Ontario curriculum available in both French and English. Students from the Toronto District School Board can sign in with their TDSB Google Accounts.
The French Experiment has free online lessons and course reviews, should students decide to move forward or keep advancing.
News in French allows students to take it to the next level and improve their French listening and speaking skills. The audio recording of today’s News in French is only available to members. Sign up today to gain full access immediately. Membership is just $5/month with a five-day free trial.
lalilo is an online phonics program for distance learning.
Mango Languages allows students to learn or practice French remotely. Search your library system to see if they offer access to this program
Independent Learning Courses offers free 24/7 access to the content of any of their 144 grade 9-12 online English and French courses.
Francolab has videos accompanied by educational activity sheets created by specialists to practice French.
Francolab Junior offers videos and downloadable activities for younger kids.
News in Slow French listening to the news is a great way to improve your French but many language learners find they speak too quickly!
Reading
Kid COVID Fights Back: Local author wrote and illustrated this book to help young children understand what they can do to be safe during COVID.
TFO – Boukili App: By downloading the Boukili application, you will make young children between four and eight fall in love with reading. This virtual library gives you access to over a hundred original digital books in French, to help them learn how to read.
TumbleBooks – Created by adding animation, sound, music and narration, TumbleBooks has picture books and chapter books for kids. TumbleBooks are books that you can read or have read to you.
French Read Aloud – A YouTube search has many channels with read-aloud sessions in French for kids.
L’Express is an online magazine for French Second Language students with interesting articles, games and activities.
Kanopy is a streaming service to watch films for library cardholders for FREE.
Bibliothèque des Amériques has thousands of digital French books to discover for FREE.
Alliance Française Toronto – Culturethèque French Cultural Library. Discover a whole digital contemporary French library on Culturethèque, the new e-library of the Francophone culture in Canada. Access your favorite magazines as they hit the newsstands. View concerts and shows, listen to lectures, read eBooks and comics, and enhance language skills with materials tailored to your needs. FREE ACCESS UNTIL MAY 30!
The Forest of Reading is a bilingual project of the Ontario Library Association. Access to books & author resources is now open to all. It is easy to flip between English and French.
Les Petites Pommes has been helping support families and children through their French journeys since 2009. Let’s Read in French! – A new French Story aimed at FI children in elementary school is posted everyday read by founder, Mary Clements. Subscribe to their YouTube challenge to see a new video every day.