Summer Enrichment French Camp

Take Kids on a Simulated Trip to Paris to Learn Language and Culture

Apr 10, 2008

Create a fun French language adventure for day campers this summer. Children will use the magic of play and imagination to travel to France.

Give kids their passport to French language and culture with a unique week of summer enrichment. Offer a "Fun with French" camp for 3 to 6 hours each day as part of a school or community enrichment program. Children spend the week learning the French language, playing games, eating French foods, and preparing for an imaginary trip to Paris. This program is suitable for children ages 6 to 10, and the language instruction can be adapted for any level.

Learning Centers

Prepare areas of the classroom for free choice times. This is especially useful for keeping your campers busy until all of the children arrive. Some suggested centers are:

Gather the children and teach French vocabulary and expressions using visuals, props, stories, and movement. This is the time to introduce songs, rhymes, and play games like bingo, Jacques Dit (Simon Says), or Twister. General topics include greetings, numbers, colors, clothing, body parts, and animals.

Arts and Crafts

Camp just isn't camp without a craft or two. Make French flags, paint impressionist murals, string bleu-blanc-rouge pony beads onto necklaces, or try some papier maché.

Outside Play Time

Organize the children for active language games outside. Get moving with hand clapping and jump rope songs, relay races, tag and circle games. Play the traditional game of pétanque, or French lawn bowling. If your camp sessions last for several hours and you have access to a playground, the kids will probably need a break for some free play, too.

Snack

After playing outside, children enjoy French food and drink for snack time. Croissants, chocolate mousse, French bread, cheese, fresh fruit, petit beurre cookies, and Orangina are sure to please. If you have an adventurous group of kids, send home a permission slip for snail tasting on the last day. Take photos and award an "I ate an escargot" certificate to the gastronomically brave.

Trip to Paris

The highlight of a "Fun with French" day camp is an imaginary trip to Paris on the last day. Excitement builds throughout the week as the children prepare everything they need to travel: passports, boarding passes, and wallets with play Euros inside. The children can make suitcases by folding a piece of poster board in half and attaching handles made out of pipe cleaners or cardboard. The kids "pack" by clipping, gluing, and labeling pictures of toiletries, electronics, and clothing from advertisements on the inside of the poster board luggage.

The much anticipated trip to Paris is an imaginative simulation. Role-play the characters of tour guide, flight attendant, customs agent, waiter, and storekeeper throughout the day. Better yet, recruit high school French students to assist in these roles. Line up rows of chairs in front of a TV to be the airplane. The flight attendant reviews the safety information as if this were an actual flight. Once the kids' bags are stowed and the plane reaches a comfortable cruising altitude, push a cart up and down the aisle and offer drinks during the in-flight movie.

Upon arrival, a customs agent stamps passports and inspects bags. Next, the tour guide leads the children on a scavenger hunt for famous Paris monuments--posters and postcards scattered around the inside and outside of the building. The tour includes a stop at a park for games and a café for snacks . (Snails, anyone?) Finally, the tourists can visit a store stocked with French pins, pencils, postcards, flags, and tins of bonbons to purchase as souvenirs with their play Euros. For closure to the week, catch a quick flight back home.

Imagination and excitement will bring your French campers back year after year. Bon voyage!

The copyright of the article Summer Enrichment French Camp in Learning French is owned by Diane Farrug. Permission to republish Summer Enrichment French Camp in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.