It's funny, though. I am only taking four courses this semester, and I am only on-campus for three days of the week, but by last Friday, I was SPENT. There is much to learn, and I know that a few of these courses will be intellectually exhausting as we begin to cram in knowledge of our provincial curriculum for our subjects of choice, and as we begin to prepare our professional portfolios.
All Teacher Candidates (TCs) have to create a professional portfolio. These portfolios include our philosophy of education statement, our resumes, some "artifacts" (basically samples of activities or lessons we have planned, and a summary of whether or not we implemented them, whether it was good, etc) and so on. As a language teacher, my portfolio will also include a separate "portfolio langagier" (language portfolio), which also highlights our linguistic identity(ies) as well as our strengths and weaknesses in the French language. Over the weekend, I began to work on this portfolio langagier, since the rough drafts of our statement on our linguistic identity and of our "plan d'action" detailing our strengths and weaknesses are due at the beginning of October. Unfortunately, the process of creating the statement on our linguistic identity has opened a wound which I have been struggling to keep shut for a very long time.
I am an anglophone by default. I am bilingual by choice. My parents both speak English, as does my entire extended family. I am less of a francophone these days as I am a francophile. I love French culture, French movies, French music, and I stand up for myself when people say disparaging things about the French people (a defense that I have had to make several times to people who just don't understand that country I love so much). In my heart, I am as much a franco as someone who was born and raised in France or Quebec. However, aside from a painfully short trip to Quebec City for our grade 12 French class, I have never visited any francophone country or region, ever.
That statement might not sound terrible to you, but it has been a source of my inner turmoil for several years. I struggle even now to try and talk about it.
My family has never been that well off. We lived *comfortably*, but we were never in a place where we could splurge on many things. We never went on vacation, except to a cottage that we would rent from a parishioner that went to my father's church. I think my parents visited England once, in 1980. That was before I was born.
Because I was gifted in French, my teachers always tried to tell me that I should go on an exchange to France. I adored this idea, but my family could never afford it. Each year in high school, I was approached by different people (my French teacher, members of the Rotary Association, among others) and asked if I would consider going abroad. I always had to respond that I would love to, but I couldn't. In university, my program offered a third-year exchange to Nice. Couldn't do that, either. My friend-now-fiancé S planned a trip to visit his mother who was living in France a few years ago. I would never have been able to fund the trip myself with my financial aid, so I asked my parents. I think you will have seen a pattern by now.
It goes well beyond the idea that I simply "couldn't" go.
It has taken me some time to think of an appropriate analogy, so here is my best effort.
Let's say that your family is Irish. You are extremely proud of this heritage, and you do what you can to honour it by eating Irish food, listening to Irish (and Irish-inspired) music, trying your hand at the Gaelic language and dreaming of the green fields of Eire as you sleep. As far as you are concerned, you are an Irish (wo)man in a Canadian's body. You are given a great opportunity to tour Ireland with some friends, who like the idea of going to Ireland, but who aren't simply innately Irish like you are. But you? You cannot go.
That has been the story of my francophone existence since the beginning of high school.
Studies have shown that people who are immersed in a culture and language pick up on it much faster (minus the grammar, which usually suffers without formal instruction) than those who are forced to simply study the language in school. My beloved colleagues in my FSL foundations course have, for the most part, spent time in a francophone region, whether for an exchange or working as an ESL teacher in a francophone country. Their French is melodic and natural. They don't struggle to find their words, and they don't have to think about the translation of basically anything from English into French. But oh man, watch out, because if they have to recite the rules of the subjunctive...I guess I'll excel?
The major problem with this self-reflection, such as my portfolio langagier as well as this blog, is dealing head-on with pain which has been tucked away for a long time. But I suppose that's the point?
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