The French Club is corresponding with students overseas to increase cultural exchange and the reading and writing abilities of students.

The club has been writing to students attending the Blaise Pascal School in Clermont Ferrand, France. Ms. Ekin, the French teacher and adviser to the French Club, has encouraged more than 60 students to join the correspondence.

“It’s not only for my students, it’s for the entire school,” Ekin explained as she leafed through a stack of letters.

Students in French Club write in English and French, but anyone who is interested can communicate with the students in France by writing letters in English.

Ekin began the program last year while teaching at Ridgewood High School. She had been friends with the English teacher at Blaise Pascal for a while, so doing the exchange was a natural transition. After having very positive feedback from students and good results at Ridgewood, Ekin decided to bring the program with her to Glen Rock.

Ms. Catherine Cabantous is working with Ekin from the other side of the project. Her English students have been writing to the students in Glen Rock, and they also made a video of themselves and their school for students here to watch.

The video showcases the Blaise Pascal school, the students, and what they have been learning in their English class. Ekin explained that the video was intriguing to her French students because it helped them put faces to the names of students they had been writing to.

Ben Solomon, a junior, enjoys the program because he likes learning about the other students lives and their day to day activities.

Solomon is in French class, not French Club, and so far he has received one letter from his pen pal. He explains that even though he likes communicating with his pen pal, he feels that it doesn’t really benefit his learning in any way.

Jean Walter, also a junior, disagrees with Soloman. “It’s not like talking to someone in class; it’s talking to someone who is fluent,” she said. Being able to converse with someone through writing is helpful for students because they have the opportunity to improve their skill of the language.

As the number of participants continues to grow, Ekin begins to think about organizing a trip to France so that students can meet their pen pals in person.

“I want to do that [a trip] eventually because I know the teacher there… it’s a very safe place in France so yes, I do eventually want to plan a trip one day,” Ekin said. Although Ekin has never been to the city in France where the school is located she is confident it would be an ideal location for a cultural exchange trip.

For now, students are busy writing letters back and forth. Hopefully all people involved will get four to five letters through out the entire year.

Ekin explains that seeing mistakes made in English writing encourages her French students to be rigid with their own grammar and writing.

Photo Credit: Alethea Jadick
Students write a letter in their fluent language, and then another in the language they are learning. Students who are not French students at Glen Rock are not required to write letters in French.