Challenges in teaching a second language

In reading an insightful article written by two French Immersion teachers on exactly the topic of my inquiry question, Using an Inquiry-Based Approach in Early Childhood French Immersion (Fortier & Hamon, 2014), they discuss a poem that really resonated with me that reflects the struggles with teaching a second language limiting the ways in which students can express themselves. Below, I've posted the poem that was referenced. 

This made me think about the sacrifices that are made in an early childhood French Immersion classroom in limiting children in the ways they can express themselves by focusing on learning and expressing themselves in French in order to encourage proficiency in the language. The article presents a common problem in French Immersion classrooms when it states, "One challenge in an early childhood setting is young students are not yet proficient in their first language communication skills while being introduced to a second language" (Fortier & Hamon, 2014, p. 8). This creates a challenge in engaging in inquiry-based projects when our students don't yet have the language to express their questions and ideas. It makes it so that inquiry-based projects are sacrificing the advancement of students towards language proficiency when they have to engage in English rather than French. 

To me, there has to be a middle ground where we can let the language development progress as we still engage in inquiry. Putting pressure on the children to develop their language has not shown to be effective. They always do end up developing language proficiency by the end of the year, where they will then be able to engage in inquiry in French in the coming years. I don't want to take away the magic of Kindergarten students sense of wonder by limiting the ways in which they can express themselves. 

No Way. The Hundred is There.
The child
is made of one hundred.
The child has
a hundred languages
a hundred hands
a hundred thoughts
a hundred ways of thinking
of playing, of speaking.
A hundred always a hundred
ways of listening
of marveling, of loving
a hundred joys
for singing and understanding
a hundred worlds
to discover
a hundred worlds
to invent
a hundred worlds
to dream.
The child has
a hundred languages
(and a hundred hundred hundred more) but they steal ninety-nine.
The school and the culture
separate the head from the body.They tell the child:to think without hands
to do without head
to listen and not to speak
to understand without joy
to love and to marvel
only at Easter and Christmas.They tell the child:to discover the world already there
and of the hundred
they steal ninety-nine.They tell the child:that work and play
reality and fantasy
science and imagination
sky and earth
reason and dream
are things
that do not belong together.
And thus they tell the child that the hundred is not there.The child says:No way. The hundred is there.
Malaguzzi (as cited in Edwards, Gandini, & Forman, 2012, p. 3)


Fortier, P. & Hamon, M. (2014). Using an Inquiry-Based Approach

in Early Childhood French Immersion, Teaching and Learning Research Exchange, McDowell Foundation.