In Nice, Ukrainian children take French lessons and find a smile

Since March 21, French courses have been offered in Nice to children and teenagers (from 11 to 18 years old) but also to Ukrainian adults. First installed in the premises of the former Saint-Roch hospital, the classrooms were transferred to Parc Phoenix to accommodate more people. With two-hour sessions, more than 200 students per day are welcomed here.

To introduce them to the basics of the French language, the organizers called on Ukrainian French teachers who had also fled their country at war. At the heart of this system, the Francophonia association, which offers educational training for teachers and students of French as a Foreign Language.

The structure called 120 French teachers in Ukraine “to tell them that we could find solutions for them in terms of accommodation, catering, in exchange for giving a little of their time. But some are too afraid to cross the country, they are with children and are afraid of the risks.”, confided the director, Yann Librati, to our colleagues 20 minutes from Nice.

To accompany their Ukrainian counterparts, professors, French, retired, were solicited. Marie-Laure Tuillier is one of these volunteers. Besides learning the language, for her, “what is important are the rituals, these little activities that will be repeated every day“.

These children who have lost all their bearings need to find a routine, reassuring structures. The benefits are already being felt, as Nataliia Putivtsev, professor of French at the University of Kharkiv, observed: “They start to smile, they become more open, because here the atmosphere is warm”.

According to the director of the Francophonia association, it will be necessary “about three weeks for students to have the basics of French”. A step that should allow children to integrate a school, why not when they return from the Easter holidays.

780 people signed up for two hours of lessons a day, Monday to Friday. So far, the city of Nice has welcomed 1,600 Ukrainians out of the 30,000 who have entered French territory.