Louisiana has a long history with French. This immersion school aims to keep it alive

Inside a small school down the bayou, southwest of New Orleans, two second-graders sit at a table covered with flash cards.

One card has a picture of a smiling alligator on it, along with different words for the animal: un alligator in standard French; un cocodrie in Cajun French; and then there’s caïman, a native word used by some Louisianans.

The students, Juliet Verdin and Lana LeCompte, say they like un cocodrie best because it’s fun to say: a short co-co sound and a long dree.

Juliet and Lana attend École Pointe-au-Chien, a new public French immersion school in Terrebonne Parish, La. (École means school in French, and Pointe-au-Chien, or point of the dog, is the name of the local Indian tribe and the bayou across the street.)

Louisiana has a long history with the French language, and while most Louisianans no longer speak it, a growing number of schools are immersing kids in it. At École Pointe-au-Chien, the focus is on teaching local French dialects first, an approach the school’s founders believe is unique in the state and possibly the country.

Like many of their classmates, Lana and Juliet’s ancestors spoke French — but the girls’ parents don’t. They’re the missing generation in a community where the language runs deep.

“When you lose the language, then you’re losing your culture,” says Christine Verdin, the principal of École Pointe-au-Chien (who also happens to be a distant cousin of Juliet’s).

That’s why her community started the school, she says, to close the gap and bring the language back, along with its local dialects.

The story of the French language in Louisiana 

Most people used to speak French in the Pointe-au-Chien community and in Louisiana, dating back to when it was a French colony.

“The way you speak tells people about who you are,” says Nathalie Dajko, who teaches linguistics and anthropology at Tulane University.

Early French influence led to many dialects. There was the French spoken by people who came directly from France. Then, in the 1700s, more French speakers arrived from what is today Canada.

The Acadians, descendants of early French settlers in Canada, spoke something very similar, “but nonetheless distinct,” Dajko says. With time, the Acadians in Louisiana became known as the Cajuns, which is where Cajun French comes from.

And then there’s Creole, a variety of restructured French created by enslaved Africans.

Native people also learned the language and made it their own, and all those dialects mixed after the Civil War.

In the 1920s, state lawmakers tried to Americanize Louisiana by requiring that English be the only language spoken in public schools.

The ban was in place until the 1970s. Dajko says by then, English was here to stay.

“You don’t have to punish somebody to tell them that their language is not valuable,” she says. “You just have to not use it.”

Because Native communities were initially kept out of public schools, they held onto their French longer. Dajko says the Louisianans who speak French today are often found in those communities. Their French is very close to Cajun, but with some small differences.

Louisiana’s French dialects vary in subtle ways in pronunciation and grammar, she says, and those variations are largely regional.

For example, in standard French, “what” is quoi and “who” is qui. Dajko says those words are used the same way in the southwestern part of the state, known as Cajun Country. But in the bayou parishes, southwest of New Orleans, qui is used for both.

She says the differences don’t mean French speakers from different parts of the state can’t communicate. They just have to listen to one another and problem-solve.

A language tool that can take you places

Verdin, the principal of École Pointe-au-Chien, is in her 60s and grew up speaking what she calls “Indian French” as a member of the Pointe-au-Chien Tribe.

“We all spoke French,” she says. “That’s the only way not to lose it.”

École Pointe-au-Chien is the first French immersion program in this part of the state. It’s open to any child in Terrebonne or Lafourche Parish, and it’s the result of a years-long grassroots effort to bring the French language back to the community — an effort supported by state lawmakers and Louisiana’s then-Gov. John Bel Edwards.

The school opened in fall 2023 with just nine kids and now enrolls close to 30 in pre-K through second grade. The plan is to add one grade a year until fifth or sixth grade.

Verdin says French is still a big part of the culture for the families who have stayed in this shrinking coastal community. She says at first, some tribe members wanted the kids only to learn native words. “And I had to say, ‘We can’t do that.’ “

Yes, the school is about preserving Indian and Cajun culture, she says, but French is also a tool that can take kids places. And if you don’t learn standard French, you miss part of the benefit.

“But you bring in our French, too. Because when they go home and speak to their grandparents, their grandparents are not going to know that a citrouille is a giraumon, which is a pumpkin,” Verdin says.

Bridging a generational gap

Autumn Voisin’s 7-year-old twins are in their second year at École Pointe-au-Chien.

Voisin says her grandmother was a native French speaker. “When she was mad, she was really fluent,” Voisin remembers, laughing.

Her grandmother didn’t teach her younger children or her grandchildren the language, she says, “so it died away with her.” Now, the family has a chance to reclaim their French heritage.

Watching her kids, Anna and Josiah, interact with their teachers who speak only French to them, “it’s amazing,” Voisin says. “They understand every word.”

École Pointe-au-Chien gets most of its French teachers from France through a decades-old agreement between the country and Louisiana to help preserve the language. Verdin, the school’s principal, says she had to get them up to speed on local dialects, and they’ve embraced teaching the language and all its varieties.

Sharon Picou oversees the school’s English curriculum. She says her Cajun dad was punished at school for speaking French, so he didn’t teach her and most of her siblings.

Picou understands some spoken French and wants to speak the language herself, but is sometimes too shy to try.

“It’s a confidence issue. I hope the French teachers don’t critique my French because I’m learning,” she says. “I can understand where the children are coming from when they’re a little apprehensive about speaking.”

Older kids spend more than half of the day learning in French at École Pointe-au-Chien, while pre-K students are taught entirely in French.

In Camille Revillet’s pre-K class, 4-year-olds are working on a math worksheet, counting boxes and drawing a line to the correct number.

Revillet asks a little girl, “C’est où les deux?” — Where are the twos?

“This is deux,” the girl replies, pointing to the correct number.

Dajko, the Tulane professor, says people have long predicted the demise of Louisiana French, but it keeps surviving.

For that reason, she’s not predicting anything, “but I think there’s a lot of hope these days in younger generations,” she says.

French speakers are no longer afraid to teach younger generations and more people, many of whom don’t speak French, are sending their kids to immersion schools.

People are excited about speaking French, Dajko says, and that’s what keeps a language alive.