Las mujeres como blanco de la guerra.

Although at the beginning of the research, I was not aware that my teacher participant would be assigned to teach full-day kindergarten, we began to address some emergent L2 learner issues during our conversations. In a full-day kindergarten French Immersion program, students are expected to take part in the same learning as L1 learners, with an additional language of

instruction and engagement. Hickey and de Meijia (2014) express the belief that young children are naturally motivated to take part in playful activities. Furthermore, emergent L2 learners are less self-conscious about errors or mistakes that they may make while beginning to learn a language. As a future kindergarten teacher, this information was vital for the teacher participant.

Her role in the classroom would be to facilitate the French learning through engaging teaching, stories, meaningful activities, and conversing with her learners. The teacher should be

aware of her students’ ability to take the language further than perhaps emergent older students would be able to if they were coming into this type of program. Younger students would have the ability to take part in play-based activities and actually 'play' with the language and willingly take risks. However, with the full-day kindergarten program comes another piece of the puzzle in the person of the ECE.

ECEs and teachers should be working closely with one another, and the teacher

participant and I discussed some possible ways to make this happen in the classroom. Bjorklund et al. (2013) write that it is important to prepare teachers on how to provide children with the target language. Especially in the type of situation that the teacher participant faced, with a solely English-speaking ECE, the two educators would have to work together cohesively to develop strategies so that they could both be involved in the teaching and learning of the L2. It would be helpful for teachers and ECEs to prepare activities that they could both execute, based on the flexibility, open-mindedness, and willingness of the ECE to take on these tasks with his or her developing French language skills. Examples of such tasks include creating language portfolios for students, designing documentation boards, and scribing students’ ideas. If the ECE was not comfortable, then the teacher would have to deliver this material to the students while the ECE was given another responsibility. For example, the ECE could circulate in the classroom, listening for key vocabulary that students use in their activity centres. Of course, there would always be the risk that the children would have some exposure to the L1 in the L2 classroom, particularly with half of the teaching team speaking mainly English. However, the ECE could facilitate basic discussions in the L2 using pre-taught vocabulary.

Hickey and de Meija (2013) stress the need for an L2 classroom to contain only the target language. It is crucial for material to be conveyed to learners, especially first-time French

students, exclusively using the target language. There is a structural problem with the program that cannot be resolved easily. The full-day kindergarten program seems to cater only to English classroom settings, since the teacher and ECE would both be well versed in the target language, which is English. However, it seems as though, as the teacher participant identified, the

government did not fully consider how the program would ‘look like’ and ‘sound like’ in a French Immersion classroom. Placing an English-speaking ECE into the classroom does not meet current standards for immersion learning.

It is compelling to think about how and why French Immersion students are seen as parallel to English students given the linguistic disparities to make it appear more palatable to parents concerned that their children might ‘fall behind’ in an L2 learning environment; an observation Lyster (1990) made almost three decades ago. If a program is deemed beneficial to learning in an L1, it does not necessarily mean that the program can be easily transferable to an L2 environment. What the full-day kindergarten situation is creating is that of a forced, contrived environment that is not only hindering L2 growth, but also the growth of the educators. English- speaking ECEs are not able to fully use their knowledge and capacity to teach and learn with students because of the language hindrance. Hickey and de Meija (2013) also echo a concern that the teacher participant discussed, namely that teachers revert to English when they become tired or they see the level of frustration in the student is escalating.

The teacher firmly believed that with the English speaking educator in the room, the French Immersion program had now become a half-English program. The teacher participant’s feeling is significant because many French Immersion teachers strive to speak to their students in the target language, but when children become frustrated, teachers automatically switch to the language in which students are more comfortable. This may not only create an issue for ECEs,

but it is one that teachers must face as well. The teacher participant revealed that although she attempts to read French books, she needs to modify what the book says, causing the book to lose meaning. She then becomes frustrated and finds an English book. The teacher’s personal struggle to consistently use the target language in the classroom undermines the purpose of the program and the CEFR itself. This situation impedes the students’ L2 language acquisition (as is

discussed in the next section). Hickey and de Meija (2013) agree when they write that teachers translate material in the L1 to get past supposed weaknesses in the L2; however, these actions actually hinder their students’ L2 language acquisition. If students are expected to gain confidence, fluency, and positive attitudes towards the L2, then teachers must also model this and use only the target language, for the benefit of the program and also the students.

The English-speaking ECE issue creates a sizable challenge for full-day kindergarten programs in the French Immersion context. It adversely affects the students’ L2 acquisition when the program is basically reduced to 50% French exposure. The teacher participant believed that there is a lack of consideration from the government for French Immersion learners in creating this stumbling block for the early years programs. The problem that remains is that full-day kindergarten French Immersion teachers are supposed to create an L2 classroom culture for students, yet the hired ECE speaks only English. This need to be addressed, as adopting the English full-day kindergarten model cannot happen without further consideration or analysis of how the program affects the L2 classroom.