Keeping Métis Knowledge Alive within a French Class

Language and culture are intertwined, especially when it comes to colonization. Often in a French class, you may find mentions of how Vietnamese can still find some trace of French colonization within the language, for example “bánh mì” coming from “pain miel.” However, we need to ensure we go past colonization into how the language continues to evolve with the culture. In an attempt to look more locally than Vietnam, a French class can begin to include Michif as the method of learning about Métis culture.

Here is a sample lesson of how Michif could be included:

In a FIF3U, using the Michif Work Book, students will be able to meet the curriculum expectations A3.1 Intercultural Awareness: using information from oral French texts, identify French-speaking communities worldwide, find out about aspects of their cultures, and make connections to personal experiences and their own and other communities and D3.2 Awareness of Sociolinguistic Conventions: identify sociolinguistic conventions associated with a variety of social situations in diverse French-speaking communities,* and use them appropriately in their written work. As an introduction in this lesson, the class could listen to this video with two Michif speakers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qT5j7HWS3qI . They class could then Think-Pair-Share some questions such as:

• What language are they speaking?

• What can you understand?

• What makes languages unique?

As the lesson develops, divide the class into small groups and give each group the Michif list of words for one category (ex. Animo). Have them work together to try and figure out what all the words are in French (you can make it a timed challenge if you wish). Afterwards, the teacher should facilitate a class discussion on what Michif is, how the language is important to culture with specific reference to Métis culture. If time permits for a fun conclusion, within the Michif Work Book, have students complete the crossword on p.34.

Within the French curriculum, there is a focus on intercultural awareness. With Michif, we are able to explore mixed languages. The introduction of the activity is listening to a video of two speakers to introduce what the language sounds like. This will help prepare students for discussions about languages and why Michif is somewhat understandable to French speakers. Then working through a few smaller activities and discussions, students will have the opportunity to see how Michif is a mixture of French and Cree. They will have the opportunity to apply their learning through trying to solve a crossword in Michif in a low-risk ability. With more time and lessons, more activities can be used from the workbook - including an entire story in Michif, which would allow for other resources from the Métis Education Kit to be incorporated

Language is very important to culture. By having Michif or other Indigenous language used within the classroom, it can make the curriculum more inclusionary - especially within French. As intercultural awareness is vital in the French curriculum, learning more about cultures, especially via language use, makes it more accessible for students who speak the language, yet gives students who do not know the second language, an opportunity to learn something new.