Coleen Persaud said goodbye to them in French

EDUCATION. The Canadian arrived from Toronto last September without mastering the language. At Aizpurdi High School, she took on the role of English assistant throughout the year.

Coleen Persaud returns to Toronto happy to be reunited with her family and her country, but sad to leave her Hendaye students and a city of which she will keep many and excellent memories. When she arrived last September to assume the role of English assistant at the Aizpurdi vocational school, she hardly mastered French, at least not to the point of conversing with the Hendayais. Largest city in Canada and capital of the province of Ontario, Toronto is located in the English-speaking part of Canada. Her students in the aesthetic and hairdressing sections also had some difficulty understanding her and letting go of chatting in the language of Shakespeare. At the center of this unlikely dialogue, English teacher Maider Chena-Basanta made the connection. At the end of the school year, Coleen is now speaking good French, sprinkled with a few "local" expressions, and the students are ready to tackle all subjects in English. Better understand a culture An alchemy more than a miracle: a few doses of grammar, vocabulary, and a lot of conversations with broken sticks carried out during activities in small groups on the most diverse subjects, far dictionary and textbooks, helped to establish the confidence necessary to express oneself in a foreign idiom: "I was afraid at the beginning, to be so far from home, in front of a class", smiles Coleen, hardly older than the high school girls that she also accompanied to Ireland in March. At 22, the young girl intended to teach English and French in Toronto. "This internship in a French school is part of my curriculum and I have just returned a thesis on this experience. Today, fortunately, there are several ways of teaching languages". She had chosen the Bordeaux academy, a bit at random, and was propelled to Hendaye, an unknown land that she discovered thanks to the teachers and students of the school, but also to the inhabitants who all welcomed her very warmly. And then Coleen sang in church with the Bixintxo choir, often in Basque by the way: "I am a choir director at home". She did not come back for Christmas in Toronto, but she was invited to a Hendaye family, and over the months, the Canadian discovered the Basque Country: "Not only did I improve my French but I also learned to eat well. Learning a foreign language also means better understanding the culture of the country. " Coleen was not overwhelmed by the Hendaye accent "What accent? I had no problem, on the contrary, you pronounce everything, it's easy and much worse with the Acadians!", She chuckles. Edith Anselme(Southwest of May 18, 2018)