I don't really know much really, I only had a couple of conversations about this. One girl said that as she wasn't that good at French she felt her understanding of classes and her work wasn't as good as it could have been had she been fully fluent in the language. She switched to English and her grades went up.

Early French Immersion students learn French by hearing the language spoken by their teacher. They learn it the same way any young child learns anything - by observing and doing. They are sponges at this age. They don't know the rules of grammar - they simply learn it by being immersed in it. They learn it because it simply is. It's an intuitive style of learning. Children attending early French Immersion are experiencing school for the first time - this is all they know school to be. Some are academic, some are not, but it's not apparent until later on.

Late French Immersion students go into the program with the foundations of English spelling, grammar, etc. They learn French by rigorously learning the rules of French grammar - how first person singular verbs always end in the letters S, E, or X. (No joke!) while third person singular should always end in letter D, A, T, E (again, no joke). They memorize and memorize and memorize - it's un orange, and not une orange. It's a different style of learning. They spend two years learning vocabulary, reading baby books, and then gradually begin reading more sophisticated books as their vocabulary and grammar improves. Typically academically-inclined children enter French immersion at this stage. They're typically children who did not struggle with schoolwork and learning in the English program.

When late FI students and early FI students enter high school, typically the early French immersion students have weakerEnglish spelling/grammar skills than the late FI students, but the early FI students have better speaking skills in French. They all catch up in the end.

In BC, French Immersion is slowly phased out in high school, and students begin replacing their French classes with English equivalents. In Richmond, for example, maths is taught in English. Science and social studies (history, geography, political science, etc.) is taught in French in grades 8, 9, and 10, and then in English in grades 11 and 12, where it is broken down into separate classes (biology, computer science, chemistry, physics, history, geography, etc.), all taught in English. How children perform in these classes determine their eligibility into university.

A lot of English scientific words originated from latin, and having French gives you an advantage, for example, many elements in the periodic table are similar to the French words (Pb = lead in English, Plomb in French, Or = gold in English, or in French) etc. So it's not a lost cause.

thanks Lychee, that's a really helpful and informative post.

I agree completely with the snipped bit, but surely studying latin is more use than French in the context of the last paragraph? If you'd studied latin you'd know that gold is aurum, hence the chemical symbol Au (not Or).

Ha! That teaches me to write anything quasi scientific on a Monday morning.

In BC you can find a good amount of federal workers who don't speak French, for instance the local Service Canada office, none of the workers speak French, if you need service in French they direct you to a phone on the wall.

I know a few people in corrections and none speak French.

Obviously knowing French will help with federal jobs, but it's not always required and people do get hired without knowing French. But if you really have your heart set on a federal job and don't know anyone on the inside, French is certainly good to know. Via Rail while a crown corp and not a direct federal employer pretty much requires every employee to know both languages, the crews I have met seem to always be transplants from the east who moved out west to fill spots, I assume there is a lack of qualified folks who know both languages and live in Vancouver area who want to work for them. Not that they hire much.

Provincial jobs in BC never really mention French, although some do mention various Asian languages at times.

My GF can do the 2 language thing with her mom, her mom will be speaking German and my GF will be speaking English back as she doesn't like to speak in German, how they do it, I haven't a clue, and of course I can only understand the one side of the convo.

My kids & I do this, frequently (the 2 language conversations). Often, we don't even realise we're doing it, unless it's pointed out to us/questioned.

I also worked - in French - with another Anglo for several years. We're still friends & now usually converse in "franglais". It's easiest to share stories/anecdotes in the language they "occurred" in.

2 of my children spent some time in "anglais enrichi" classes, which I suppose is the closest Qc gets to an equivalent of FI. They acquired a certain fluidity of idiom which the 3rd child who only did ESL classes & heard English at home, didn't.

Although we'd be classed as a bilingual family, child #3 is definitely more comfortable in French (schooling language) & would class it as her 1st language.

Chinese as a second language would definitely get you the job though

it's true. I know FI is the 'political' choice for Canadians but in BC Spanish or Mandarin would arguably be more useful. Esp. Mandarin.

Korean too.

My friend worked there for a bit and actually said the reverse is true- unless you are truly truly fluent then you're ability to offend remains very high...

And for the op... We have chosen FI for our little one. Tbh to me it appears to be a no brainer. Learning two languages at this age helps childrens brain development which in turn helps them in other studies... We went to a FI info night this week and yes there is a lag in English development but all children catch up in the end. Plus the English is definitely something we can help with at home. FI won't make them bilingual but should they wish to carry on they will get there in the end when she's old to make a decision, but that's not now. I believe it's in her best interests as it stands now.

Not sure that can be a given, every kid is different and there has to be a small percentage of kids who never do catch up and remain behind their entire school life.

We're with Tirytory and Lychee on this, our daughter started in FI at Grade 1, we arrived in Canada a few weeks before the school year started, and whilst we could have got her into a non-FI school, it wouldn't have been very local for us, but it's not something we particularly investigated.
We were quite happy for her to go straight into FI, aged 5, having had one good year in Reception in the UK, before we moved out here. What a great opportunity to learn a new language. She writes in English at home, I have enough French knowledge from my time at school to help with French reading, but we're very much of the opinion that if you put her in a room with a mix of other children her own age when she's 14, I reckon the majority will all be at similar levels in terms of English reading and writing. Some will be better than others, but isn't that the same anywhere, even when there is no second language involved.
If you want to talk about small percentages, of course some might be behind the rest, that's just statistics. Sadly, a small percentage of school children will have been killed in road accidents too. A small percentage will have been diagnosed with a learning disorder, whether they had been in FI or not.
Our daughter is happy at school, she understands the French that is spoken in her class, and she responds as best she can. The FI part is for three years, then the English part of the curriculum starts. If she's behind her English-only speaking contempories in 5 years time, then this is the time we'll look at how to redress the balance.