Ag in the Classroom offers French resources for first time

For the first time, Agriculture in the Classroom plans to offer French resources for e-learning.

Sara Shymko, executive director, said e-learning initiatives at Ag in the Classroom are relatively new because of the pandemic.

“We have a children’s website that we kind of launched phase one of in April and we’re launching phase two of that at the end of October,” she said.

“The other e-learning modules that we just translated into French, they’re somewhat interactive so that students, whether they’re in the classroom with their own tablets, or the teachers guiding them through it, the idea is that it can be engaging for the students.”

Before the pandemic, AITC didn’t offer French resources because of limited opportunities for students to interact with farmers or do hands-on work, due to a lack of French speakers.

COVID-19 forced the organization to transition to e-learning, which gave it more chances to expand its resources, including making more available in French, Shymko said.

“So in Saskatchewan here with a growing number of French immersion teachers in school, as well as the Francophone division, there just simply are not a lot of French resources available for teachers to use. And so we felt that this was an opportunity for us to reach immersion students all across the province through these e-learning modules.”

All of AITC’s resources for Foundations of SK Agriculture are also offered in French.

“So having these e-learning modules that cover really all of the crops and animals grown and raised here in Saskatchewan, we now know that they can be taught in the French schools as well,” Shymko said. “And we’re continuing to see opportunities to translate other really popular resources into French. And hopefully, when the pandemic ends, it would be great if we could even host some events in French.”

To do that, AITC needs people in agriculture who are fluent in French, causing Shymko to put out a call to farmers fluent in the language.

The French resources are currently available on AITC’s website.