Launch of new resource to support cultural intervention in Francophone minority settings

June 23, 2017

OTTAWA – The Canadian Teachers’ Federation (CTF) is proud to release today a new guide designed to inform and enhance cultural intervention in Canadian linguistic minority schools. This resource targets students aged 14 to 17, the prime time for adolescents as they to affirm their identity, make important life choices, and deal with an increasing number of influential factors.

Titled Pour passer de l’activité à l’impactivité (to shift from activity to impactivity), this guide is a cultural intervention reference tool that provides school personnel with a framework for reflection, a series of planning tools, and a common language.

“This ever-evolving guide is able to be adapted to constant, rapid, and complex changes, and meet the growing needs of diverse, multilingual and multiethnic Francophone communities, which are anything but sedentary,” says CTF President Heather Smith.

Cultural intervention in French-language schools in minority settings is a well established concept, in one form or another, in all regions of the country: in the classroom, where teachers act as cultural transmitters, or via specific programs of cultural activities However, people who work in cultural intervention have pointed out the lack of tools to measure the impact of cultural interventions on students.

That is why CTF, thanks to a Canadian Heritage grant, conducted this project to validate cultural intervention strategies and propose a framework that takes minority setting realities into account. The guide was developed by a committee composed of teachers and cultural intervention specialists from various parts of Canada.

“Our main objective with this guide is to make students aware of their Francophone identity and proud of the French language and culture,” adds the President.

In short, this free online guide offers:

• a definition of cultural intervention;
• tools to set the specific goals of a cultural intervention and measure its impact;
• ways to bring school staff to share resources, ideas and promising practices.

The guide will be adapted into English so that the Quebec Provincial Association of Teachers, a CTF Member organization, can have the opportunity to apply the proposed framework in Anglophone minority settings.

Founded in 1920, CTF is a national alliance of provincial and territorial Member organizations that represent over 232,000 teachers across Canada. CTF is also an affiliate of the 32-million member Education International. @@CanTeachersFed

Information:

Sara Lafrance, Acting Director, Services to Francophones

Contact:

Francine Filion, Director of Communications, 613-688-4314