Phonics-based "first reader" books in French?

September 16, 2013 8:23 PM

I have a child starting grade 1 french immersion, and am looking for some (very) early reading books in French. Said progeny responded astonishingly well last year to a phonics-based early literacy series in English by Usborne (this one). Can anyone recommend an equivalent in French? Is phonics even a thing in French?

Some great extant AskMe threads, here and here, but the recommendations skewed a little more advanced -- and not specifically Phonics-ish. Much prefer books that are actually fun, of course, rather than medicinal - but really looking for a very basic approach. Found a couple of phonics manuals in French, but nothing quite comparable to that Usborne series.

posted by ~ to Education (7 answers total)

I don't know for certain, but I am guessing phonics isn't a thing in French. French pronunciation is more consistent with regards to spelling than English. However, silent letters are very common, and vowel sounds are often represented by a string of letters. I can't imagine the phonics approach working well. To the extent that phonics would work, it would be the same as in English. Plus, the kid would need to hear a French speaker, right? Or do I not understand the concept of phonics?
posted by Comet Bug at 10:34 PM on September 16, 2013

Phonics is the name of the learning method, but what it teaches are phonemes. A google search for French phonemes suggested 'French phonemes kids' which means you're not the only one searching for them. I did see some early-learner stuff for French phoneme-based learning-- English-language resources for young French learners, perhaps mostly from the UK.

I think this is a great idea; for myself, I think my breakthrough in engaging French was when I figured out that I was abandoning my US-English ruleset for pronouncing words based on their spelling (and vice-versa) and engaging a new one.
posted by Sunburnt at 1:02 AM on September 17, 2013

Best answer: "Phonics" is called in French the méthode syllabique. There's been a decades-long, bitter and quasi-ideological debate in France about the respective merits of the méthode globale ("whole language" method) vs the méthode syllabique. Most teachers now use a mixture of both methods. A common "mixed method" is Super Gafi, while a common phonics book is Léo et Léa.
posted by elgilito at 1:48 AM on September 17, 2013 [3 favorites]

Best answer: My son does French immersion. The school made extensive use of this site (paid, I think). It's not phonics, but has levelled books which repeat a lot at the lower levels(The cat sat on the mat; the cat sat on the house; the cat sat on a chair etc.), so you could use them and introduce the idea of phonics yourself.
posted by mukade at 5:02 AM on September 17, 2013

My kids' school used this company as well - but the English Raz-Kids portion. Thanks for this question/answer, folks, as I was looking for something for Spanish. :)
posted by tilde at 6:38 AM on September 17, 2013

Response by poster: That's absolutely perfect, elgilito. Thanks so much for the explanation and links.

That site looks terrific as well, mukade. I actually already recognize a couple of those books from my daughter's class as well!

(I'm not sure how I feel about our interests coinciding, Tilde.)
posted by ~ at 8:42 PM on September 17, 2013

Maybe I'm your evil twin?

But we're going to spin up a free trial over the weekend. Given our past liking of Raz Kids, I can see where this will be a good resource for us if I can get around the flash requirement; we are a heavy iOS house so I may have to get some kind of Android device for the kids.
posted by tilde at 8:30 AM on September 18, 2013