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It’s story time and the students sit on the carpet in the front of the classroom. The teacher sits on a chair facing the students and reads to them “L’arbre Genereaux”, or “The Giving Tree”. The students pipe up often and read along in French because they know how the story goes. Hung from the ceiling are the students’ artwork. One reads, “Je mange les pommes. Miam! Miam! Elles sont bonnes!”

Down the hall is another classroom. The students sit on the blue carpet in the back of the room and play a letter and word game. In French, the teacher asks for a word that begins with “P”. Kindergartner Maggie McKeown, in her red, white, and navy blue plaid jumper, replies, “un pirate”, and giggles.

McKeown, along with her 134 fellow kindergartners, attends Académie Lafayette, a Kansas City kindergarten through eighth grade French immersion public charter school. Immersion means the core curriculum is taught entirely in French. By 8th grade, graduates are fluent in the language. For that reason, some interviews for this story have been translated into English.

“[The students] come out well rounded,” kindergarten homeroom teacher at Lafayette and former student teacher at STA for Ms. Alice Amick, Katherine Suarez said. “They know all the subject matter they should, but also in a different language. For me, French is not the goal for school. French is the means for teaching.”

But how do the seven kindergarten teachers teach 5 and 6 year olds how to speak French? According to Suarez, kindergarten is like acting. She said the kindergarten teachers use theater, repetition, and visuals to teach, but every teacher uses their own techniques they like.

Yael Israel, a French native kindergarten teacher at Lafayette, said during the students’ first year they learn basic French conversation phrases, a lot of vocabulary, and letters and sounds.

“We start orally,” Israel said. “We focus on the language. In immersion environments, it’s not possible to do grammar with kindergartners.”

Senegalese fifth grade teacher Mr. Jean Claude Diatta compares the French learning process in kindergarten, to babies learning their native languages.

“It’s more the communication,” Diatta said. “[Babies] learned to speak English from repetition of their parents. The parents didn’t teach grammar and things like that.”

Suarez said the French immersion is a difficult process at first and the first few weeks have to be gentle. She says learning another language is all about the confidence.

“[The first day] I get a lot of weird looks,” Suarez said. “I get, ‘Can you just say it in English?’ But [the students] are trying so hard. I just let the class flow and guide the learning.”

According to Israel, although learning another language is hard, the kindergartners generally enjoy learning the French.

‘At the beginning it’s hard for them,” Israel said. “But once they realize what they’re accomplishing they become proud. I think they like knowing something their parents don’t know.’

According to Diatta, the benefits of speaking a foreign language are endless.

“When you speak two languages you can embrace more people,” said Diatta. “You are like an agent of peace [for other countries].

Suarez agrees and said the immersion program is challenging and allows students to be critical thinkers.

“Here, parents can’t always help [with schoolwork] because they may not speak French,” said Suarez. “It forces [the students] to work harder.”

When the students finish reading “L’arbre Genereaux” and finish their game, they continue their usual kindergarten day with the rest of their studies.

Eight years from now McKeown will still be wearing her red, white and navy blue plaid jumper, but now she will be fluent in French and bilingual.

“[School is] awesome,” McKeown said. “It is just awesome.”