The French Escapade

Salute! Comment ça va?

Just the other day, I came across a notebook and chuckled because it had something scribbled in French in my writing.
It was in 2009 when my daughter took French as third subject. We told her as we have not studied French, we won't be able to help her and she has to solely rely on the school teachers. One day she came crying that she cannot understand in the class. French was a new subject and the school only had two French teachers but unfortunately the teacher wasn’t great. Nothing she wrote or said could be understood.
Being a mother, I could not bear to see my daughter like this, however the options were limited. Right then I knew I have to step up. I had no clue about this foreign language it was as foreign as it could be to me. Back in 2009 it was not very common to have access to internet at home. So now here we were, mother-daughter stuck with the French book which school had assigned.
Damn it! No English word in sight no matter how hard we tried. The only saving grace were the tiny pictures drawn in the corner of the book. Looking back, it was hilarious how we used to struggle and would jump if we could make out some sense from the pictures and text. Now one can imagine a mother's plight and pride. While I might not have been of great help, I wanted her to know she was not doing this alone and no matter what she would always have my support. What else could I do? Send her for tuitions? NO way! Well, we (me and my husband) feel that if kids know the option of tuitions they would not be attentive in the class and would not try to work hard. Somehow the year passed and she managed to pass her French exam too.

Next year she got a good teacher so a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. When I look back I feel, that was a good decision in two ways (1) it has made my daughter sincere. She doesn't want to miss school because she understands the value of hard work and that whatever is being taught in the class is important.
(2) it helped me and my daughter bond together.

I made it a point to sit with her while she studied and would ask her questions that I vaguely remember reading 7 years ago. She is still doing French and doing very well. We always have a good laugh when we remember those days.