Lexia for French Immersion

French at school. English reading at home.

Why English phonics is so important in French Immersion.

Lark says:

The “Wait and See” trap is twice as dangerous in French Immersion.

Lark Barker, Education Director for Radical Reading, sitting at the kitchen table advising on school system failures, the science of reading and Lexia Core5.

The problem

Most FI programs in Ontario delay formal English reading instruction until Grade 3 or 4. The theory is that total immersion requires total focus.

The radical reality

You live in an English world. Your child is surrounded by English books, signs, and screens. Their brain wants to read English. But if they don’t have the code, they do the only thing they can: They start guessing. By the time the school finally introduces English in Grade 4, your child has spent their critical formative years wiring bad habits into their brain.

Busting the Myth

Will English phonics confuse their French?

Short answer: no. Phonological awareness, which is the ability to hear and work with the sounds inside words, is one underlying skill rather than two separate ones. Research on bilingual readers finds it transfers between alphabetic languages.

So the English code your child builds at home is not competing with their French. It actually supports it. The clearer a child is on how letters map to sounds, the more they can do with the French they are hearing all day.

Radical French Immersion

The ultimate bilingual strategy: French at school, English at home.

You don't need to hire an English tutor to sit at your kitchen table. You just need a short daily dose of neurological skill building.

The school builds language exposure

Let the classroom act as the immersion environment. Their job is to surround your child with the language to build French vocabulary, conversational fluency, and verbal confidence. They handle the exposure.
Illustration of a brain being wired, representing the biological reality of learning to read.

Lexia at Home builds the reading code

Let our at-home program systematically wires up their English decoding circuits. Just 10-20 minutes a day builds the rock-solid foundation they need to actually process their exposure and thrive in both languages.

Born to Speak. Wired to REad.

Build a bilingual reading brain.

Pick your grade level to learn more and get started.
JK · Readiness SK–2 · Foundations 3–5 · Momentum

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