Emma, placed in Besançon and Montpellier

I recently returned from 5 weeks in the South of France in Montpellier, and 3 weeks in Besancon as a Language Assistant through Aliore. Thank you to Soizick Chartier for supporting me throughout and always being there for me if I needed to ask any questions or get any advice from her. The family warmly welcomed me into their home and immediately made me feel as a member of their family, even their dog too.

I really enjoyed sharing my language and culture with the children and the parents, as well as being able to learn more French too. This programme was perfect for me, as I really wanted to pursue my interest in French and carry on learning it. It was a pleasure to help improve the children’s English and it was lovely to see them progress throughout my time there.

The family were also very helpful and allowed me to ask questions whenever I needed to if I didn’t understand certain words in French. I loved that they involved me in all of their activities, whereby I met their friends, their family members and we went to different gatherings which I really enjoyed. One of them also introduced me to one of their students, so it was nice to also meet up with someone my age too and socialise with different people. The family took me on wonderful sightseeing trips, and they always planned some exciting activities for us to all do.

During my time in Montpellier, I was also lucky to find a French group where I could practice my French at conversation workshops with people from all over the world which I loved, This has been an extremely memorable experience, that I will never forget and I would definitely do it again.