A French student walks into room 403, and sees posters around the room showcasing French phrases they’ve been practicing for years. The student also sees, a replica of the Eiffel Tower that their teacher has spoken so vividly about. Then, they notice a familiar figure sitting at the teacher’s desk. They recognize this to be Madame Guerriero, the French teacher down at the Middle School.
Madame G, as she is known by her students, has been teaching French for 20 years at River Dell Middle School and is now beginning her first year teaching French at the high school.
Madame G is now the teacher for 5 different French courses: French 1B, French 2, French 3, French 4, AP French 5. In the morning, she teaches here at the high school, and in the afternoon she drives down to the middle school to teach her French 1B courses. A tiring, yet rewarding experience for Madame Guerriero.
Madame G isn’t the first teacher to be moved up from the middle school to the high school. Mrs. Del Piano, one of the English teachers at the high school, also moved up from the middle school and one piece of advice from her was to, “Find a mentor or colleague who can give you a strong sense of what’s expected of the students and what’s expected of [the teachers].”
Madame G is beyond thrilled to be up at the high school teaching these new courses. When asked she said she was most happy to be reunited with her students, teaching the AP French course, and taking over the French Honor Society.
The feeling of affection is mutual between Madame G and her students.
Madame G explains that she enjoys getting to see them again because, “I know them all and it is just wonderful because it feels as though we never parted.” She is especially excited to reunite with the seniors who she hasn’t seen in the longest time.
Natalie Spitzer, a senior at River Dell, mentioned that she is very pleased to have Madame G back, “I’m very passionate about the French language and culture so it’s really nice to have a native French speaker who I can practice more with.”
When it comes to the AP French program, Madame G feels very lucky and positive about teaching such an advanced course designed to enrich students in the French language and culture. She loves the Advanced Placement course because, “I love hearing them speak and express themselves in such an advanced way.”
Guerriero mentioned that they work on many debates, cultural comparisons, and writing properly in French. But, affirmed that what makes her happiest is when she hears the students speaking French.
Madame G has also taken over the French Honor Society. The society has already had it’s first few meetings and a bake sale! She mentions that activities are open to suggestions but some of the ones people have suggested are: watching French movies, donating money to schools in need, and providing peer tutoring to students in need. She is also hopeful that more French students will be able to qualify to enter it in the near future.
When Mrs. Correa, the assistant principal at River Dell High School, was asked why it was decided to move Madame G up to the high school she said, “the driving force is low enrolment numbers in the French program, especially at the High School level, and not as many staff members are needed to run the program anymore.”
Unfortunately, this is also one of the factors as to why the French program will be phasing out soon. This means that the program will be ending soon mostly because of the low number of students that have signed up to take the class.
Overall, Madame G is very excited to be at the high school and reconnect with her students since. She is also hopeful that the program will come back someday especially because, “It has been predicted that by 2050, French will be a very dominant language since there are many countries around the world that speak French such as countries in Africa, South America, and Europe.” The future for the French program is not definite, but what is definite is that Madame G will do a stellar teaching job up at the high school.
