Physically distant, but socially together—the Alliance Française is finding a new way to do solidarité
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On a typical weekday evening, the Alliance Française building in Turner was once a hive of activity.
Its classrooms are full of Canberrans getting their mouths around French vowels, the main hall hosting casual dinners that showcased delicacies from different regions of France.
No longer. The building now stands empty. In a hiatus. The action has moved elsewhere. On the door a sign reads “All our classes are now online!”
Scattered around Canberra suburbs, people are logging into their classes and saying Bonjour through their phone or computer.
Some are already in their pyjamas sitting comfortably on their beds, others are multi-tasking and getting the dinner on for the kids. But for all, it’s a time to reconnect with people they used to meet at the Alliance Française building once a week, a time to share the usual language-learning jokes with classmates and be jollied along by the ever-enthusiastic teacher. It’s also a time to disconnect from the all-pervasive vibe of the Coronacrisis.
Inspired by a desire to keep us socially together at a time when we need to be physically distant the Alliance Française has made the biggest change in its 75 years in Canberra.
“We are a community organisation with a big heart that aspires to be open to all,” explains its director, Patrice Gilles. “Many of our students are in the at-risk age brackets. So we knew that to keep them safe, we would need to enable them to learn from home.”
The Alliance Française team. Note: photo taken before social-distancing regulations.
So within the space of one frantic week, around 350 students and more than 10 teachers simultaneously launched themselves into the unknown: from physical classroom to virtual teaching space.
To everyone’s delight, almost all made it through the teleportation to arrive in their virtual class, ready to continue their French language journey.
Oddly enough, this change has made the class experience more social and just ever so slightly more intimate as the classes go into people’s homes. Dogs bark in the background, and children sometimes come wandering in to ask a question. These impromptu interruptions can even become springboards for exploring different subject matter during the class.
As human beings, it is not in our nature to be socially isolated creatures. We thirst to encounter other people, to share our experiences and to be buoyed up by social interaction.
At this time when we all have to be physically distant, we need to find ways to meet this deep social need to be with each other. And the Alliance Française is using the language and culture of France to help meet that need, taking as its motto—#EnsembleEnligne—Together online!
NOTE: For the week 6-10 April, the Alliance Française de Canberra is offering a 15% discount off all Term 2 courses starting 28 April. See www.afcanberra.com.au
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