About me

I was born in the city of Rennes (Brittany) but I spent my childhood in Nantes (Seattle’s twin sister).

By the time I was a teenager, my parents moved to the small city of Cholet.  Later, at age eighteen, I moved to Angers in the Loire Valley, where I was a full-time music student for a year. At the same time, I graduated before studying English and Italian at université Angers.

At 20, I decided to move to Paris because I had a strong interest in Art History, Archeology, and History of Cinema. Today, after having spent so many years in the French capital, I can feel and say that I’m a “Parisian.”

At the Université of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne I obtained two diplomas: a Bachelor’s degree in History of Cinema and a Master’s degree in Art History and Archeology. In that field, I conducted research on Italian drawings from the Renaissance for five years. At that time, I wrote a catalogue for the Louvre Museum and a long article on the history of drawing for an encyclopedia published by Hachette. I also had the privilege of spending a year at the Villa Roberto Longhi in Florence, thanks to one of its international scholarships. 

Nevertheless, I didn’t embrace Art history as a career. Instead, I became a school teacher, which allowed me quickly to move to the United States and teach French.

From 1999 to 2003, I taught first at French Immersion School of Washington (Bellevue), then at The Lycée Français d’Austin, Austin, Texas. After that experience, I returned to France in order to specialize in teaching French as a Foreign Language and French literature as well. I obtained a Master’s in FLE and a Bachelor’s in French Literature.

At the end of 2009, back in the United States, I started teaching again at FISW. Since, I have kept focusing on French teaching for native and non-native speakers and sharing French culture.

ATodays an independent teacher I only teach French. I try to share the best of French culture, i.e. for me its literature and its history, with all my students, young or adults.

Philosophy

Having introduced classical guitar to children over the years, I see the teaching of the French in the same manner as teaching music. It is highly customized and personalized to the individual.

Each learner, whether child, adolescent or adult, is unique. Skills, motivation, etc. vary from one pupil to another. For this reason, I try to identify the best course for each student’s specific needs, and then I choose, for a given time, the method of teaching that is most suited to those needs.