So you have a list of French school supplies…
A illustrated reference (Part I)
Maybe the list you were given looks a bit like this one. If you happen to have taken French in high school, some of these words probably look familiar : stylo, for example, or crayon. Other words you might be able to guess at, like dictionnaire or calculatrice. But most of this stuff doesn’t show up in a high school French class, and figuring it out from a dictionary isn’t always easy. And so, without further ado, here is an photographic explanation of what’s on this list.
A trousse here means a pencil case, which in France is typically made of fabric (or leather, if you’re fancy) and zips closed. They’re available in any number of colors and styles, and, while this one is fairly clearly intended for a child, there are also versions intended for adults. Those tend to be smaller and more sophisticated looking.
A stylo à bille is better known as a ball point pen. In France, these Bic Cristal pens are ubiquitous, and kids will need them in four colors : bleu (blue), rouge (red), noir (black), and vert (green). You might also be able to buy erasable pens (stylo gomme), but check first. Especially in the lower grades, some teachers forbid them. They also often forbid the stylo 4 couleurs, the well known 4 color pen.
The stylo à plume, or fountain pen, might show up on your list, or it might not. If it does, you can rest assured that any decent papèterie, or stationary store, will carry them in a vast assortment of styles and at a variety of price points. They even exist in versions specially designed for kids who are still learning to write. Along with this, you’ll need to buy appropriately sized ink cartridges (cartouches adaptées). If possible, buy cartridges of the same brand as your pen. Otherwise, I highly recommend asking for help with this, since there are at least two distinctly different styles of cartridge, and they aren’t interchangeable. (Also, make sure that the ink you get is labeled effaçable or erasable. Blue ink generally is. Other colors are not.)
You’ll need effaceurs to go along with your fountain pen. These might look a little bit like dry erase markers, but they are, in fact, very different, as I learned the hard way. The white cap covers the erasing end of the pen, which is capable of dissolving fountain pen ink. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to write over your correction with fountain pen, because the new writing will also disappear, so you use the blue tip to write your corrections.
Even though French kids do most of their work in pen, they still use crayons à papier, or pencils some of the time. The Pink Pearl erasers of my childhood have been replaced the gomme blanche, which is more effective for erasing in any case. Your kid will also need a taille-crayons avec réservoir, which is to say, a pencil sharpener with a reservoir for containing the shavings.
Your kids will use shockingly large numbers of these bâtons de colle, or glue sticks, and after several years of experience, I can say that it’s worth buying this brand. In particular, they’ll be expected to glue many pages of hand outs into their notebooks, and a glue that fails to hold will result in lost papers and tears. (And yes, this is an unusually large photo of a glue stick. I’d say something about how its size is a metaphor for the relative importance of the glue stick in your child’s school experience, but that would probably be overstating things a bit.)
Sadly, as in the United States, kids are expected to have scissors with rounded tips, or ciseaux à bouts ronds for school usage. Alas, they don’t work any better here than they do there.
And finally for this list, you’ll likely need to provide some number of feutres effaçables pour ardoise blanche, or whiteboard markers.
You may have noticed that we’re far from having reached the end of this supplies list. There will be more to come (and I’ll add links here once I’ve written the others.)
If you have more school supplies to hunt down, you can find more at So you need more French school supplies: An illustrated guide Part II.
