Personally, I believe that early childhood is really the foundation of our francophone communities. All of us here live in regions where the vast majority is anglophone. In spite of all our efforts, our children do not necessarily have a lot of opportunities to develop in French outside the school system. This is an important factor in giving them this foundation of their francophone culture and identity, which they will be able to retain later on. These young people start out in English from a very early age, English is not a problem for them, but it will be much more difficult for them to rise to the same level in French later on.
This is readily apparent in the French-language primary schools. It is very easy to determine which students have grown up in a francophone system. They already speak perfect French and, in many cases, English as well. Children who have not spent a lot of time in that kind of system have enormous problems. They are years behind from an educational standpoint, since they have a very poor, even non-existent base in French.