GMS French & Latin



Conversational French - 6th & 7th Grade Optional

Mr. Dupree dupreej@ Room 128

Course Description

Conversational French is a 90-day (1 semester) course for Optional students at Germantown Middle School. In this course, students will learn the rudimentary structure of the French language in a conversational format through four thematic units: a “basics” pre-unit, a unit about describing the self, one about describing their academic life, and another about describing family. (Note that a full list of topics covered in this class can be found in the course outline below, and on the SCS World Languages Middle/Exploratory curriculum webpage at .

Course Assessments

Topics and structures will be practiced and assessed through pair and group conversation, interviews, speeches, mock pen pal letters, and through other dialogue formats. Each unit is assessed by writing letters to fictional pen pals concerning the information and structures learned in that unit.

Course Goals and Objectives

- Meeting and/or exceeding the Novice-Mid target of the ACTFL (American Council for the Teaching of Foreign Languages) Proficiency Guidelines. The proficiency targets are explained at .

Course Materials

- 1 ½ inch white binder

- College-ruled paper

- Writing utensils

- English-French / French-English dictionary (encouraged, but optional)

Course Grading Scale

All work done in the French classroom is weighted equally. For example, if a student’s averages are as follows...

Classwork = 89% Projects = 95% Quizzes = 93% Tests = 85%

...the grades would be averaged as 89 + 95 + 93 + 85 = 90.5.

Rules and Procedures

All details pertaining to rules, procedure and class protocol and expectations will be discussed in the opening days of the class. Students will learn these rules and be quizzed on them in the first week of class. These rules are:

- 1) Be respectful

- 2) Be prepared

- 3) No food or gum in the class

- 4) Speak French whenever and wherever possible

Course Outline

We will learn the following topics throughout the semester:

Pre-Unit

- Basic phrases and questions

- Classroom dialogue

- French alphabet/pronunciation

- French & Francophone geography

- Calendar (months and days)

- Numbers 0 -31, dates

- Weather

Unit I

- Personal & physical adjectives

- Hair & eye color

- Likes & dislikes

Unit II

- School supplies & locations

- People in the school

- Schedules

- Ordinal numbers

- Describing others

Unit III

- Family members

- Third-person speech

- Basic verbs être and avoir

- Basic -ER verbs

Will we also average one project per quarter. These will be scheduled tentatively, but include making a “travel brochure” of a French-speaking country or region, a family tree (real or fictional), and creating a map or model of their (real or fictional) school. Note that in the interest of creativity and valuing privacy, I give students the option of using reality or fiction in any assignment that may require them to reveal information about themselves or their families.

Student & Parent Signatures

I have read this syllabus and understand the rules, requirements, expectations, and structure of this class.

Student _______________________________ Date __________

Parent _______________________________ Date __________

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