Tuesday 30 September 2008

Reading

I have uploaded a couple of good papers to the Bibliography in Blackboard.

Following an enquiry from a student regarding which of course books to buy, my advice would be borrow them from the library!

Sunday 28 September 2008

SALT conference 1 November

The annual conference of the Scottish Association of Language Teachers (SALT) takes place on Saturday 1st November at the University of Stirling.
There is a varied programme of keynote speakers, 3 seminars from a choice of 29 covering primary and secondary, plus publishers' displays and freebies. The cost is £58 (£18 for students) including coffee and lunch.
It is a very enjoyable and worthwhile day.
More info online

Thursday 25 September 2008

les nombres

In the tutorials we'll be working on numbers next week. If you want a head start:-

links to lots of number activity sites here

Wednesday 24 September 2008

Carla Bruni

Je vous ai promis Carla Bruni, femme du Président Nicolas Sarkozy. Et voilà!
Quelqu'un m'a dit

young French people in Ayrshire

There are several young (early twenties) French, Spanish, German and 1 Chinese language assistants living in Ayrshire - Kilmarnock, Ayr, Irvine, Ardrossan. If any of you would like to meet them socially let me know and I will give you some more info.

French and other world languages

francophone is the French adjective for French speaking
France about has information on who speaks French, numbers and countries etc

French speaking countries here, in English!

As for the most widely spoken here are some interesting lists. Note the date of 1997. Here is another list dated 2006.



Tuesday 23 September 2008

l'alphabet


Listen to the pronunciation of single letters here

Say the word you want spelt, then

comment ça s'écrit? how is that written? eg

Votre (ton)  nom de famille, comment ça s'écrit?

A is for …       A comme …

Alphabet song Canadian choir jazzy karaoke 
abcdefg
je sais que tout va changer
hijklmn
là où le courant te mène
opqrstu
plus tard que deviendras-tu?
vwxyz
quand tu ouvriras tes ailes

usual alphabet song
abcdefg
hijklmnop
qrstuvw
qrstuvw
xxyz OK
ça c'est l'aphabet français

Nice alphabet poster showing French handwriting

Monday 22 September 2008

Quel est votre nom?

Quel est votre nom? Mon nom est Kay McMeekin

French people usually give their surname only. Mon nom est Lafarge.
and their signature is just the surname.
Otherwise they give their surname followed by their first name, LAFARGE Paul. This can cause confusion when you give your name to a French person!

Mon nom de famille est McMeekin Mon prénom est Kay

Be prepared to spell your name!

Les prénoms

Here you can find the most popular first names by year from 1940!
or this site from 1900 - 2006
What names do French people your age have? Pick one you like to be your "French" name!

Saints' days (la fête) are celebrated like birthdays in France. People will say bonne fête. Everyone knows when your saint's day is. Find out here

Comment t'appelles-tu?


Je m'appelle Kay. Et toi?


Stand in a circle and throw a soft toy randomly (or seemingly randomly - start with pupils you know will cope!) Pupils throw toy back to you. When more confident they can throw toy to other pupils.

Then, instead of et toi, use the question Comment t'appelles-tu?
This is the normal way of asking when talking to someone younger or the same age and status.

A more casual form you may be familiar with is Comment tu t'appelles? It means the same but is more informal.

The correct way of forming a question is using inversion - ie verb before subject and joined with a hyphen.

Here are the other questions and answers
Comment t'appelles-tu? Je m'appelle …
Comment vous appelez-vous? Je m'appelle …
Comment s'appelle ton père? Il s'appelle André.
or Mon père s'appelle André.
Comment s'appelle-t-il? Il s'appelle …

Comment s'appellent tes frères? Ils s'appellent Paul et Pierre. or Mes frères s'appellent …
Comment s'appellent-ils? Ils s'appellent Paul et Pierre.

Comment s'appelle-t-elle? Elle s'appelle

vous
is for adults (or plural)
Note the single -l- in the vous form
the "-t-" is there for ease of pronunciation
The "-ent" verb ending is pronounced the same as the "-e" ending

Online quia exercise

Hot potatoes ordering exercise

BEd students

Please complete this form and submit! It will save me a lot of typing!

Thursday 4 September 2008

Bonjour et bienvenue

Welcome to this blog of grammar and teaching notes to support teaching French in primary schools.