General French-Elementary Programme

This General French elementary programme is designed to provide you with a good idea of what you might cover over a typical course. It is flexible rather than prescriptive, in that it would be adapted to your specific level, aims and interests. Of course, it will also depend on the number of lessons you will have.

The topics/vocabulary or grammar won’t necessarily be studied in this order.

vocabularyTopics & Vocabulary:

  • Talking about oneself, job, family and friends
  • Asking for information about someone /giving instructions
  • Writing an email/ letter or a postcard
  • Commenting on a graph/ a document
  • Making a call/ leaving a message
  • The body/ going to the doctor & the pharmacist
  • Talking about personal tastes, likes/dislikes
  • Talking about hobbies/ sport
  • Talking about business/ job
  • Looking for a flat/ house: ad abbreviations
  • Home: describing rooms and activities in each room/ describing objects (shape, size, usage)
  • Talking about feelings and emotions
  • Talking about abilities
  • Asking for advice/ a favour/ giving advice
  • Giving your opinion
  • Suggesting/ forbidding something
  • Refusing/Accepting
  • Talking about future plans
  • Describing actions in the past/ telling stories
  • Expressing different levels of certainty
  • Idiomatic expressions/ proverbs.

french culture croissantCultural content:

  • French regions
  • French-speaking countries culture (Francophonie)
  • French etiquette: dos and don’ts in France
  • French bank holidays/ celebrations
  • French etiquette at work
  • French body language
  • French cinema.

skills workSkills Work:

  • Lots of speaking/active practice & revision
  • Role-plays
  • Lots of listening
  • Pronunciation – key sounds.
grammarGrammar:
  • Review of the past tense passé composé with être and avoir + past participles (regular/irregular)
  • Imperative
  • To have to: “il faut”
  • Frequency adverbs (souvent, parfois, rarement etc)
  • The immediate past: ‘venir de’ (Ex: Je viens de finir mon exercice).
  • Word order: the adjectives
  • Using ‘on’
  • Present continous (être en train de + infinitive)
  • Relative pronouns (qui, que, où)
  • Quantities/ Partitive articles (du, de la, des)
  • Possessive pronouns/ Demonstrative pronouns
  • Past tense: “imparfait”
  • Comparatives (regular/irregular)
  • Passé composé vs imparfait
  • “Chez”+ pronoun
  • The future tense (regular/irregular)
  • Modal verbs (vouloir, pouvoir, devoir)
  • Direct Object Pronouns (ex: le, la, les)
  • Indirect pronouns  (lui, leur)
  • Passive form
  • Aims and causes (pour, parce que)
  • Prepositions
  • Pronouns “‘y” and “en”
  • Should/Shouldn’t (“devoir” in the conditional)
  • Indefinite adjectives and pronouns (tous, la plupart, quelque, aucun)
  • Si + future
  • Conditional tense
  • Use of different registers to express opinions.

All the lessons are truly tailor-made courses and customisable. I will listen to you and adapt and modify them where and when appropriate. To discuss your needs or course content, please contact me.