Skip to main content

Top ten free French teaching web sites for able pupils

Oh no! Not another "top ten"....

These are the sites I value the most highly for teaching my pupils aged 11 to 18 in a grammar school. They may not be the best, but they are the ones we use most. In no particular order.....

1. LanguagesOnline.

This is our favourite web site by far for interactive grammar and vocabulary work. It is written and designed mainly by Andrew Balaam from Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe. It is attractive, challenging and enjoyed by students. It can be used from the front, but is best used in a computer suite.

2. Curiosphere.tv.

This is the site I first go to when searching out listening material for A2 students. Clips are often interviews with experts ina field. The speech is clear and slow enough for comprehension, with repetition. The standard is challenging, above that required in A2 level examinations. It is a large archive covering many A-level topics. You can use Curosphere in a computer suite or from the whiteboard.

3. Ashcombe School "video quizzes"

Although the sound quality is not as good as one would like, the concept is simple and sound. Interviews with French assistants accompanied by hot potato gap fill exercises. You can reveal the transcript and see a translation. You can use this site in a computer suite or a classroom from the front.

4.  BBC Learning Zone Class Clips (Secondary French).

I enjoy using the short video extracts from the front of the class. The BBC has built up a large archive of French videos at various levels. They are a good source of situational French.

5.  Youtube.

A marvellous source of songs, slides and videos of all types.

6.  TES Connect.

The best repository of powerpoints and worksheets around. the quality and accuracy varies, but if I am looking for an instant resource, it is the place I start (after frenchteacher.net)

7.  MFL Sunderland.

This is hosted by Clare Seccombe and has a good range of accurate worksheets and other resources produced by various teachers. Some of the material is too easy for the ablest students, but there are very useful sheets, especially when it comes to controlled assessment time.

8. Languages Resources.

This is Samantha Lunn's site which has a very large range of resources, some of which are too easy for the able learner. It is not error-free, but it is easy to edit Word docs and powerpoints.

9.  Lafrancebis

This site is hosted in Japan by Christophe Bergue from Kobe University and contains,among other things, good listening material with interactive tasks good for able Y11 pupils, or AS Level students. Easy to use and interesting sources.

10.  Frenchteacher.net

Well, I couldn't omit this site as it is the one we use most. The very large range of worksheets, texts with exercises, powerpoints, lesson ideas and links, all suit able students very well indeed.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What is skill acquisition theory?

For this post, I am drawing on a section from the excellent book by Rod Ellis and Natsuko Shintani called Exploring Language Pedagogy through Second Language Acquisition Research (Routledge, 2014). Skill acquisition is one of several competing theories of how we learn new languages. It’s a theory based on the idea that skilled behaviour in any area can become routinised and even automatic under certain conditions through repeated pairing of stimuli and responses. When put like that, it looks a bit like the behaviourist view of stimulus-response learning which went out of fashion from the late 1950s. Skill acquisition draws on John Anderson’s ACT theory, which he called a cognitivist stimulus-response theory. ACT stands for Adaptive Control of Thought.  ACT theory distinguishes declarative knowledge (knowledge of facts and concepts, such as the fact that adjectives agree) from procedural knowledge (knowing how to do things in certain situations, such as understand and speak a language).

The 2026 GCSE subject content is published!

Two DfE documents were published today. The first was the response to the consultation about the proposed new GCSE (originally due in October 2021) and the second is the subject content document which, ultimately, is of most interest to MFL teachers in England. Here is the link  to the document.  We are talking about an exam to be done from 2026 (current Y7s). There is always a tendency for sceptical teachers to think that consultations are a bit of a sham and that the DfE will just go ahead and do what they want when it comes to exam reform. In this case, the responses to the original proposals were mixed, and most certainly hostile as far as exam boards and professional associations representing the MFL community, universities, head teachers and awarding bodies are concerned. What has emerged does reveal some significant changes which take account of a number of criticisms levelled at the proposals. As I read it, the most important changes relate to vocabulary and the issue of topics

La retraite à 60 ans

Suite à mon post récent sur les acquis sociaux..... L'âge légal de la retraite est une chose. Je voudrais bien savoir à quel âge les gens prennent leur retraite en pratique - l'âge réel de la retraite, si vous voulez. J'ai entendu prétendre qu'il y a peu de différence à cet égard entre la France et le Royaume-Uni. Manifestation à Marseille en 2008 pour le maintien de la retraite à 60 ans © AFP/Michel Gangne Six Français sur dix sont d’accord avec le PS qui défend la retraite à 60 ans (BVA) Cécile Quéguiner Plus de la moitié des Français jugent que le gouvernement a " tort de vouloir aller vite dans la réforme " et estiment que le PS a " raison de défendre l’âge légal de départ en retraite à 60 ans ". Résultat d’un sondage BVA/Absoluce pour Les Échos et France Info , paru ce matin. Une majorité de Français (58%) estiment que la position du Parti socialiste , qui défend le maintien de l’âge légal de départ à la retraite à 60 ans,