Skip to main content

An easy web search task


Here is a nice reading-focused lesson which could be done in a computer room or on laptops/iPads. It's what used to be called a "web quest" activity. Essentially the students go to the Gites de France site and search for a gite of their choice, completing a vocab list along the way. That might be enough for you, but if you want to give it a communicative twist, a few possibilities spring to mind.

1.  Students find five gites, rank order them by different categories, e.g. price, facilities, area, size.

2.  When students have chosen a gite they work in pairs, with one person describing their gite to their partner, who must note down the description.

3. Pairs choose a gite together, then draw up a luggage list for the trip and plan five activities to do in the area (as if they were planning a short holiday break).

4. In pairs, students look at each other's choice and discuss the pros and cons of their partner's choice. They agree which of their choices is better.

5. Give students a profile of three potential gite renters, e.g. age, preferred style of house, preferred region, price limit, type of activities they like (e.g. beach, mountains, town, country). They need to find a good match for each of the people, then justify their choice to a partner.

All these activities might be recommended for a high-flying Y9, or more likely, a motivated Y10-11 class.

Here's my worksheet on frenchteacher.net. Feel free to copy and adapt. Better still, shell out £30 for access to well over 2000 resources!!

On loue un gîte

Allez au site www.gites-de-france.com

Sur la carte interactive sélectionnez une région sur la carte.

Il vous faut un gîte pour 6 personnes, avec 4 lits. Vous ne voulez pas payer plus de 550 € par semaine. Trouvez 3 gîtes qui correspondent à vos besoins. Cliquez sur les photos et notez, en anglais, les équipements de chaque gîte.

En ce faisant, complétez la liste de vocabulaire ci-dessous :

Consultez wordreference.com si nécessaire (ouvrez une deuxième fenêtre).

Français                     Anglais                       Français                     Anglais

rez-de-chaussée         ________________    chauffage                    ________________

insert                           ________________    chambre attenante      ________________

lit bébé                        ________________    maison mitoyenne      ________________

lave-linge                     ________________    draps fournis               ________________

cheminée                    ________________    coin cuisine                 ________________

deuxième étage          ________________    animaux autorisés       ________________

mobilier de jardin        ________________    congélateur                 ________________

maison rénovée          ________________    lave-vaisselle              ________________

tarifs                            ________________    micro-ondes                ________________

buanderie                    ________________    terrain clos                  ________________

salle d’eau                   ________________    séjour                          ________________

pelouse                       _______________      piscine chauffée         ________________

 

Quand vous avez choisi votre gîte préféré et complété la liste de vocabulaire, présentez votre gîte à un partenaire ou au/à la prof.

Travail écrit : Mon gîte idéal   120+ mots

Comments

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,