Quelques paroles de bienvenue
This page and its links are intended for student use in learning French and in staying informed what is going on in class. Lesson Plans are in html format on the page for each French level. What follows on this page consists mostly of references to various external websites, with a bit of discussion about what might be found there.
To figure out how to type ACCENTS in word processing programs, find some help on this page. and from the same source some nice interactive quizzes
On-line French Dictionary through L'Internaute:
Here is a basic French Language Course which may assist in understanding things covered in class that remain obscure. It presents the necessary grammar at an elementary level in what seems to me to be a pretty useful way. http://www.jump-gate.com/languages/french/index.html
This next one has been a real favorite of mine. French in Action was developed at Yale University in the 1980s. The course has 52 episodes, really only 51, since the first is an introduction in English. Each episode is a half hour video. You can watch the videos on line by accessing this website. You will need to register - it's free. Sometimes it makes you sign in and sometimes it doesn't. Finding which episode you want can also be a bit troublesome, but not terribly bad. There is a two volume text accompanying these. I have them, along with the workbooks. Since I haven't bought the audio CD's yet, the workbooks are not very useful, actually not useful at all. I've shown some of at least a few of these episodes to all levels. For various reasons, they are not our primary text. If you've got nothing to do of an evening, and can hook up with broadband speed, start off with one of the earlier episodes and soak up all you can. If you want to read a transcription of the dialogue portion of the episode - so you can use your reading skills to improve your listening skills - you can access this website for teachers and click on "preparing your lessons" before selecting the number of the episode you want. Since the course was developed and produced twenty some years ago it is a bit dated, but it is still one of the best ways of beginning to learn the language up to about an advanced intermediate level I've found, and it can definitely enhance any book and paper course quite considerably.
Notes:
(1) These videos play in a default player called Video On Demand (VOD). This can be changed to Quick Time (but I don't think you can change back) Quick Time allows you to increase the image size. I think I had to install Flip for Mac in order to accommodate this. I don't know if that's necessary for Windows users.
(2) You can get them to play automatically on your browser's default .wmv player by going to this URL -
mms://media.scctv.net/annenberg/French_In_Action_02.wmv
- which will bring up episode 2. In order to get a different episode you have to put this URL in your brower's address bar instead of the http://stuff and change the 02 to some other two digit number up to 52. I have no clue how this works, but it does.
The third comprehensive learning experience resource is relatively new from the University of Texas. A really interesting and technologically recent online course called Français Interactif. It's a complete first year college course, with video and audio files, grammar explanations, vocabulary presentations, downloadable worksheets (les cahiers), everything you could possibly want. One student is using this exclusively. I'll be introducing it in due course for enhancement purposes at all levels. You can go poke around it anytime you want. If, for instance, you're having trouble with verb forms, or pronouns, or possessive adjectives, or whatever, take a look at the pertinent grammar presentations (you'll need to open a chapter and check out its table des matières) then work on the interactive drills and tests. This allows all the practice you could wish for. You can also access the course through the University of Arkansas.
For some more listening comprehension practice, check out BBC's Ma France. This has a series of videos with optional subtitling you can use to practice your listening skills. You'll pick up a lot of information about French culture as well.
A really comprehensive gateway site is called Tenneesee Bob's Famous French Links.
Its table of contents looks like this:
* Finding New Francophone Sites
* Books and Literature
* Art, Music, Film and General Culture
* History of France and the French-Speaking World
* Virtual Francophone Tourism
* The French Language
* Press, Radio/TV, Telephone
* Education in French-Speaking Schools
* French across the Curriculum and in Everyday Life
Check it out for additional stuff about practically anything French.
Kaolin's Partons Vite at YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Hdeypv4vuY
Lyrics - Partons Vite
Introduction to Paris by means of a slide-show presentation from Mme Brenner - very nice over-view of la Ville Lumière - Paris Slide Show
A little introduction to French Christmas traditions from the University of Arkansas:
Dustin’s project - video for Shock