Part C: I live in THIS country...

OPTIONAL EXTENSION:

What is your country called in French? Some pupils may want to say which country they come from.

(See “extra words and phrases 2”)

Get used to the sounds

(c) Different countries

❑ Echoing: show the e-flashcards "I live in this country" with sound on and text off. Children echo. Now show them again, this time with text on. Children echo.

J’habite en Angleterre

I live in England

J’habite en Écosse*

I live in Scotland

J’habite en Irlande

I live in Ireland

J’habite en Irlande du Nord

I live in Northern Ireland

J’habite en Grande Bretagne

I live in Great Britain

J’habite au pays de Galles

I live in Wales

J’habite en Belgique

I live in Belgium

J’habite en Suisse

I live in Switzerland

❑ Display a map of your country, e.g. the British Isles. You ask your French speaking puppet, “Où habites-tu?” The puppet replies “J’habite en France”. Pupils echo the puppet. The puppet then asks you, “Où habites-tu?”. You point to where you live on the map, and say, e.g. “J’habite en Grande Bretagne” (I live in Great Britain) Pupils echo your reply.

❑ Use your puppet to help children practice both phrases. The puppet asks individual pupils: “J’habite en France. Où habites-tu?”. Pupils reply with the phrase that it true for them, e.g. “J’habite en Angleterre” (I live in England) or simply “en Angleterre”.

Pupils can also take it in turns to work the puppet and ask the question.

❑ Where do they speak French?

The e-flashcards show several countries where French is spoken. This might be a good point to talk with the class about where in the world people speak French. (See Talking Points).

J’habite au Canada

I live in Canada

J’habite aux États*-Unis

I live in the United States

* NOTE: accents are shown for reference, but are usually omitted over capital letters. see Talking Dictionary

❑ Play “longest sentence”

Pupils can try to construct their longest French sentence ever - using “et” (“and”) as a linking word, which pupils know from “Salut! Ça va?” They can either speak themselves or through the class puppet, e.g. “J’habite à Londres en Angleterre et j’ai un chien, un hamster et un frère.”

If pupils are confident, they could play “Just half a Minute” - in which they experiment to see what is the longest statement they can make in French without repetition. This could be done in groups using a stopwatch.

If the children enjoy this, do it regularly. Individuals could try to improve on their personal best. What is the class record?

Watch the films again

❑ Show the films again for reinforcement. Pupils will be surprised at how much they can now enjoy even more second time around.

Look again at sounds

❑ Play “It’s that sound again”

This game was first introduced in Early Start French 1. By asking pupils to pick out some distinctive French phonemes, it helps them listen attentively to French sounds in general, and so improves their pronunciation.

Now that the new words and sounds are familiar, pick out a “key sound” from this chapter’s new words. Ask children to suggest all the French words they know that also contain that sound.

You could make this a regular short feature e.g. “Today’s sound is X as in (example) . Try writing each word on the board as it is added to the list, underlining how the key sound is written - refer to the “key sounds” in this chapter and to the Talking Dictionary.

As the children’s vocabulary expands, you can repeat this with some of the other sounds. This will help them remember the French they already know.

Introducing the written word

Pupils havee already seen the French town names spelt on the screen maps and e-flashcards, so will know that, as with other proper nouns, the pronunciation and spelling of place names is often idiosyncratic.

❑ Play “find the sound”

As described Early Start French 1, place some word-cards on the floor. Seat pupils around the cards, and play music. Pupils pass a soft ball. When the music stops, you say a sound, e.g. “Find a “i”, as in “Lille”. The pupil holding the ball has to pick out a word-card containing that sound (e.g. dix, lundi) and the whole class says that word.

Spot the SILENT letters

Try this game, in which children listen to a word while they look at how it is written. You display a word on a text-card or write it on the whiteboard and tell the class the letter you have picked, e.g.“s”. As you say the word, point to each occurrence of “s”. Ask them to raise a hand if they hear that letter (YES), but to shake their head if it’s silent (NO): e.g. “Calais (NO)”; “S (YES) ars (NO)-Poteries (NO)” Try also: “samedi”, “souris”, “hamster”, “sept”...; with “t”: “salut”, “vingt”,“où habites-tu?”... ; with “h”: “Hesdin”, “huit”,“hamster”... This game can also be played as a knockout competition. You could repeat it in later sections as children learn more new words, to continue developing their ear for French sounds. NOTE: you hear the “l”s in “Lille” and “ville”, but in “Marseille” there is just a faint “y” sound. The final “-s” of “Lens” is not silent.

Cross Curricular Activities

❑ Geography - mapwork:

Give pupils copies of the two activity sheet maps of France and Nord-Pas de Calais. They can label the dots with the names of the towns mentioned in the films and the talking points. Add the names of any other French towns which are significant to them.

❑ Extended projects:

We suggest activities that can be worked on by groups or individuals throughout Early Start French 2.

Town Guide project

Pupils could develop ideas for a simple guide, in French, to your home town. It could be a printed leaflet for visitors to carry (perhaps a “trail guide” with a map), a wall display, or a multimedia presentation. When finished, find some real French visitors to try it out - such as your partner school - see Ch.2.16.

A project of this kind can develop skills in geography, design & technology, ICT, art, literacy and numeracy. You could ask your French partner school to do a parallel project.

Make an “en France” display

Make a display area in your classroom where you show what the class finds out about a French town. You could choose a town where:

◆ your partner school is situated

◆ a French person they know comes from

◆ a famous French person comes/came from

◆ you are going on a school trip. Throughout this Early Start French 2, you will discover things that you can add to the display.

“Our Imaginary Town” project

“What would it be like to be French and live in a French town?” You could discuss with pupils what they would like to include in an imaginary French town or village. As they work through Early Start French 2, they could gradually realise a model or drawing, based on what they discover and see in the films.

❑ Geography and ICT - French Railways: France has a good network of long distance trains between Paris and the main French cities. Fast international trains go to other European countries, like the high-speed Eurostar trains to London via the Channel Tunnel.

To help pupils get to know some French towns, you could choose a destination in France, and ask them to plan how to get there by rail using maps and timetables that can be found on websites and apps such as thetrainline.com and eurostar.com. They could start from Calais (the French port where cross-Channel ferries land) or from your home town. Travel could be by plane or ferry as well as by rail.

❑ Literacy - creative writing:

Pupils could write (in their own mother tongue) about experiences on a journey they would like to make to France. It might be a school journey to visit their partner school; travelling to Lens for a football match; going on holiday to the seaside or a well-known city.

Children could refer to the previous activity, and find out more about the place(s) they plan to visit from the internet, tourist leaflets, and your school library or the local public library. Local travel agents may be willing to provide illustrated brochures. Tourist Offices in France will often send brochures, leaflets, maps and travel timetables - and, of course, you can print information from the internet.

Talking point 2

‘The Hexagon’

On a map, France has a roughly 6-sided shape - which is why French people talk about their home country as “l’Hexagone”.

France and Britain have about the same population -60 million - but France is much less crowded because its land area is twice as big. One in 5 French people live in Paris, and 3 out of 4 live in towns.

■ Ask pupils to find out from an atlas map:

◆ Which seas are on three sides of the hexagon?

◆ Which mountains make two sides?

Talking point 3

Other cities in France

EXTRA WORDS AND PHRASES 3

* NOTE: different spelling in English. see Talking Dictionary

These towns are marked on the activity sheet map of France, and also shown in the presentation online: with Lille, they include the five biggest French cities:

■ The capital, Paris (pop: 11 million), is much the biggest (see ch.2.15 on Paris as a centre of fashion).

Talking point 4

Where do they speak French?

Most people living in France speak French as their everyday language - although 1 in 6 has a parent or grandparent from outside France. French is also the first language of many people in neighbouring countries: Belgium (the capital Brussels and the south); Luxembourg; Switzerland (around Geneva); and Corsica.

French-speakers beyond Europe

■ Next are Lyon and Marseille (pop: 1.5 million each) and Toulouse - all in the warm south of France, a region of growing prosperity and high-tech industries, where more and more French people want to live.

■ We also show Saint-Malo, a small historic port and one-time pirate base

In the 18th century, France had big colonies in North America, and helped the USA gain independence from Britain. , Today there are 7.5m French-speaking Canadians in Québec ; French is the main language in former Caribbean sugar islands like Haiti, Martinique, Guadeloupe; and in the former prison colony of Guyane, now famous for its rocket base.

Until the 1960s, France also had large colonies in Africa, stretching from the Mediterranean south across the Sahara desert to the Congo. French remains the main language of over 5m Africans in many countries of North and Central Africa (l’Afrique du nord, l’Afrique centrale); and on island relics of empire in the Indian Ocean like Madagascar, and in the Pacific like Tahiti French is one of the most widely learnt second languages in the world - one reason being that France attracts so many tourists. It is the most visited country on earth, way ahead of the USA, Spain, Italy and Britain.

We find out more about nationality and French speaking countries in Early Start French 3 .