How to Teach French

Teaching French can be an enjoyable and rewarding career. It is a challenge though to teach your students all of the important aspects of the language while keeping them motivated. Follow these steps to keep your students engaged as they learn to speak the language of love.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Expose your students to French auditory materials during each lesson, especially during the first few lessons. Play French songs, movies and audio CD's in class so that they hear authentic French accents from the beginning of their language training.

2. Make sure each student speaks a substantial amount of French in every lesson. Direct the students in spoken repetition exercises, have them converse in small groups and ask them to give French presentations on interesting topics as they progress.

3. Begin teaching French grammar and verb usage early on so that the students can form sentences right away. Start by teaching the present tense of the verbs être, avoir, aller, faire and venir. Then move on to the present tense of the regular "er," "ir" and "re" verbs and finally to all other commonly used irregular verbs.

4. Present the other verb tenses such as: the near future (le futur proche), the recent past (le passé recent), the past tense (le passé composé), the imperfect (l'imparfait), the future (le futur simple), the imperative (l'impératif), and the conditional (le conditionnel). Teach the subjunctive and other more complicated tenses to fairly advanced students.

5. Teach the students useful phrases and vocabulary words that relate to real life situations that they may encounter when traveling to a French speaking country. For example, knowing how to ask for and give directions, order in a restaurant, make a hotel reservation and discuss train and flight schedules are practical conversational topics that will help your students navigate during their time abroad.

6. Incorporate reading and writing into each lesson. Assign interesting articles and books for your students to read to further their comprehension of the language. Ask them to write short paragraphs and eventually full papers on the readings to sharpen their French writing skills.

7. Integrate exciting information on French culture, literature, travel, history and politics into each lesson to keep the students' attention and to educate them on more than just the language itself.

Tips & Warnings

• Be creative. Design fun lessons that relate to your students daily lives so that they can actually use what they're learning on a daily basis.
• When you test your students, include listening and reading comprehension sections as well as oral, grammar, vocabulary and writing sections on each test.
• Don't rush through the lessons. Many students may have difficulties learning French, so make sure to cover each topic in depth so that your students thoroughly grasp each concept before moving on to something new. Provide extra help to those who are struggling with the material.

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