French Language (Beginner 1)

Mention French dressing to a French-speaking person, they will probably think you are talking about fashion. Offer une assiette anglaise to an English-speaking person, they might expect to see a Blue Willow pattern. From one language to another, phrases often travel in mysterious ways.

But however arcane or straightforward the route, the journey is always an adventure, a re-invention, a challenge. The challenge of thinking in a language where anything is a he or a she, where the noun takes chronological precedence over the epithet, and where an accented letter can make all the difference.

French was mainly shaped by Roman and Germanic influences over about 1,000 years and was officially born with the signature, in 842, of the Oaths of Strasbourg, a treaty of political allegiance generally considered to contain the earliest texts in a language that is distinctly French.

Today, French is spoken, written, and sung by an estimated 160 million people in over 50 countries across the world. Recognized as one of the three major international languages, along with English and Spanish, it belongs as much to global business and politics as to contemporary artistic and literary expression.

By the end of this course, students should be able to understand familiar words and everyday expressions and read and write simple sentences and statements in the present tense, including in basic interrogative and negative forms.

They should be able to greet others and introduce themselves, and to ask and answer simple questions (such as personal details and likes/dislikes).

Outline:

Saying hello and greeting others

• Alphabet and numbers
• The date and the time
• Introducing yourself: saying who you are and where you live
• Talking about your family and relationships
• Talking about likes & dislikes

Grammar and Construction

• Basic phonetics and sounds
• The noun: gender, articles
• The verb: forms, grammatical persons, conjugations
• The present tense: regular conjugations and some essential non-regular verbs
• Être (to be) and avoir (to have)
• Adjectives and adverbs
• Where and when: places, dates and time
• The basic negative form
• The possessive adjectives (my, your, etc.)
• Asking a question: the interrogative form
• The preposition in front of a city and a country