AP French Language and Culture
Course Outline and Syllabus 2011-2012
St. John’s College High School, Washington, DC
Sharyn Sazama-Moreau, AP French Language and Culture Teacher: May 2012
Course Description
In our AP French classroom, where French will be the only language of communication, students
will continue to strengthen their French skills. The course is designed to further develop their
command of the French language and enhance their appreciation of French and French-speaking
culture by maximizing student involvement through real-world exchanges. To this end and to promote
our students use of technology in a collaborative way, every student will have an Ipad. Our primary
uses of the Ipad will be: 1. Online resources, i.e., their textbook, supplementary reading, and
listening/viewing material 2. Videoconferencing to permit real-world type exchanges with others
3.Organization tools and applications that allow for individual and collaborative study 4. Networking
systems for writing e.g. email, blogs, and instant messaging, to encourage alternative styles of writing.
Our class uses authentic material to improve students’ reading skills, sharpen their grammatical
awareness and broaden their vocabulary. Through formal and informal exercises that are, or are very
similar to real-life situations, students will increase their writing proficiency. They will also use only
French to communicate in class during discussions, debates, and presentations. We will use
videoconferencing, through web-based centers like Skype and Showdini both inside and outside
of class, with each other and with other students in the French-speaking world. We will set up an
exchange with a classroom in Quebec with whom we can exchange conferences, emails and
blogs. This will further develop students’ listening and speaking skills. Other listening practice
will include, but not be limited to, podcasts, radio broadcast, videos, songs and film excerpts.
Through a large variety of exercises, the AP French course will provide each student with the
foundation necessary for successful completion of the AP Spanish Language exam and/or entry
into an upper level Spanish class at the university level. This class is designed to increase all
means of communicating in French, including spoken interpersonal and presentational, written
interpersonal and presentational, written and print interpretive, and audio, visual and
audiovisual interpretive. It is intended to boost students’ proficiency in French from the
intermediate to a high level. The choice of readings and real-life settings anticipate students
making connections between their native language(s) and culture(s) and French and Frenchspeaking cultures. The year will be divided into six themes that will take a month and a half to
cover: les défies mondiaux, la famille et la communauté, la sciences et la technologie, la vie
contemporaine, l’esthétique, et la quête de soi.
General Guide to Thematic Units
(Note: Our activities may include blogging, journaling, interactive exercises, oral and written
presentations, VoiceThread, email writing, and the use of social networking. Three times during the
year, we will have videoconferencing with a sister school in Quebec. Scheduling for this must be
done in conjunction to their schedule.)
Unit 1- Global Challenges: Environment
September
• Study vocabulary associated with nature and environment.
• Read and discuss Jean Giono’s L’Homme qui plantait les arbres.
• View and discuss film that accompanies this text.
• Read, react and debate article from Portail Belgique: Quelles sont les conséquences pour
l'homme et l'environnement ? (http://www.climat.be/spip.php?rubrique17&fs=)
• Read and discuss article from metropolehaiti.com: Haïti-Environnement: La déforestation,
emblème d'une situation catastrophique
(http://www.metropolehaiti.com/metropole/full_poli_fr.php?id=17422)
• Watch an interview of a young Haitian girl about Haiti’s deforestation.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGDKHThiw-E&noredirect=1). Answer questions
concerning the interview then set-up and conduct their own interview.
• Watch and analyze video Saison des ouragans (http://www.radiocanada.ca/nouvelles/international/http://www.radio- (Saison des ouragans)
canada.ca/widgets/mediaconsole/medianet/5912925)
• Write a personal reflection blog on climate changes.
• Listen to, discuss and complete activities for Francis Cabrel’s L’arbre va tomber.
• Complete any listening and Internet activities from Sept Jours sur la Planète that correspond to
the environment.
• Grammar review: present and imperative tenses, all pronouns.
• Write blog addressing global challenges and a PowerPoint about the future of our environment
incorporating the above grammar.
• Write emails to Quebec epals about global challenges to our planet and our countries responses
or lack of responses to these issues.
Unit 2- Families and Communities
October/November
• Study vocabulary associated with family and relationships.
• Read and discuss excerpts from Mémoires d’une jeune fille rangée. (Simone de Beauvoir).
• Read Mélusine in Autour de la littérature and discuss myths and their role in defining a culture.
• Compare and contrast today’s family structures with those of the Middle Ages and the early
part of the 20th century.
• Read, discuss and react in a blog about an article from L’Express: Des responsables UMP pour
le mariage homo (http://www.lexpress.fr/actualite/politique/des-responsables-ump-pour-lemariage-homo_1053776.html)
• Participate in a debate about what defines a family in today’s world.
• Complete any listening and Internet activities from RFI Français facile that correspond to
families and communities.
• Review new vocabulary for poetry, especially “figures de style”.
• Listen to and do comprehension exercises, then read and analyze Victor Hugo’s Demain dès
l’aube. (http://www.bachlund.org/Demain_des_l%27aube.htm and
http://www.audiocite.net/livres-audio-gratuits-poesies/victor-hugo-demain--des-laube.html)
• View and listen to Youssou N’Dour’s Kirikou n’est pas grand mais il est vaillant
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ7kAfsqkKE) and do listening comprehension exercises.
Discuss the video.
• Read article and do reading comprehension exercises and written reaction to Sénégal: Youssou
N’Dour devient ministre de la Culture (http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/2012/04/05/0100320120405ARTFIG00620-senegal-youssou-n-dour-devient-ministre-de-la-culture.php.)
• Grammar review: past tenses; future, prepositions; conjunctions.
• Write an opinion of the texts discussed incorporating above grammar and addressing families
and communities.
• Write a modern version of Mélusine and update VoiceThread portfolios
Unit 3-Personal and Public Identities: Integration/Assimilation
November/December
• Study vocabulary associated with immigration and politics.
• Analyze, discuss and participate in interactive activities about French colonization and
contemporary immigration, and the dilemma of the veil.
• View, do exercises and debate Tariq Ramadan: Débat sur le voile intégral ! Part 1
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87xxGy4e3yw)
• View excerpts concerning integration and assimilation from Welcome and Persepolis.
• Discuss: being foreign in a foreign land.
• Read and discuss Gisèle Pineau’s Un papillon dans la cité.
• Listen to and discuss Josephine Baker’s J’ai deux amours.
• Complete any listening and Internet activities that correspond to immigration, integration or
assimilation on RCI Guadeloupe Radio Caraibe International (www.rciguadeloupe.fm/) or RFI.
• Grammar review: subjunctive; relative pronouns, formal and informal questions.
• Write emails to Quebec epals discussing our American identities and our countries views on
immigration.
• Write about our own personal identities incorporating above grammar and pulling in research
about our background and immigration in the United States.
Unit 4- Beauty and Aesthetics: Art, Cinema and the Performing Arts
January/February
• Study vocabulary associated with visual and performing arts.
• Present interactively and discuss aesthetics in cinema and the performing arts including a
discussion. Make connections between art and cinema (example Pierre-Auguste Renoir vs.
Pierre and Jean Renoir) and performing arts and culture.
• Watch except from Jean Renoir’s La Grande Illusion. Discuss influences (examples: This son
was influenced by his father/this film influenced other films, notably Casablanca)
• Watch Jean Cocteau’s La Belle et la Bête and discuss how it defines inner and outer beauty and
where else we see this theme in fairy tales.
• Analyze, compare and discuss two works of art: La Danse à Bougival by Pierre-Auguste
Renoir (1841-1919) and Nana Rose by Niki De Saint Phalle (1999).
• Complete a performance-based oral assessment, incorporating paintings, sculpture and film
• Read, discuss and complete activities for an article from Le Parisian: VIDEO. Record mondial
pour «Le Cri» de Munch vendu 119 millions de dollars (http://www.leparisien.fr/loisirs-etspectacles/record-mondial-pour-le-cri-de-munch-vendu-119-millions-de-dollars-03-05-20121982330.php)
• Watch the accompanying video and discuss.
• Listen to and discuss MC Solaar’s Victime de la mode
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDtqGdtLkTc).
• Have group discussions and presentations on “How do we put a price on beauty?”
• Add to their blog: Impressions about art and cinema.
• Create an imitation of any of these works for VoiceThread.
• Grammar review: conditional tenses, descriptive adjectives and adjective agreement;
possessives and demonstratives.
Unit 5- Science and Technology: Our Ever Changing World
February/March
• Study vocabulary associated with technology and social networking.
• Read and discuss excerpt from Camus’ La Peste and an article on Camus’ unfinished work Le
premier homme (http://thierrycollet-cetalir.blogspot.com/2009/01/le-premier-homme-albertcamus.html)
• Listen to an activity on sending textos and SMS.
• Read, discuss and complete oral and written activities for Didier Daeninckx Solitude
Numérique (fsf4uhavergal.wikispaces.com/.../Text_Solitude+n...).
• Read La communauté internationale à la rescousse des oiseaux migrateurs
(http://www.rfi.fr/science/20120525-communaut%C3%A9-internationale-oiseaux-migrateursafrique-eurasie) and discuss.
• Debate the pros and cons of our technological revolution using Showdini .
• Read excerpts from Natalie Sarraute’s Tropisme and compare and contrast it with our world
today. (http://www.etudes-litteraires.com/sarraute-tropismes.php and Tropisme (VI) in Autour de
la littérature.)
• Listen and do practice exercises, then view and discuss La plus grande greffe de visage jamais
réalisée (http://fr.news.yahoo.com/la-plus-grande-greffe-de-visage-jamais-réalisee.html)
• Write a blog entry addressing how the use of social networking is changing the world.
• Write a commentary to Thierry Collet on his blog (see above).
• Grammar review: Reflexive verbs, si clauses and associated tenses, especially imperfect and
pluperfect.
Unit 6- Contemporary Life: Education
March/April
• Study vocabulary associated with schools, learning and subjects.
• Read, discuss and react in writing to Azouz Begag’s Le Gone de chaaba.
• Watch excerpts from Cantet’s Entre les murs and discuss the differences and similarities
between what they see in the film and their own experiences in school. Write a blog in
reaction.
• Read, discuss and react in writing to excerpts from Camara Laye’s L’Enfant Noir
• Based on the texts about educational issues, work in groups to create a presentation that
explores different aspects of the French school system.
• Read and react to Ensemble à l’école avec Fetitsa (discriminationsegalite.cidem.org/.../fetitsa.pdf ), and compare their tale with the original Petit Chaperon
Rouge. How has the version we know now been changed and how would we change it even
further today? Reflect on how we can keep the educational lesson intact while
manipulating the story. Add this to our blog.
• Watch and comment on video: Casseroles- Quebec 24 mai 2012
(http://vimeo.com/42848523).
• Debate the rising prices of tuition.
• Complete any listening and Internet activities from Sept Jours sur la Planète that
correspond to education and other contemporary issues in the francophone world.
• Add to their linguistic journal re: linguistic differences.
• General grammar review before AP exam.
Course Materials and Resources
Primary textbooks
• AP French: A Guide to the French Language Examination, text and accompanying CDs,
2nd edition, Ladd 1998
• Une fois pour toutes, 3rd edition, Hale Sturges II et al, Pearson, 2008
• L’homme qui plantait les arbres, Jean Giono
• Le papillon dans la cité, Gisèle Pineau
• Le Gone de chaaba, Azouz Begag
Supplementary texts and resources (Samples, more may be used)
• Released AP exams
• En bonne forme, 7th edition, Houghton Mifflin 2001
• Autour de la littérature, Peter Schofer, Heinle & Heinle, 1987.
• Imaginez, Mitschke, Vista, 2008
• Point par point, exercices de grammaire française (avancé, intermédiaire, débutant),
Didier 2000
• Reprise, college edition, NTC, 1993
• Trésors du temps, Glencoe 2005
• Explorations: La littérature du monde français, 4th edition, Heinle & Heinle 2001
• La Peste, Camus
• Tropisme, Sarraute
• Mémoires d’une jeune fille rangée, de Beauvoir
• Les Contes d'Amadou Koumba, Birago Diop
• Les Contemplations, Hugo
• Passages d’enfer, Didier Daeninckx
Internet (Samples, more may be used)
• www.bbc.co.uk/languages/french
• www.tv5.org
• www.rfi.fr
• www.radio-canada.ca
• www.rciguadeloupe.fm/
• www.youtube.com
• www.lexpress.fr
• www.lefigaro.fr
• www.leparisien.fr
• www.yahoo.fr
Film and film excerpts (Samples, more may be used)
• Entre les murs, 2008
• Welcome, 2009
• Persepolis, 2007
• La grande illusion, 1937
• La belle et la bête, 1946
Songs by the following artists (Samples, more may be used)
• Josephine Baker
• Francis Cabrel
• MC Solaar
• Youssou N’Dour
Course Objectives and Teaching Strategies
The AP French Language and Culture course strives to promote both fluency and accuracy in
language use while not overemphasizing grammatical accuracy at the expense of
communication. To guide students in the study of language and culture, the instruction includes
all aspects of the target language in a variety of settings. With only French as our means of
communication, we will incorporate the four skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking, as
well as use of technology and reflections on culture in each class. The course raises students’
awareness and appreciation of culture, exploring French and French-Speaking cultures from both
contemporary and historical contexts. We will access information through a variety of cultural
products that include the tangible (books, music, art), intangible (laws, beliefs, institutions),
practices (traditions, social interactions), and perspectives (attitudes, ideas, values). There are six
groups of learning objectives used to organize our expectations of what students should know
and be able to do effectively to succeed in class. These objectives span three modes of
communication: interpersonal, interpretive and presentational. With technology at our fingertips,
the students will interact with each other and the teacher throughout the class in French both in
writing and speaking. The teacher will be the facilitator of all the learning tasks, but to assure
that spoken interpersonal communication meets our classroom standard, and that students are
continually improving, all participants in class will observe and monitor one another to see how
their meanings and information is received.
At the beginning of each week, students will receive an outline of the tasks of the week,
including homework, evaluations and presentations. Each week they will have informal and
formal oral grades and blog journal writing as well as a more formal essay writing exercise. They
may also have sessions of videoconferencing, Skype or Showdini within and outside the class as
well as email writing exercises. Their formal oral assessment will take the form of a presentation,
debate, or answering questions on material that they have been able to prepare in advance. The
informal assessment will include any participation with other students, participation in
communication exchanges inside and outside of class, in-class discussions, and volunteering to
answer questions without previously preparing the material. Vocabulary quizzes, in-class writing
and examinations will be evaluated using the AP French Language and Culture rubric.
To improve their writing
Each unit will provide a thematic basis for students to write formal essays. Depending on the
topic of the unit, they will have at least two reactions to reading assignments and two reactions to
audio/audiovisual material. They will have to write a blog journal once a week that incorporates
a theme or themes that we have covered in class. Once every two or three weeks, they will have
to write an additional email to their epals. For every unit, they will also have a lengthier
rédaction in which they will need to synthesize information from several sources, organize their
thoughts clearly and support their opinions. Topics from past AP tests that target our unit of
study will be used for in-class writing assignments. Most units include a creative writing exercise
that can be done in class if time permits, or at home. Improving syntactical and grammatical
accuracy and developing vocabulary is a desired outcome throughout the course. There will be
individual conferencing to discuss ways of improving writing for the larger rédactions. For
shorter writing assignments, the class will go over the most common errors together. Students
will receive an initial grade for the first submission, and a second grade for their re-write.
Geneviève Delfosse’s approach for improving writing proficiency from AP Central will serve as
a base and guide throughout the year.
To improve speaking ability
Class is conducted solely in French and students use it in all discussions in the classroom. They
are encouraged to continue communicating in French with each other outside of the classroom
and must speak in French with the instructor outside of the classroom at all times. Constructive
group oral assessment takes place on a daily basis with frequent checking back with the teacher.
Students will have to respond to conversational prompts, react to reading, listening and viewing
segments, debate cultural questions, and present group and partner work to the class. Once a
week, they will have a more formal speaking assignment during which they will be evaluated on
participation and comprehensibility. In addition, the class will also use Showdini to practice
speaking with each other over the Internet. Once a month we will have a videoconference outside
of class as well. There will be three Skype sessions a year to communicate with a sister school in
Quebec, and each time the communication will become less scripted and prepared. For this, only
participation will be evaluated. At the end of each unit, each student will have a speaking test
with the teacher; they will be evaluated using the AP French Interpersonal Speaking Rubric.
To improve reading skills
At the beginning of the school year, we will review the reading process and how to work on
vocabulary in context. Each unit has a variety of texts of varying length to challenge the
students’ comprehension and to allow for analysis, commentary and responses to cultural cues.
Newspaper and internet articles, novels and excerpts from novels, as well as short stories, fairy
tales, poems, song lyrics, Internet commentaries, blogs and emails are all used in class to develop
reading competence. Students receive vocabulary lists before reading and are expected to
generate more words to add to the list while working on the reading assignment. Each reading is
intended to help them build strategies to decode text and to build their language base. The
readings are a vital means for gaining insight into the culture. They are also springboards for
reactions and essays. Students will be assessed on their reading comprehension as well as on
their written reactions and/or essays that culminate the reading assignment.
To improve listening skills
In class, listening skills will be honed as students are immersed in the language at all times. An
array of different sources, some more formal than others, will allow for exposure to different
accents around the world and include French, Canadian, Caribbean, African and even French
with an American accent samples. Outside of class, they will occasionally be assigned listening
practice, and they are expected to listen to authentic audio materials on their own at least once a
week. In addition to songs and videos, they should listen to www.rfi.fr, www.radio-canada.ca,
and www.bbc.co.uk/languages/french. They will need to include information about their weekly
listening in their weekly blog journal. Every week, they will have a listening comprehension
quiz, and every quarter, listening comprehension will be part of each unit test.
To improve command of technology
Since this is a technology pilot classroom, our goal is to use technology to its utmost and have
paper use at a minimum throughout the course of the school year. We will be exploring different
uses of technology and using our Ipads and the Internet as our primary source of authentic
materials. We will also use as many communicative resources as we can via the Internet to
incorporate variety into our exchanges. Additionally, we will explore templates and websites,
such as Bubbl.us and Mindmeister.com that increase the students’ awareness of brainstorming
and mapping techniques, in order to better organize their thoughts and information. This will also
provide for collaborative exchanges among the students and compel students to make broader
connections between themes and concepts. This will be a component of the class, but will not be
formally evaluated.
To increase appreciation of culture
The materials for class are authentic and representative of the cultures that make up the Frenchspeaking world. Culture is therefore incorporated into the development of language skills and is
woven into the thread of their reactions, essays, debates and presentations. Cultural awareness
will aid them in their interpretive command of the language during listening and reading
exercises and examinations. Cultural appreciation will only be evaluated as to how it assists
students in creating richer written and spoken commentaries, spoken debates, written essays and
creative writing samples.