AP French Language Syllabus
Course Long Plan
This course, designated AP French Language, prepares students for success on the AP
exam by refining knowledge of grammatical structures, expanding active and passive
vocabulary, and practicing the reading, writing, speaking and listening skills tested on the
AP French Language examination.
I speak almost exclusively French in the classroom and ask students to do the same.
Topics for writing assignments are chosen to provide an opportunity to draw upon
vocabulary and structures being studied, and self-correction techniques are taught and
required. A “bell-ringer” several times a week provides practice producing all tenses of a
given verb with a given subject.
Students have been introduced to the tf1, tv5, Radio France International and BBC
languages websites in French 3 and 4. Several times each semester I either print out
articles or project TV news reports from these sites for class discussion.
In addition to required assignments, students are strongly encouraged to watch French
language movies. Several times a semester I project movies in French after school for
interested students from all my French classes, and AP students are required to attend.
All students receive a CD of songs we have listened to, translated and discussed in this
and previous classes. These songs are often chosen because they provide repeated
examples of specific grammatical structures or tenses, and repeated listening is
encouraged for reinforcement.
FIRST SEMESTER
The first semester of the course will be devoted to a review and expansion of grammar
based primarily on the Interaction textbook. Each chapter concludes with a test covering
grammar and vocabulary, with an emphasis on material that was either new or had been
presented only briefly in earlier courses. Chapters that do not have a challenging
vocabulary component are supplemented with thematic vocabulary lists from Ladd.
August
Interaction, Chapter 1:
Emphasis on stem-changing “er” verbs and irregular plurals of nouns.
Also review: être, avoir, faire, aller, the imperative, and articles.
Thematic Vocabulary: shopping
Interaction, Chapter 2:
Review “oir” verbs, with special emphasis on devoir, valoir & falloir.
Supplement with handout on uses of devoir in various tenses.
Reflexive verbs, including reciprocal reflexives and verbs with different meanings when
used reflexively or non-reflexively. Supplement vocabulary with handouts.
Also expand avoir idioms and review depuis with present tense and imparfait.
Listening activity: Recording of family dinner conversation.
September
Film : A la Gloire de Mon Père
Interaction, Chapter 3 :
Review irregular ir verbs.
Adjectives: irregular forms, position, adjectives with different meanings before or after
noun, position of multiple adjectives (supplement with Barron’s), demonstrative and
possessive adjectives.
Review use of c’est vs. il/elle est.
Adverbs
Comparatives and superlatives
Read La Fille du Puisatier by Marcel Pagnol orally in small groups.
Summarize each scene orally
Present AP scoring rubric for writing and sample essays. Discuss strategies for timed
writing: organization, timing, length, linking terms, THINK IN FRENCH. Present selfcorrection techniques to verify noun/adjective and subject/verb agreement.
Descriptive writing assignment. First draft in 40 minutes in class, then revision at home.
Interaction, Chapter 4:
Review irregular re verbs
Passé composé review. Verbs that can take either avoir or être. Position of adverbs.
Review passé simple.
Interaction, Chapter 5:
Review of imparfait. Special uses: after si and venir de.
Imparfait vs. passé composé in detail.
Plus-que-parfait.
October
Interaction, Chapter 6
Interrogative adjectives and pronouns.
Interaction, Chapter 7:
Review object pronouns: y and en, order, disjunctive, imperatives, past participle
agreement. Also possessive, interrogative and demonstrative pronouns.
Begin practicing Function Word Fill-Ins in Ladd.
Interaction, Chapter 8:
Review and expand use of subjunctive, including formation and uses in present and past.
Thematic vocabulary: à la fac.
Read “Le Petit Prince.”
Listen to excerpts from recording and discuss in class.
Forty minute timed writing in class. Revise based on correction symbols.
Film: “La Belle et la Bête” or other Disney fairy tale.
November
Interaction, Chapter 9 (two weeks):
Prepositions: verbs followed by à or de + infinitive and other uses of prepositions.
Past infintive, particularly with apologies. Present participle. Present infinitive after
sans/avant de/afin de, etc.
Relative pronouns, including ce qui, ce que, ce dont and ou.
Interaction, Chapter 10:
Futur and Futur Antérieur
Past Conditional
Conditional sentences with all tenses
Thematic vocabulary: les vacances
Begin practicing Verb Fill-Ins in Ladd
December
Interaction Appendices:
Passive voice
Special uses of definite article
Indirect discourse
Begin practice AP listening rejoinders and dialogues in Ladd.
Review for comprehensive semester exam.
Reading assignment from Manigances over Christmas vacation, to include a vocab log.
SECOND SEMESTER
The second semester will be devoted to polishing the material covered first semester and
to practicing each of the four sections of the AP exam: reading, writing, listening and
speaking.
Each week will include the following activities from Ladd:
Function word fill-in and/or verb fill-in
Listening rejoinder and/or dialogue
Reading passage.
January
Class discussion of Manigances, followed by a 40-minute timed writing assignment.
Vocab quiz taken from student logs.
Week 1: Presentation of AP scoring rubric for speaking section of exam. Students record
answers in class to questions from speaking activities in Ladd or Barrons. After
receiving feedback from me, they will take the tapes home and record an improved
answer for a grade.
Week 2: Students will record answers to all five questions from a previously released AP
exam for familiarity with the format. After feedback from me they will take the tapes
home and re-record the one minute description of a picture sequence for a grade using the
AP rubric. They will then hear student recordings released by AP, give them a grade, and
learn what grade was actually received.
Weekly recordings, based on Ladd, Barrons or previously released AP exams, will
continue throughout the second semester.
Mid-January: begin reading Suite Française by Irène Nemirovsky. Students will be
divided into pairs or small groups, each reading the chapters that follow a specific
character and reporting orally to the rest of the class. First vocab quiz.
Assignments from Ladd, to be discussed in class:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 4 and 6
Listening Dialogues # 10, 12 and 14
Readings # 10, 12, 14
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 10, 12, 14
February
Finish Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky. Class discussions and writing assignments
will also draw from the biographical information about the author in the Preface and from
her notes and correspondence in the Annexes. Second vocab quiz.
Watch French TV weather reports and read forecasts on line and in newspapers. Prepare
and read a weather forecast to the class imitating intonation of French méteorologue.
Timed writing describing a real or imagined hurricane evacuation.
Humorous group skits portraying a hurricane evacuation. Vocab quiz.
Practice AP exam.
Assignments from Ladd, to be discussed in class:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 8 and 10
Listening Dialogues, series # 20, 22, 24
Readings # 20, 22
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 20, 22, 24
March
Watch Cyrano de Bergerac.
Reading of selected passages from Cyrano and Molière (concerning “précieuses”).
Class discussion comparing Cyrano with romantic works studied in previous years:
L’Homme au Masque de Fer, Le Fantôme de l’Opéra.
Vocab quiz based on readings.
Assignments from Ladd, to be discussed in class:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 12, 14
Listening Dialogues # 26, 28, 30
Readings # 26, 28
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 26, 28, 30
April
Intensive practice in reading, writing, listening and speaking using activities in Ladd and
previously released AP exams.
Daily discussion of word or verb fill-in, reading passage questions, listening rejoinders or
dialogue questions.
Assignments from Ladd:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 16, 18, 20
Listening Dialogues # 32, 34, 36, 38, 40
Readings # 32, 34, 36, 38, 40
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 32, 34, 36, 38, 40
Practice recordings taken from previously released AP exams.
Timed writing from a previously released AP exam.
May
AP exam
INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS
Primary Textbooks:
Interaction: Révision de Grammaire Française with accompanying CD.
St. Onge, Susan and Ronald, Thomson Heinle, 2007, Seventh Edition.
AP French: Preparing for the Language Examination with accompanying CD.
Ladd, Richard and Girard, Colette, Pearson Prentice Hall, 1998, Second Edition
Supplementary Textbooks:
Trésors du Temps, Niveau Avancé
Lenard, Yvone, Glencoe McGraw-Hill, 1997
Barron’s How to Prepare for the AP French, Barron’s Educational Series, 1998.
Literary works to include :
La Fille du Puisatier, de Marcel Pagnol
Suite Française, d’Irène Nemirovsky.
Le Petit Prince, d’Antoine de Saint Exupéry
Manigances, de Boileau-Narcejac
Films to include:
A la Gloire de Mon Père
La Belle et la Bête
Cyrano de Bergerac
Additional Material:
Previously released AP French Language examinations
Handouts from AP Institute
French magazines and newspapers
Recordings of French songs
Websites :
www.tf1.fr
www.rfi.fr
www.paroles.net
www.lefigaro.fr
www.bbc.co.uk/languages
www.tv5.org
AP French Language Syllabus
Course Long Plan
This course, designated AP French Language, prepares students for success on the AP
exam by refining knowledge of grammatical structures, expanding active and passive
vocabulary, and practicing the reading, writing, speaking and listening skills tested on the
AP French Language examination.
I speak almost exclusively French in the classroom and ask students to do the same.
Topics for writing assignments are chosen to provide an opportunity to draw upon
vocabulary and structures being studied, and self-correction techniques are taught and
required. A “bell-ringer” several times a week provides practice producing all tenses of a
given verb with a given subject.
Students have been introduced to the tf1, tv5, Radio France International and BBC
languages websites in French 3 and 4. Several times each semester I either print out
articles or project TV news reports from these sites for class discussion.
In addition to required assignments, students are strongly encouraged to watch French
language movies. Several times a semester I project movies in French after school for
interested students from all my French classes, and AP students are required to attend.
All students receive a CD of songs we have listened to, translated and discussed in this
and previous classes. These songs are often chosen because they provide repeated
examples of specific grammatical structures or tenses, and repeated listening is
encouraged for reinforcement.
Office hours: Friday from 2 to 2:30 p.m.
FIRST SEMESTER
The first semester of the course will be devoted to a review and expansion of grammar
based primarily on the Interaction textbook. Each chapter concludes with a test covering
grammar and vocabulary, with an emphasis on material that was either new or had been
presented only briefly in earlier classes. Chapters that do not have a challenging
vocabulary component are supplemented with thematic vocabulary lists from Ladd.
August
Interaction, Chapter 1:
Emphasis on stem-changing “er” verbs and irregular plurals of nouns.
Also review: être, avoir, faire, aller, the imperative, and articles.
Thematic Vocabulary: shopping
Interaction, Chapter 2:
Review “oir” verbs, with special emphasis on devoir, valoir & falloir.
Supplement with handout on uses of devoir in various tenses.
Reflexive verbs, including reciprocal reflexives and verbs with different meanings when
used reflexively or non-reflexively. Supplement vocabulary with handouts.
Also expand avoir idioms and review depuis with present tense and imparfait.
Listening activity: Recording of family dinner conversation.
September
Film : A la Gloire de Mon Père
Interaction, Chapter 3 :
Review irregular ir verbs.
Adjectives: irregular forms, position, adjectives with different meanings before or after
noun, position of multiple adjectives (supplement with Barron’s), demonstrative and
possessive adjectives.
Review use of c’est vs. il/elle est.
Adverbs
Comparatives and superlatives
Read La Fille du Puisatier by Marcel Pagnol orally.
Summarize each scene orally
Present AP scoring rubric for writing and sample essays. Discuss strategies for timed
writing: organization, timing, length, linking terms, THINK IN FRENCH. Present selfcorrection techniques to verify noun/adjective and subject/verb agreement.
Descriptive writing assignment. First draft in 40 minutes in class, then revision at home.
Interaction, Chapter 4:
Review irregular re verbs
Passé composé review. Verbs that can take either avoir or être. Position of adverbs.
Review passé simple.
Interaction, Chapter 5:
Review of imparfait. Special uses: after si and venir de.
Imparfait vs. passé composé in detail.
Plus-que-parfait.
October
Interaction, Chapter 6
Interrogative adjectives and pronouns.
Interaction, Chapter 7:
Review object pronouns: y and en, order, disjunctive, imperatives, past participle
agreement. Also possessive, interrogative and demonstrative pronouns.
Begin practicing Function Word Fill-Ins in Ladd.
Interaction, Chapter 8:
Review and expand use of subjunctive, including formation and uses in present and past.
Thematic vocabulary: à la fac.
Read “Le Petit Prince.”
Listen to excerpts from recording and discuss in class.
Forty minute timed writing in class. Revise based on correction symbols.
Film: “La Belle et la Bête.”
November
Interaction, Chapter 9 (two weeks):
Prepositions: verbs followed by à or de + infinitive and other uses of prepositions.
Past infintive, particularly with apologies. Present participle. Present infinitive after
sans/avant de/afin de, etc.
Relative pronouns, including ce qui, ce que, ce dont and ou.
Interaction, Chapter 10:
Futur and Futur Antérieur
Past Conditional
Conditional sentences with all tenses
Thematic vocabulary: les vacances
Begin practicing Verb Fill-Ins in Ladd
December
Interaction Appendices:
Passive voice
Special uses of definite article
Indirect discourse
Begin practice AP listening rejoinders and dialogues in Ladd.
Review for comprehensive semester exam.
Reading assignment from Manigances over Christmas vacation, to include a vocab log.
SECOND SEMESTER
The second semester will be devoted to polishing the material covered first semester and
to practicing each of the four sections of the AP exam: reading, writing, listening and
speaking.
Each week will include the following activities from Ladd:
Function word fill-in and/or verb fill-in
Listening rejoinder and/or dialogue
Reading passage.
January
Class discussion of Manigances, followed by a 40-minute timed writing assignment.
Vocab quiz taken from student logs.
Week 1: Presentation of AP scoring rubric for speaking section of exam. Students record
answers in class to questions from speaking activities in Ladd or Barrons. After
receiving feedback from me, they will take the tapes home and record an improved
answer for a grade.
Week 2: Students will record answers to all five questions from a previously released AP
exam for familiarity with the format. After feedback from me they will take the tapes
home and re-record the one minute description of a picture sequence for a grade using the
AP rubric. They will then hear student recordings released by AP, give them a grade, and
learn what grade was actually received.
Weekly recordings, based on Ladd, Barrons or previously released AP exams, will
continue throughout the second semester.
Mid-January: begin reading Suite Française by Irène Nemirovsky. Students will be
divided into pairs or small groups, each reading the chapters that follow a specific
character and reporting orally to the rest of the class. First vocab quiz.
Assignments from Ladd, to be discussed in class:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 4 and 6
Listening Dialogues # 10, 12 and 14
Readings # 10, 12, 14
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 10, 12, 14
February
Finish Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky. Class discussions and writing assignments
will also draw from the biographical information about the author in the Preface and from
her notes and correspondence in the Annexes. Second vocab quiz.
Watch French TV weather reports and read forecasts on line and in newspapers. Prepare
and read a weather forecast to the class imitating intonation of French météorologue.
Timed writing describing a real or imagined hurricane evacuation.
Humorous group skit portraying a hurricane evacuation. Vocab quiz.
Practice AP exam.
Assignments from Ladd, to be discussed in class:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 8 and 10
Listening Dialogues, series # 20, 22, 24
Readings # 20, 22
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 20, 22, 24
March
Watch L’Homme au Masque de Fer.
Class discussion comparing L’Homme au Masque de Fer with romantic works studied in
previous years: Les Misérables, Cyrano de Bergerac, Le Fantôme de l’Opéra.
Vocab quiz based on readings.
Assignments from Ladd, to be discussed in class:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 12, 14
Listening Dialogues # 26, 28, 30
Readings # 26, 28
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 26, 28, 30
April
Intensive practice in reading, writing, listening and speaking using activities in Ladd and
previously released AP exams.
Daily discussion of word or verb fill-in, reading passage questions, listening rejoinders or
dialogue questions.
Assignments from Ladd:
Listening Rejoinders, series # 16, 18, 20
Listening Dialogues # 32, 34, 36, 38, 40
Readings # 32, 34, 36, 38, 40
Function Word and Verb Fill-Ins # 32, 34, 36, 38, 40
Practice recordings taken from previously released AP exams.
Timed writing from a previously released AP exam.
May
AP exam
INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS
Primary Textbooks:
Interaction: Révision de Grammaire Française with accompanying CD.
St. Onge, Susan and Ronald, Thomson Heinle, 2007, Seventh Edition.
AP French: Preparing for the Language Examination with accompanying CD.
Ladd, Richard and Girard, Colette, Pearson Prentice Hall, 1998, Second Edition
Supplementary Textbooks:
Trésors du Temps, Niveau Avancé
Lenard, Yvone, Glencoe McGraw-Hill, 1997
Barron’s How to Prepare for the AP French, Barron’s Educational Series, 1998.
Literary works to include :
La Fille du Puisatier, de Marcel Pagnol
Suite Française, d’Irène Nemirovsky.
Le Petit Prince, d’Antoine de Saint Exupéry
Manigances, de Boileau-Narcejac
Films to include:
A la Gloire de Mon Père
La Belle et la Bête
L’Homme au Masque de Fer
Additional Material:
Previously released AP French Language examinations
Handouts from AP Institute
French magazines and newspapers
Recordings of French songs
Websites :
www.tf1.fr
www.rfi.fr
www.paroles.net
www.lefigaro.fr
www.bbc.co.uk/languages
www.tv5.org