This is a course designed for students who completed French Elementary 1 & 2 or who have studied French up to GCSE or equivalent. This course aims to provide you with the necessary linguistic tools to be able to confidently cope with everyday situations, make and respond to invitations, apologies, etc., and understand a simple and direct exchange of limited information on familiar and routine matters.

This course is the first part of the preparation for CEFR A2.

Understand sentences and frequently used expressions related to areas of most immediate relevance (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment).

Communicate in simple and routine tasks requiring a simple and direct exchange of information on familiar and routine matter

Describe in simple terms aspects of his/her background, immediate environment and matters in areas of immediate need.

All courses on the Languages for All programme are delivered on a hybrid mode, mixing face-to-face and virtual teaching. You will be expected to actively participate in role-plays, interactive activities and group discussions. Course material is accessible on the University’s Virtual Learning Environment, Learning Central, and should be cross-platform compatible.

18contact hours – 2 hours per week of interactive language workshops.

Intellectual Skills:

-        Enhanced cognitive skills leading to innovation, creativity and problem solving.

-        Critical analysis applied to discourse, texts, images and events.

-        Advanced listening and reading skills: the ability to scan complex texts (including audio) for gist, to synthesise information and focus on salient points.

Discipline Specific (including practical) Skills:

-        Understand spoken phrases and the highest frequency vocabulary related to areas of most immediate personal relevance; catch the main point in spoken short, clear, simple messages.

-        Read very short, simple texts; find specific, predictable information in simple everyday material.

-        Communicate in simple and routine tasks requiring a simple and direct exchange of information on familiar topics and activities.

-        Write short, simple notes and messages relating to matters in areas of immediate needs.

Transferable Skills:

-        Ability to learn additional languages for personal/employment reasons.

-        Awareness of and sensitivity to diversity based on culture.

-        Ability to navigate and mediate between more than one culture to interpret meaning and intent beyond the purely linguistic.

-        Heightened literacy, textual analysis and oracy in mother tongue.

-        Presentation skills.

-        Ability to work cooperatively, as a member of a team or with a partner.

-        Problem solving and the ability to look at things from multiple perspectives.

Written class test (30%) and course work (30%).  

Oral and aural continuous assessment (40%). 

-       information about self and others; asking questions and interviewing; giving and understanding information about holidays, travel, vacation jobs;

-        Recounting a series of events; following a spoken or written account of an incident;

-        Interacting in a social context; informal and formal usage.

Foundations French 2 (Palgrave Foundation Series Languages), 2008, 2^nd edition; K. Beeching and A. Fontaine Lewis; Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke (Units 1-3).

Grammaire Progressive du Français, Niveau intermédiaire, 2013, 3rd Edition; M. Grégoire and O. Thievenaz; CLE International.

Preparation for DELF A2:

Réussir le DELF A2, 2010; M. Dupuy and M. Launay; Didier.