This 10-week course is pitched at level B1 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), and completion of the course meets some of the level requirements. To help develop your fluency in the language, the course will focus primarily on speaking and listening skills, but will also include practice in reading and writing. You will have plenty of opportunities to practise the target language through hands-on class activities such as discussions and role-plays.
French: Intermediate - Part 1
This is an In-person course which requires your attendance to the weekly meetings which take place in Oxford.
Overview
Programme details
Course starts: 1 Oct 2024
The weekly course schedule below is intended to give an indication of the main topic(s) likely to be covered in each session. Please note that these may sometimes change according to the tutor’s discretion to reflect the interests and needs of course participants.
Week 1: Relationships
Week 2: Living together as a community
Week 3: Discovering the arts (festivals and spectacles)
Week 4: One or several French language(s)?
Week 5: Living in the city
Week 6: Bon voyage !
Week 7: Learning? A lifelong project!
Week 8: Happy at work
Week 9: Grammar focus
Week 10: Winter traditions and celebrations
Key grammar points:
* The subjunctive mood (present): how to form it? when to use it?
* Compounding past and imperfect tenses: how to form them? when to use which?
* Complex sentences: how to create them?
* The comparative and superlative degrees
* Adjectives and word order: before or after the noun?
* The past of the past verb form: pluperfect
Key functions:
* Giving a piece of advice
* Expressing your opinion
* Comparing two things
* Narrating events
* Making suggestions
Recommended reading
All weekly class students may become borrowing members of the Rewley House Continuing Education Library for the duration of their course. Prospective students whose courses have not yet started are welcome to use the Library for reference. More information can be found on the Library website.
There is a Guide for Weekly Class students which will give you further information.
Availability of titles on the reading list (below) can be checked on SOLO, the library catalogue.
Preparatory reading
- Edito B1 / Heu, Elodie; Gatin, Marie; Perrard, Marion, Petitmengin, Violette; Spérandio, Caroline; Nicolas, Emmanuel
Digital Certification
Digital badge
Upon successful completion of this course, you will be issued with an official digital badge from the Department for Continuing Education, University of Oxford. After the course, you will receive an email with a link and instructions on how to download your digital badge. You will be able to add your badge to your email signature and share it on social media if you choose to do so. In order to be issued with your badge, you will need to have attended at least 80% of the course.
Fees
| Description | Costs |
|---|---|
| Course Fee | £275.00 |
Funding
If you are in receipt of a UK state benefit, you are a full-time student in the UK or a student on a low income, you may be eligible for a reduction of 50% of tuition fees. Please see the below link for full details:
Tutor
Dr Coralie Schneider
Coralie is an experienced teacher and holds both a PGCE (French with Spanish) and a PhD in Linguistics. She has also taught French in secondary schools, in a sixth form college, at the Universities of Oxford and Buckingham and at the Alliance Française of Oxford. A native of Paris and a keen traveller, she enjoys sharing her knowledge of French language varieties and cultures with students of all ages and levels.
Course aims
To help you to practise and consolidate the language required to express yourself with a degree of fluency and spontaneity in some situations regularly encountered at work, educational settings, leisure centres and while travelling abroad.
Course objectives:
- To develop the learners’ language skills to be able to deal with a range of situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where the language is spoken.
- To consolidate reading comprehension skills to enable learners to understand a range of texts written in everyday and job-related language.
- To equip learners with the vocabulary and grammatical structures required to write straightforward, connected texts on some topics which are familiar or of personal interest.
- To increase the learners’ intercultural awareness and understanding of some of the differences and similarities in social and everyday practices between their own and the target culture.
Teaching methods
You will learn through a communicative teaching approach with the emphasis on actively engaging in classroom activities in the target language. These are likely to include role-plays, pair- and small group-work, and conversational practice conducted in a supportive, collaborative and informal learning environment.
The course has been structured to help you primarily to improve your speaking and listening skills and to deepen your intercultural awareness of a range of practices and frames of understanding in the target culture. You will also learn and practise new grammatical structures in a communicative context and will be encouraged to develop your reading and writing skills in your own time.
Learning outcomes
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
- exploit language to deal with a range of situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where the target language is spoken;
- understand the main points of clear standard speech on a range of familiar matters regularly encountered at work, educational settings and leisure centres;
- read and understand a range of simple texts which include job-related language, descriptions of events, reasons or opinions;
- write straightforward connected texts on familiar topics or matters of personal interest.
Assessment methods
You will be set optional assignments to consolidate your learning and to allow you to progress at your own pace.
Application
Please use the 'Book' or 'Apply' button on this page. Alternatively, please complete an enrolment form (Word) or enrolment form (Pdf).
Level and demands
Selection criteria
Our public programme is open access, and most of our adult language classes are mixed ability. To benefit from this course, participants will have done one of the following:
- gained a GCSE (Grade A/A*) in French, or
- achieved A2 Level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages in French.