Le bureau des objets trouvés

Today in elementary French at the Modern Language School, the class practised how to explain, at the lost property office, what you have lost, what it is like and where you might have lost it. Sadly, we might all lose something while on holiday, so it is important to be able to explain. Lost! The […]

Saying “my darling” in French

In today’s French class at the Modern Language School, we were studying possessive adjectives (they sound dangerous, but they don’t bite). It’s the grammar name for words like my, your, his, her, our, their. With these, though it does not come naturally to English speakers, the word for my, etc. agrees (gender and number) with the […]

Buying clothes and shoes in French

Today in the French elementary course, we did a lot of practising on clothes and accessories description and buying, including a very silly catwalk… I believe the vocabulary for clothes is the one that includes the most “faux amis” (false friends, words that look like their English equivalents but mean something else). / For example, […]

Un jeudi matin très sage en classe de français

Le jeudi matin, c’est la classe de français avancé et d’habitude il y a beaucoup de  discussion et de rire. Mais ce matin, tout était calme et les étudiants, qui travaillaient en groupes, étaient très sages. Pourquoi? Eh bien, parce que tous les membres du groupe, tous âgés de plus de 45 ans, faisaient du […]

French to take away

The French Wednesday evening class at the Modern Language School are currently getting their heads round the verb to take, which is no mean feat. You might know that French can sometimes be a contrary language, so while the English eat their dinner, we French take it (nous prenons le déjeuner). We hardly drink either, […]

Today’s French Intermediate Class

There should be a health warning on the lid of the Wednesday evening French intermediate class at the Modern Language School. Something like “Beware! This class is dynamite!” It’s not just because people are lively and questioning, nor because they enjoy finding out more and more about French; it’s because they will not hesitate to […]

French Advanced Conversation

At the Modern Language School, we are now running a monthly French advanced conversation class which started Saturday the 15th of October 2016. We had a (silly) introduction game involving names of animals, a few riddles and a discussion in groups about clichés and reality when it comes to lunch break in France, starting from […]

French conversation (1)

Here are some of the words / phrases people found useful at the French monthly conversation class on Saturday at the Modern Language School: une arnaque( a swindle), être sage comme une image (to be good as gold), la gamelle (the lunch box), les autochtones (the natives), un coup de soleil (sunburn), faire du stop (to […]

French with laughter

In French advanced plus, this year, it’s all about oral expression, play acting and honing one’s spoken language at the Modern Language School.    Last Thursday students in groups composed their own dialogues about reporting facts using perfect, imperfect and pluperfect tenses. They then performed their dialogue for the class.    Even when starting from […]

This week’s French elementary class

On Monday afternoon, in French elementary class (2nd year), we had a look at regular -re verbs. Our text book is the excellent Façon de Parler 1 and here is a review of the vocabulary we learnt. depart-en-weekend