MFL
Purpose of study
Learning a foreign language is a liberation from insularity and provides an opening to other cultures. A high-quality languages education should foster pupils’ curiosity and deepen their understanding of the world. The teaching should enable pupils to express their ideas and thoughts in another language and to understand and respond to its speakers, both in speech and in writing. It should also provide opportunities for them to communicate for practical purposes, learn new ways of thinking and read great literature in the original language. Language teaching should provide the foundation for learning further languages, equipping pupils to study and work in other countries.
Aims
The national curriculum for languages aims to ensure that all pupils:
- understand and respond to spoken and written language from a variety of authentic sources
- speak with increasing confidence, fluency and spontaneity, finding ways of communicating what they want to say, including through discussion and asking questions, and continually improving the accuracy of their pronunciation and intonation
- can write at varying length, for different purposes and audiences, using the variety of grammatical structures that they have learnt
- discover and develop an appreciation of a range of writing in the language studied.
Literacy in French
The curriculum in French rotates around literacy and grammar.
In particular, for our subject, it is very important the analysis of the individual words, in terms of both, their nature and the role they play in the sentence. The other very important literacy point we develop in French is to learn what it means to conjugate a verb, and how to do it.
| Year 7 |
Autumn Term 1
– Conjugation of the present tense of the verb “être” with “je, tu, il/elle”.
– Regular adjective gender agreement.
– Conjugation of the present tense of the verb “avoir” with “je, tu, il/elle”.
– Indefinite articles.
– Subject pronoun “it”.
– Definite articles.
Autumn Term 2
– Conjugation of the present tense of the verb “faire” with “je, tu, il/elle”.
– Conjugation of the present tense of -er verbs.
– Two verbs structure: “aimer + infinitive”.
– Preposition “à” with -er verbs.
– Christmas in France.
Y7 Spring Term 1
– Revision of fundamental grammatical concepts such as articles, adjectives, pronouns, subject, object, verbs’ conjugation (in English).
– Introduce yourself; say where you live, what languages you speak, your nationality.
– Numbers up to 100; months; dates; days of the week.
– Say your age and birthday.
– Describe hairstyle and eye colour (revision).
– Describe your personality.
– Present tense of the -er verbs.
– Possessive adjectives (my, your, his/her).
– Prepositions used with countries and towns (en, au, aux, à).
Y7 Spring 2
– Revision for the assessment.
– Describe your family.
– Easter traditions in France.
Summer Term 1
– Topics: Clothes – Weather – Activities in town.
– Grammar: Present tense of regular verbs.
Summer Term 2
– Revision of what we have done this year in preparation for the end of year assessment.
| Year 8 |
Autumn Term 1
– Revision of gender and number of nouns.
– Revision of definite and indefinite articles.
– Revision of “il y a / il n’y a pas”
– Revision of possessive adjectives.
– Revision of the present tense of regular verbs.
– Feminine nouns’ formation rules.
– Feminine adjectives’ agreement rules.
– Subject pronoun on.
Autumn Term 2
– The Perfect tense (with avoir).
– Demonstrative adjectives.
– Partitive article.
– Practice of the present and of the perfect tenses in different contexts.
– Christmas in France.
Y8 Spring Term 1
– Revision of fundamental grammatical concepts such as articles, adjectives, pronouns, subject, object, verbs’ conjugation (in English).
– Geography of France (towns, rivers, mountains).
– Points of the compass.
– Prepositions used with the points of the compass.
– Passé Composé.
Y8 Spring Term 2
– Revision for the assessment.
– Directions in town.
– Prepositions used with directions.
– Easter traditions in France.
Summer Term 1
– Daily routine with reflexive verbs in the present and past tense. (best pupils with more than one pronoun / everyone with ‘je’)
– Revision on saying the time.
– Revise and consolidate present tense and past tense with ‘avoir’
– Introduction of past tense with ‘être’
– Describe your area.
Summer Term 2
– Revision of what we have done this year in preparation for the end of year assessment.
| Year 9 | |
| Autumn Term 1 | Grammar Revision. Revision past tense, used in the context of Y8 topics (therefore revision of Y8 vocabulary as well). |
| Autumn Term 2 | School and education – Past tense (l’imparfait) best pupils with more than one pronoun / everyone with “je”). The superlative. |
| Spring Term 1 | – Technology in everyday life. – The near future (le futur proche). |
| Spring Term 2 | – Revision for the assessment (use of present, past and future tenses) – Media and social networks in France. – Easter traditions in France. |
| Summer Term 1 | Various topics- Revise and consolidate le futur proche. (Best pupils: start using the past tense without support. Everyone uses past tense with support). Question words. |
| Summer Term 2 | Various topics- Revise and consolidate the present, past and future tenses. (Best pupils use a variety of tenses without support. Everyone uses a variety of tenses with support). |
| Year 10 | |
| Autumn Term 1 | Revision of all the grammar needed for the GCSE exam |
| GCSE AQA Curriculum | |
| Theme 1 – Identity and culture | |
| Unit 1 – Me, my family and friends | |
| Autumn Term 2 | Revision for the assessment |
| Unit 2 – Technology in everyday life | |
| Unit 3 – Free time activities | |
| Spring Term 1 | Unit 4 – Customs and festivals |
| Theme 2 – Local, national, international and global areas of interest | |
| Unit 5 – Home, town, neighbourhood and region | |
| Spring Term 2 | Revision for the assessment |
| Unit 6 – Social issues | |
| Unit 7 – Global issues | |
| Summer Term 1 | Unit 8 – Travel and tourism |
| Theme 3 – Current and future studies and employment | |
| Unit 9 – My studies, life at school and college | |
| Unit 10 – My studies, life at school and college | |
| Summer Term 2 | Unit 11 – Education post-16, jobs, career choices and ambitions |
| Unit 12 – Education post-16, jobs, career choices and ambitions | |
| Revision of everything we did this year | |
| Revision for the end-of-year assessment | |
| Year 11 | |
| Autumn Term 1 | Revision of all the grammar needed for the GCSE exam |
| Structure of the Writing exam | |
| Revision of all the three themes covered in the GCSE curriculum | |
| Autumn Term 2 | Revision for the mock exams |
| Structure of the Speaking exam | |
| Speaking – Exam preparation | |
| Writing – Exam preparation | |
| Reading – Exam preparation | |
| Listening – Exam preparation | |
| Spring Term 1 | Speaking – Exam preparation |
| Writing – Exam preparation | |
| Reading – Exam preparation | |
| Listening – Exam preparation | |
| Spring Term 2 | Speaking – Exam preparation |
| Writing – Exam preparation | |
| Reading – Exam preparation | |
| Listening – Exam preparation | |
| Summer Term 1 | Speaking – Exam preparation |
| Writing – Exam preparation | |
| Reading – Exam preparation | |
| Listening – Exam preparation | |
| Summer Term 2 | Speaking – Exam preparation |
| Writing – Exam preparation | |
| Reading – Exam preparation | |
| Listening – Exam preparation | |