French

Not only is learning French fun, but French is by far one of the most beautiful, poetic and inspiring languages of all the romance languages of Europe.

Learning a language opens up a whole world of cultural experiences and is a valuable part of our students' education.

Learning a new language allows us to celebrate difference and diversity and it is a wonderful opportunity to help us to understand how people from other cultures interact with the world.

In French, we not only have fun learning a new language, we also enjoy learning about the culture, religion, history, dress, music, food and cooking of France and other francophone countries such as Switzerland, Belgium, Canada, many African nations and our neighbours in the Pacific.

The French language is spoken in more than 40 countries, including some of Australia's nearest neighbours and it is one of the most widely spoken and taught European languages in the world.  French is one of the most common second languages in Australia.

Learning another language helps us to understand how language works, and many students develop a more sophisticated understanding of the English language which helps to improve literacy skills.

The study of French provides students with knowledge, understanding and skills that form a valuable foundation for a range of courses at university and other tertiary institutions.  There are opportunities for future employment and experience in areas such as education, public relations, commerce, hospitality, marketing, international relations, media and tourism.

We learn how language works through many fun activities such as:

• making films
• writing and acting in plays
• conducting interviews
• creating role-plays
• creating blogs
• listening and responding to advertisements, announcements, messages, conversations, news items and emails
• reading extracts from magazines
• watching films and TV shows in French
• producing different kinds of writing such as articles, diary entries, letters and postcards.

All students studying French at Katoomba High School have the option of studying French in Stage 5 and Stage 6.

The following information is from the NSW Syllabus for the Australian Curriculum, French K - 10 Syllabus:

Objectives

Knowledge, Understanding and Skills

Communicating Strand

Students use language for communicative purposes by:

• interacting - exchanging information, ideas and opinions, and socialising, planning and negotiating
• accessing and responding - obtaining, processing and responding to information through a range of spoken, written, digital and/or multimodal texts
• composing - creating spoken, written, bilingual and/or multimodal texts.

Understanding Strand

Students analyse and understand language and culture by:

• systems of language - understanding the language system including sound, writing, grammar and text structure; and how language changes over time and place
• the role of language and culture - understanding and reflecting on the role of language and culture in the exchange of meaning, and considering how interaction shapes communication and identity.

The Communicating and Understanding strands are interdependent and one or more of the objectives may be emphasised at any given time, depending on the language and the Stage of learning.

Values and Attitudes

Students:

• develop an interest in and enjoyment of language learning
• appreciate and value their own heritage, culture and identity
• appreciate and respect the culture, beliefs and values of others through language learning.

Strands

The content of the syllabus is organised through the two interrelated strands of Communicating and Understanding, and related objectives and outcomes.

The strands reflect important aspects of language learning related to communication, analysis and understanding of language and culture, and reflection.  Students reflect on the experience of communicating and on their own language and culture in comparison to those of others.

Syllabus Outcomes

Stage 4

LFR4-1C     - uses French to interact with others to exchange information, ideas and opinions, and make plans

LFR4-2C     - identifies main ideas in, and obtains information from texts

LFR4-3C     - organises and responds to information and ideas in texts for different audiences

LFR4-4C     - applies a range of linguistic structures to compose texts in French, using a range of formats for different audiences

LFR4-5U     - applies French pronunciation and intonation patterns

LFR4-6U     - applies features of French grammatical structures and sentence patterns to convey information and ideas

LFR4-7U     - identifies variations in linguistic and structural features of texts

LFR4-8U     - identifies that language use reflects cultural ideas, values and beliefs