Understanding French also means understanding its codes.

The principle: work on the language in its context

A message can be grammatically correct and still come across as too blunt, too formal, or simply unusual in a given situation.

We usually work on those nuances from very concrete situations: writing to a colleague, speaking to a manager, meeting the parents of one of their child's classmates, sitting down to lunch, or making sense of a joking remark.

We can then look at the register in use, the choice between « tu » and « vous », certain expressions, the intonation, or what stays implicit in the conversation.

The aim is to give the student more bearings, so they can read the situations they meet and choose for themselves how they want to express things.

What it looks like in the room

• We start from real situations. A conversation, an email, or something the student has just lived through can become the material for a lesson.
• We look at several ways of saying the same thing. We look at what changes with the relationship between the people, the context, or the degree of formality.
• We also work on what is heard. Intonation, rhythm and the way a sentence is phrased can carry as much meaning as the words themselves.
• We put usage back into its context. Ways of communicating vary with people, generations, professional settings and situations. I offer bearings, not absolute rules.