Everybody knows that French is spoken in France, even if some well-meaning but confused students mistake the adjective for the proper noun (as in,
"Have you ever been to French?")
Views of France, especially of Paris, are readily available. I don't expect to see the Olsen twins exploring Burkina Faso anytime soon (although one never can tell!) With this unit, I want to give my students a sense of familiarity with the unfamiliar, to push beyond France to those French-speaking countries that often get little more than a surface treatment during middle school French language classes.
This unit will serve as an invitation for cultural exploration, as we will use authentic films from French-speaking countries as the foundation for our shared cultural knowledge. Initiated by basic information about each country, and augmented by samples of popular music, works of art, selections of poetry, and traditional recipes showcasing dominant crops, these films will illustrate key characteristics of each culture. Our goal is to acknowledge the qualities of each culture as distinguished from each other, as well as from what we know of our own culture. While students are recognizing the differences between cultures, it is my hope that they will also attain an understanding of universal human needs and emotions.
I teach French at Betsy Ross Arts Magnet School, a New Haven middle school driven by a curriculum of "Artademics," a program that develops and enriches both artistic and academic strength. The goal is for students to learn to use
all
of their faculties to solve problems and make decisions, as they progress through life. Although created with the Artademics theme in mind, the lessons and strategies included in this unit can be used successful in a distinct array of classroom environments.
Using authentic films as teaching tools is attractive, as it teaches children to appreciate the artistic merits of a good film, at the same time as that film's format appeals to this generation's fascination with moving images on lit up screens. Film is a familiar mechanism for reflecting and disseminating popular culture, and by using it to provide information about that which is unfamiliar, I believe that the foreign cultures and geographies showcased in this unit will be better received, better understood, and better appreciated, by students. In addition, initiating a conversation about culture by way of cultural and artistic mediums, will guide the student in demonstrating understanding through similar-type mediums. Inviting the interaction of Gardner's Multiple Intelligences, the path to ultimate synthesis is cleared; having students experience and recreate ideas through authentic mediums, it is paved.
This unit is intended for upper-middle school students, grades 7 and 8. The student population at Betsy Ross is very diverse, and I hope to both celebrate and enlighten that diversity by showing films that may reflect parts of that population, while illuminating others. The unit should be broken down into 4 sub-units, 1 per marking period, for the entire school year. Each sub-unit can cover as little or as much as the teacher (and time) sees fit. A unit such as this will never be complete; there is something for everyone, and teachers should permit themselves to focus on what rings true for them and their students. I have tried to provide a variety of resources that will lead each teacher in more directions towards more resources. With this in mind, please read the
Resources
section, as it contains several useful resources not cited in the body of the unit.
Sub-units are designed so that what the class addresses explicitly one semester will be implicitly present the next, so that students may have
Aha!
moments of familiarity and cleverness while exploring new territories. Students should be led to the role of Fact Finder (Enquíteur, Enquíteuse); in this way, the sum is much greater than the parts.
