Jennie en France

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• 1 Kathy // Feb 9, 2010 at 11:07 pm

  Cool. I find that watching these things on video helps better than just simply reading it. Your videos are also nice unlike some other ones which have hard to read font and colors. I like the colors and simple text on yours (like watching a powerpoint on youtube). Keep it up and please upload more videos. c:

• 2 Sally // Feb 9, 2010 at 11:32 pm

  Fantastic — brilliant video! Keep up the good work
  .-= Sally´s last blog ..Rat killing on I’m a Celeb… =-.

• 3 Jamie // Feb 10, 2010 at 12:20 am

  I’m currently obsessed with trying to improve my spoke French/accent, so I had fun watching this and repeating everything. Thanks!

• 4 cathy // Feb 10, 2010 at 2:18 am

  love it! i’ve had the “je ne sais pas” reduction explained to me, but never written out to me – very helpful to see it visually. thank you
  .-= cathy´s last blog ..ghent =-.

• 5 judyb // Feb 10, 2010 at 4:54 am

  Jennie,

  I am loving the stuff you have shared recently. Will you come to Seattle and teach my French class for me ?

• 6 Patrick Crosby // Feb 10, 2010 at 6:23 am

  Thanks, I found this video very helpful! I always left the hint of an ‘n’ when saying “je ne sais pas”, but didn’t know I could just drop it all together.

  I hope you add more videos…
  .-= Patrick Crosby´s last blog ..Fast Online Foreign Language Dictionary =-.

• 7 Gwan // Feb 10, 2010 at 10:19 am

  Very nice, thanks! Funnily enough I was talking to a French guy on Friday and according to him only “Americans” say ché pas, and dropping the ‘ne’ in general is an American habit! Which I don’t think is true btw… I do drop the ‘ne’ constantly, which is perhaps a bad habit, but personally I don’t say ‘ché pas’, I don’t really think my French is good/colloquial enough yet to get that casual, I don’t want to sound like a textbook robot, but equally I think you sound a little bit bizarre if you get too slangy when you don’t speak the language perfectly. Or maybe it’s just because I’m not American
  .-= Gwan´s last blog ..Night train to Tours =-.

• 8 Emmy // Feb 10, 2010 at 10:43 am

  good work jennie (and D!) Keep the revolution up! People need spoken French!
  .-= Emmy´s last blog ..when the classroom does strange things to adult learners =-.

• 9 Dedene // Feb 10, 2010 at 5:27 pm

  Great! I’m passing this along to a friend who teaches French in the UK. He’ll love it!
  .-= Dedene´s last blog ..Ad for Canal+ =-.

• 10 Corie // Feb 11, 2010 at 10:05 pm

  Hey Jennie,

  I was a language assistant in Marseille in 2007-2008. I just came across your site, and am sending some lesson plan ideas the assistants in Marseille came up with when I was there. I thought it might be helpful and you could incorporate them into the “Lesson Plans” portion of your site. They’re listed below. For myself and the other assistants in Marseille, there was no official curriculum and no support, so we felt really frustrated — this is a great resource for current assistants!

  —
  High School: Get me off this Island
  You tell the students that you are going to play a role playing game. They are all on a deserted Island and there is a rescue boat coming but they can only save one of them. Each student has a card saying how old they are, their profession, family status ect. (For example: 10 yr old genius; 75 yr old Catholic Priest; 35 yr old , physicist and Mother of 2) Then as that person they have to get up in front of the class and convince the class why they should be the person saved. At the end there is a vote and one student wins. It can actually be a quite funny lesson. For example, in one class the Priest gave a lecture on how he could save everyone’s souls and that he could put in a good word with the man upstairs and ensure that everyone went to heaven.

  Elementary School: Vocabulary Words
  I put students in groups of three and gave each group a paper with vocabulary words for feelings (happy, sad, tired, etc) that they kept secret. Each group acted out their word and the other students guessed. I did the same for illnesses.
  Elementary School: Introductory Questions
  I asked students “Where do you live?” and “Where do you come from?” Students made up their answers, wich they had a fun time doing. Then I made a chart on the blackboard, with cultural icons’ names as the category headings. I had pictures of the icons students matched with the name; students guessed and put the pictures above the appropriate name. Then I made two rows across on the chart: the
  first, “Where does he live?” and the second, “Where does he come from?” students filled in the chart. Then I asked, “Who is English?” and “Who is American?”
  Elementary School: Classroom Objects and Placement
  I brought in a “paper person” named Flat Stanley, that my little cousin had drawn for me. Flat Stanley comes from a children’s book in
  the States, and in the book he travels all over the world. After going over appropriate vocabulary, one student placed Flat Stanley in a specific place around the classroom (next to the bookshelf, on the computer, etc), and chose another student, who said, “Flat Stanley is under the chair.”
  Elementary School: Clothing and/or Parts of the Body
  I would say “He has got brown hair. He has got a black T-shirt. He has got jeans.” describing someone in the class. The students would of course guess. Then they began to describe someone, making the sentences themselves. The student who gave the description would choose a student who would guess.

• 11 Nadege // Feb 13, 2010 at 10:44 pm

  Good job!

• 12 Raemur // Feb 18, 2010 at 5:45 am

  Cool ad. I like. I always wondered about why it seemed as if they were going a bit fast. Keep it up, you’re helping alot of persons and your hard work won’t go unrewarded!

• 13 Jennie // Feb 21, 2010 at 12:20 am

  Thanks everyone! I do plan on making many more videos. And Gwan, dropping the ne is definitely NOT just something Americans do. (That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard, btw.) I hear j’sais pas more often than ché pas, but I almost never hear anyone say ne for any negative sentence.

  @Corie: Thank you for sharing your lesson plans!

• 14 Bren // Mar 17, 2010 at 2:36 pm

  Fantastic video. Superb to hear the native voice along with the written expressions. More please!!!

• 15 Bren // Mar 17, 2010 at 6:36 pm

  Fantastic video. Superb to hear the native voice along with the written expressions. More please!!!

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