Crépieux, G. Massé, O. Rousse, J. (2013) Interactions 1: Méthode De Français (Course material for Français langue étrangère at Lycée d’Adultes, Paris)
When speaking in French there is a rhythm and a tone. The tone is easy, at the end of very grouping of syllables you raise the tone of your voice until the last one where you don’t, unless the sentence is a question. Rhythm I find harder.
The example given in the book is,
| Elle est anglais et elle est artiste. |
| E/lle es/t an/glaise/ et /e/lle es/t ar/tiste. |
Which should sound like ‘El les tan glaise ……… et el les tar tiste’ with the high tone at the end of glaise.
Identification or business card
A good way to practice some of the ways to give information is to present a fiche d’information, or information sheet, with someone’s details on it. Something like,
- Prenom (first name)
- Nom (family name or nom de famille)
- Nationalité (nationality)
- Ville (city)
- Pays (country)
For instance if I had a friend from Spain called Sarah Lopez who lives in Paris I might say,
Je présente Sarah. Elle nom est Lopez et elle prénom est Sarah. Elle est espagnole et elle habite à Paris. Son pays est l’Espagnol.
Although, depending on how formal the occasion was I might have started with, je vous présente Sarah. It is also possible I would have said her profession such as, elle est avocate.
A slight more fun way to practice is to go the Fake Name Generator and create random French people.
Fake person
Tyson DuLin
11, rue Isambard
35300 FOUGÈRES
Mother’s maiden name: Perreault
Phone: 02.83.33.44.03
Country code: 33
Birthday: January 28, 1993
Age: 26 years old
Email Address: TysonDuLin@dayrep.com
Website: LiteracyChannel.fr
Company: H.C. Bohack
Occupation: Decontamination technician
Height: 5′ 8″ (172 centimeters)
Weight: 164.8 pounds (74.9 kilograms)
Favorite color: Green
Vehicle: 1998 Nissan Gloria
These notes are from Interactions 1 Méthode de Française A1.1 and where copyrighted work is used it is done so under the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994.