VHS Course Catalog

AP® French Language and Culture Section LR

Prerequisites
Students must have completed a minimum of French III with a grade of B or better. Successful completion of French IV is preferred.

Technology Requirements:
Students will need access to Power Point, Quick Time, and Real Player. This course requires students to have access to a computer with headphones, microphone, and software to record voice and save in WAV format. Students must also be able to download MP3 files to school computers. Instructions will be provided for Sound Recorder, used in Windows. Audio recording requires Adobe Flash 10.1 or later. Other software may be substituted, as long as it has the ability to record up to 2 minutes of voice in the WAV format.

Description
The AP® French Language and Culture course is designed to promote proficiency in French and to enable students to explore culture in contemporary and historical contexts. The course focuses on interpersonal, interpretive and presentational communication, encourages cultural awareness, and incorporates the six themes of global challenges, science and technology, contemporary life, personal and public identities, families and communities and beauty and aesthetics. By using these six course themes outlined in the AP curriculum, students will increase their cultural knowledge and experience with the Francophone world through a comparison with their own cultural experience.

Instructional content will include the arts, current events, literature, sports, and more. In addition to textbooks, materials will include websites, podcasts, films, newspapers, magazines, and literature. The course helps develop language skills that can be applied beyond the French course in further French study and everyday life.

AP® French will enable advanced French students to improve writing skills and problem-solving techniques in preparation for the AP French Language Exam. Students will explore the French-speaking world through a variety of perspectives based on authentic and up- to- date materials and the use of French media like TV5 Monde, while gaining a better understanding of themselves.

A variety of assignments and activities will be included. For example, students would read and discuss poetry, create their own poetry and showcase their poems in a class magazine. Another example is that students might participate in an online mock trial after researching France’s role in the slave trade and which key figures were involved. They would assume the roles of those figures who lived during that specific time period. Also, students will read an important work of classic or contemporary literature, write an essay that focuses on a specific theme or aspect and then participate in a discussion that addresses comprehension, stylistic techniques and relevant historical or situational background. Current events in French society, politics, culture, education, etc. would also drive assignments and activities regarding discussions, debates, written work and research that encourage students to consider their own views, in oral and written formats as well as those of their peers.

Students enrolled in Advanced Placement VHS courses are expected to take the AP exam, and are required to report their AP examination scores to VHS (note: students who are failing their AP class are not required to take the exam). Upon receipt of the student's exam score, each score will be recorded by VHS and assigned an anonymous tracking number to ensure student anonymity and confidentiality. By enrolling in an AP VHS class, the student authorizes their school site coordinator and school administration to report AP examination scores to VHS. Exam results will not affect the student's VHS grade or future enrollment in VHS courses.

This course has recommended summer work. Students are expected to complete and submit the summer assignment for extra credit. The summer assignments will help students prepare for the course as well as the AP exam. All summer work for AP French can be found here: [AP Summer Work]

Course Objectives
By the end of the course, you will be able to do the following:
Comprehend extended audio selections of an advanced nature
read unedited texts
Write a substantial essay on a given topic with few grammatical and idiomatic errors
Communicate orally with a native speaker used to dealing with non-native speakers
Develop and refine an extensive vocabulary, including idiomatic expressions
Use accurately all of the major irregular verbs, compound tenses, the subjunctive mood, the passive voice, conditional sentences, the infinitive, and common prepositions.