Goofing Around… Is it Allowed?

Life has been hectic lately… actually I have been working around the clock! But the bright side of it is… I just love it! Give me new projects to work on anytime and I will be the most excited gal in town!… Besides teaching my regular students in conventional settings, I added a few online… then I started to create flash card sets which, of course, are quite different from what we usually see! Dave tried them and said it was cool… and very helpful. Therefore I will use them here for you to play… it will be a nice change from my regular tests… I guess I will have my regular players’ feedback sooner or later. And… what else is brewing? I am currently working on converting some of my learning materials into PowerPoint slide shows for beginners’ classes… To make a long story short, I am very busy!

I keep my students busy as well… Saul is working very hard on fixing his mistakes in French so that he will be at his best for his upcoming oral test next week. I am really proud of him… last night, I noticed quite an improvement: he had followed my advice and instructions à la lettre… he was speaking more slowly, he did not use any slang words or expressions (useless to mention those are banned from the SLE oral test!), he used accurate vocabulary, he traded the futur proche for the futur simple, he kept his answers shorter in the first part of the interview (lesser he will speak, less mistakes he will make!), he paid more attention to my questions, he was able to target only important points on the tapes and he was articulating better… Since he became self conscious and kind of cautious, he will now have to recover his natural flow! Something else to work on in the next couple of days.

Seema sent me an email Saturday… saying that, once again, she had had a bad day last week… her morning teacher had pushed too hard on her pronunciation and later she basically told her to get a life! Well… not exactly, Seema is a nice woman and she would never be blunt the way I am… yet, once translated, what she said meant what I would have said myself! Then her afternoon teacher had added up to her frustration by having her work on exercises targeted on her mistakes… she basically told him to back off (once again my words, not hers!) and that she wanted to move on with new materials… eventually she would fix her most common mistakes on her own. I know she will survive the boot camp because she knows exactly what she wants and she keeps control of her learning… she is the one who knows  how she learns best! Good for her!…

James did not find a new teacher yet… it seems language schools are not interested in part-time contracts! They do not even return his calls… It confirms what I always thought: they are in this business for money only! They would never go out of their ways to accommodate a client!… Sometimes I do wonder… Am I stupid? Should I do what they do?… Even if I wanted to adopt their philosophy, I could not!… Consequently I will live with the fact that I am stupid!

Dave’s new written expression test has been ready for a couple of weeks now, but he is still waiting for a date!… I am speechless… I really do not know what to say here… In French we have an expression “bureaucratie crasse”…

And I have not heard from Jay in 10 days now… The last time I saw him, he was not feeling well at all… so I am really worrying about him… it is not his style to vanish! Hopefully I will hear from him soon… I cannot help it, I am a real mother hen with my students!

Sunshine Susan!… she is such a cutie… she loves chatting and learning expressions that Francophones use all the time. Actually she has been improving a lot in the past few weeks: she gained confidence and she speaks much more naturally! Yet we have to work on serious topics to make sure she will meet the level B requirements… Is that painful for her! Each time we have an interview simulation, I can see her deflate by the second… she would like to be perfect the first time and, unfortunately, it is not the case… but she will eventually get there, with some time and lots of patience.

Last Friday, we had a discussion on the famous mots-liens in French… As I wrote several times before, language schools emphasize those connectors as if they were part of some cult or religion… I think people know by now that I really do not give a damn about words we do not use in real life contexts. Of course, Susan hears from colleagues who attended or are attending those schools… and the importance of mots-liens is always discussed when they meet. For some unexplained reasons, it has serious negative impact on Susan! She wants to learn about accurate vocabulary, correct verb tenses, French style syntax and useful expressions.

That day I decided she needed to get away from all this… it was time to bring back what is the most important thing ever in learning: FUN!!! Okay… maybe I pushed it a little too far, but when she left she was happy! I invited Frédéric to join us for 30 minutes or so for a very special class… a lesson on the mots-liens! I divided them in two categories: Les mots-liens du peuple and Les mots-liens de la Fonction publique du Canada. Then I asked them to provide me with connectors in those two categories… Of course, Frédéric had a long list of “ben… ben lâ… ben lâ lâ… pis.. pis lâ… pis lâ lâ… tsé… tsé lâ… tsé lâ lâ… ben tsé lâ…” which could be stretched indefinitely into different combinations… then, in a more serious way, he gave a list of real connectors such as “parce que… lorsque… alors… pendant que… puisque… car… bien sûr… par conséquent…” Susan was aux anges because his list made sense to her…  Actually Frédéric is using simple connectors, which all Francophones do understand. If he spoke with words such as “néammoins, or, en outre, certes, etc.” people would give him dirty looks thinking he is a snob! Frédéric’s mother tongue is French… he is a Québécois pure laine and his French, even if not perfect (no one either speaks or writes perfect French! and anyone who thinks differently lives in Dreamland!), is GOOD! Colourful at times of course yet it is OUR French (like it or not…)!

After class, Susan was smiling… and the three of us had the time of our lives! And from now on, I decided to introduce a 30 minute lesson each Friday and we will compare Le français du peuple et Le français de la Fonction publique du Canada… It will be a journey in the real world versus the fake world… and, trust me, Susan will still be able to perform at her oral test! Yet she will be able to communicate with her French speaking colleagues and friends at a comfortable level… And you know what? It feels so good sometimes to just let it go, have fun and behave like goofs!…  I recommend this medicine for healing any distressed soul!

Règlement no 7

tiré des

 «Règlements auxquels devront se soumettre ceux qui entreront céans»

 (rules for the behaviour of all those entering these doors)

“Ils ne soupireront ni ne baîlleront, de peur de communiquer leur ennui à leur entourage”