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homeschooling - learning french

6 replies

mumagain4 · 03/11/2011 20:23

Hi everyone, I am homeschooling my four children and the eldest is 13 (year 9). I have just started a beginners french course with the Open University L192. The course looks good. I'm wondering whether my age 13 daughter could do the course too, just behind me. I don't suppose she could come to tutorials but she could do everything else. I was hoping she could get to GSCE standard anyway at some stage. Any comments? thanks

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chickflit · 03/11/2011 20:26

When I did the course you could do some of the tutorials online so maybe she could listen in to those.

The course is very good and I think it does take you to do GCSE level by the end of it.

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mumagain4 · 03/11/2011 20:31

Thanks for that chickflit. Yes lots of the tutorials are online, and its just about 3 you actually go to so thats a good idea. That means she will have to keep up the pace otherwise it won't make sense - something to work for!

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chickflit · 04/11/2011 08:14

I was a bit disappointed with the OU course actually, my tutor used to disappear in between tutorials. I paid for an external French teacher once a week to come to the house and assess the work I'd studied on the OU, answer any of my questions and just go over the stuff with me, which I found very beneficial.

Also, sometimes in the middle of the night on BBC2 there are lots of French programmes for learners so I used to Sky plus those and watch them. I also read children's books starting with the basics like Petit Ours Brun - so baby books really, but even then you're learning to construct simple sentences, conjugate a verb etc and of course the pictures explain the text.

There are magazines you can get for children from a company called Bayard-Jeunesse, they just sent me one this morning for my 9 year old (we live in France so his French is pretty good) but I actually sat down and read it and found it quite interesting the language wasn't too difficult. The magazine was called Astrapi and is aimed at 7-11 year olds, but Bayard do loads of different genres of magazines for different age groups. I think they deliver to the UK also.

www.bayard-jeunesse.com/

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mumagain4 · 04/11/2011 10:54

Thanks, will follow the link. Someone has given me loads of childrens books in french so will do that too. What standard of french did you have when you started the course? Were you near GCSE do you think when you finished? Good idea about the private tutor, but yet more expense...I have heard varying reports about this course, I suppose its just difficult learning at a distance.

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LastSummer · 05/11/2011 23:53

I'm home schooling too! An excellent and extremely thorough three-part French course, accompanied by CDs and a website, that goes from scratch to beyond GCSE is "So You Really Want to Learn French."

www.galorepark.co.uk/product/textbooks/47/so-you-really-want-to-learn-french-book-1.html

You and your children will all be able to use the course, so it's not as expensive as it may at first seem. To arrange exchange holidays with families in France, as I have done, I recommend: www.lingoo.eu/

If somehow you can find the cash, I urge you to hire a tutor for weekly lessons that will hone your accent and improve your confidence.

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mumagain4 · 08/11/2011 10:01

Thanks lastsummer. A tutor certainly seems a good idea. Do you know anything about the L192 ou course? Also just to pick your brains, I think my daughter will need to do the Cambridge igcse because the edexcel igcse doesn't have enough oral content for the English bacc. Would you know if this is much harder than other igcse's? Don't know if anyone can help on this. Thanks