Core French 8

Unit 1: Listening and Viewing with Intent

Big Idea: listening and viewing with intent supports our acquisition and understanding of French. Hearing and reading French letter patterns, and comprehending a variety of spoken and written questions.

• Same-sound letter groupings and rhyming words

• Letter patterns with consistent pronunciations, liaisons, and élisions

• Asking and understanding a variety of questions

Unit 2: Expressing Ourselves and the World Around Us

Big Idea: we can express ourselves and talk about the world around us in French. This unit is also where, with increasing fluency, we participate more actively in reciprocal back-and-forth interactions — explaining our reasons and sharing our opinions with someone else. Grade 8 introduces the FIRST emerging time frames (present, passé composé, futur proche) alongside the full common-vocabulary toolkit: time and frequency, descriptions, comparisons, reasons/emotions, beliefs/opinions, and cultural-aspects vocabulary.

• The present-tense system

• Passé composé (emerging): talking about the past

• Futur proche (emerging): talking about the future

• Expressing time and frequency

• Describing items, people, and personal interests

• Making comparisons and contrasts

• Giving reasons for preferences, emotions, and physical states

• Expressing beliefs and opinions

• Vocabulary for cultural aspects of communities

Unit 3: Sharing Experience Through Stories

Big Idea: we can share our experiences and perspective through stories. Recognizing the common elements of a story, and narrating a simple story of our own using expressions of time to show logical progression.

• Common elements of stories

• Narrating a simple story using expressions of time

Unit 4: Authentic Francophone Cultures Through Creative Works

Big Idea: we can experience authentic Francophone cultures through creative works. Exploring architecture, dance, filmmaking, music, poetry and prose, sculpture, and theatre as windows into Francophone culture — and understanding the ethics of using someone else's creative work respectfully.

• Exploring Francophone cultures through creative works

• Ethics of cultural appropriation and plagiarism

Unit 5: Culture, Languages, and Communities

Big Idea: our understanding of culture is influenced by the languages we speak and the communities with which we engage. Discovering Francophone communities around the world, their cultural aspects, and the connections between indigenous communities and the French language.

• Francophone communities around the world

• Cultural aspects of Francophone communities

• Connections between indigenous communities and the French language