Wednesdays at DEFLE
Wednesdays are made more complicated for us by the kids being off school, so I was the only one to get up at 6 this morning. It was very foggy and damp, but I got to DEFLE in good time!
8h30 - 9h30 Litterature actuelle. We talked about the working definition of contemporary literature - it will be within the last 30 years. We have to read a book - La Place, by Annie Ernaux, an ex-Bordeaux III student. It is mercifully short, so even if I don't like it I reckon I'll be able to finish it! And we have to go to a bookshop when a modern author is presenting their book, do a COMPTE RENDU of the presentation, see what the critics are saying about the book, photocopy a brief extract from the book and do a bit of lit crit on it ourselves. It will end up as a 5 page folio, we work in pairs and we have till January to do it. Doesn't sound SO bad does it - except the dreaded words COMPTE RENDU.
9h30 - 10h30 This was followed by Litterature actuelle with a different tutor, who strongly hinted that she didn't like Annie Ernaux! With this tutor we talked basically about autofiction and the use of the first person in writing. Then we started to work on a short extract from some book or other. By next time we have to do something with it, but I can't remember what.
10h30 - 12h30 - Grammaire. We did lots of tests and exercises designed to make us want to study grammar and to make us realise how much the study of grammar could achieve for us. We had a dictee (another French extreme word game) where we had to reproduce the first two paragraphs of Madame Bovary, which were read to us twice. A slight disaster because I didn't know some of the vocab. We will also have to begin each lesson by playing conjugaison tag. Hank challenges Ursula "prendre - conditional present". Ursula conjugates the verb out loud in front of everybody then responds with "Hank - essayer - simple past". I have something like that on my Palm, so I must get into training!
We finished grammar at 12:45 - 15 minutes late, the tutor adores grammar so (and so will we by the end of the course, she says) so I had to dash to get Pat and kids and deliver her to her 13h30 - 17h30 class. She will write about that later.
During grammar I suddenly had the strong impression that I was in a fictional boarding school, listening to an eccentric professor of Botany. It helped a lot!
Because it's prayer meeting at 20h30 - 22h00 tonight, and I am rarely home by 23h00, I had a short nap before picking up Pat.
8h30 - 9h30 Litterature actuelle. We talked about the working definition of contemporary literature - it will be within the last 30 years. We have to read a book - La Place, by Annie Ernaux, an ex-Bordeaux III student. It is mercifully short, so even if I don't like it I reckon I'll be able to finish it! And we have to go to a bookshop when a modern author is presenting their book, do a COMPTE RENDU of the presentation, see what the critics are saying about the book, photocopy a brief extract from the book and do a bit of lit crit on it ourselves. It will end up as a 5 page folio, we work in pairs and we have till January to do it. Doesn't sound SO bad does it - except the dreaded words COMPTE RENDU.
9h30 - 10h30 This was followed by Litterature actuelle with a different tutor, who strongly hinted that she didn't like Annie Ernaux! With this tutor we talked basically about autofiction and the use of the first person in writing. Then we started to work on a short extract from some book or other. By next time we have to do something with it, but I can't remember what.
10h30 - 12h30 - Grammaire. We did lots of tests and exercises designed to make us want to study grammar and to make us realise how much the study of grammar could achieve for us. We had a dictee (another French extreme word game) where we had to reproduce the first two paragraphs of Madame Bovary, which were read to us twice. A slight disaster because I didn't know some of the vocab. We will also have to begin each lesson by playing conjugaison tag. Hank challenges Ursula "prendre - conditional present". Ursula conjugates the verb out loud in front of everybody then responds with "Hank - essayer - simple past". I have something like that on my Palm, so I must get into training!
We finished grammar at 12:45 - 15 minutes late, the tutor adores grammar so (and so will we by the end of the course, she says) so I had to dash to get Pat and kids and deliver her to her 13h30 - 17h30 class. She will write about that later.
During grammar I suddenly had the strong impression that I was in a fictional boarding school, listening to an eccentric professor of Botany. It helped a lot!
Because it's prayer meeting at 20h30 - 22h00 tonight, and I am rarely home by 23h00, I had a short nap before picking up Pat.
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