Hi!
This description of French grade school teaching certainly ties in to my own ideas of teaching, even to holding back a student who cannot handle the next grade. (Something good for both him and his classmates.
They also practice early speaking to their classes from upfront.
And note that they go on to secondary education at 11.
Harry
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telegraph.co.uk
LEARNING FROM THE FRENCH By Angie Power (Filed: 11/11/2003)
I have lived in France for 22 years and, as the mother of two
young sons, I find there is a lot to admire in the French primary
school system. Indeed, anyone who believes in the rigours of
traditional three Rs teaching need look no further for
inspiration.
From the start, French children are taught joined-up writing. On
the first day at primary school, teachers begin with the letter
"a", and the children copy it out time and time again on their
slates or white boards until every stroke and shape is correct.
Day two will be the letter "b" and so on, until day 26 and the
letter "z".
French children write on squared paper that resembles our maths
paper: the curves and stems of every letter start and finish at
precise points in the square. That explains why everyone's
handwriting is so similar in France. Rigorous, repetitious but
successful rote learning is a feature of French arithmetic
teaching, too. By the time a child is eight, he usually knows all
his multiplication tables. My son answered 10 questions every
morning in class to the beat of a metronome. "Five times eight",
tick; "nine times nine", and so on, the children writing the
answers down on the tick.
Initially, I was horrified at the stress he was being put under
every morning, but he seemed to take it in his stride. As he got
better, he actually looked forward to the lessons. By the end of
the year, it was "five times eight plus nine times seven", tick.
Traditional mental arithmetic has always been regarded as
important and there has never been any question of calculators in
primary schools.
So much is achieved in French primary schools because parents
play an important part. Every child has a cahier de textes - a
homework book for parents to see and sign. There is no written
homework at this age but lots of learning by heart must be done
at home - poems, verbs, historical facts, even La Marseillaise.
I do not know any parent who does not take school work seriously.
They always know what their children have been studying and are
encouraged to work on any weak spots. Parents do not feel
overcome by the vastness of education; rather, they feel part of
it.
French teachers believe in tests. My sons have small tests once a
week and more detailed ones - controles - about every two months.
A mother knows by heart what her child's average mark is and
where he comes in class. If his test performance is poor, a child
will stay in the same form for a second year. My sons have had
children in their classes who have been two years older than the
rest because they have not gone up a form with their peers.
Primary school teaching revolves around a national curriculum. If
your child moves school to the other side of France, the new
school will be doing exactly the same programme.
My children are used to speaking in public because they do a lot
of recitation at school. After learning a poem, or the planets in
the solar system, at home, they recite it to the class the next
day.
I used to shrink at the idea of my son standing at the front on
his teacher's platform with the children facing him in rows. Then
French mothers explained that they believed recitation improves a
child's memory. I certainly think it can give a child confidence.
Teaching a foreign language - usually English - begins by the age
of nine at the latest, when an hour-and-a-half a week is
compulsory. The emphasis is on oral work and basic vocabulary and
includes memorised forms of how to introduce yourself and give
your personal details.
The aim is not formally to teach a foreign language but to
accustom the children to hearing and saying unfamiliar words and
sounds. By the time they start their secondary education at 11,
when formal foreign language lessons begin, they are used to
participating verbally.
There is much to admire in the French system. But I find the same
is true when I talk to French mothers about the English system.
They are impressed by the character building, the team work and
the way that creative, questioning minds are encouraged. It is
good to swap notes, don't you think?
********************************************
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Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042
Tel: 818 352-4141 ----- Fax: 818 353-2242
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