Foreign Language Curriculum is the Worst

I started learning French when I was in 8^th grade, which was longer ago than I care to admit. I had a pretty good teacher – Ms. Armitage was entertaining, she focused a lot on repetition so we actually learned some things, and she used some engaging songs to help things stick. By the time I got to high school, I was ready for French 2. Mr. Fitz was the best, and I still consider him in my top 3 favorite teachers from high school. I completed the French program at my high school, all the way up through AP French Language.

In 2019, after I moved to a new state with my now-husband, I landed a job teaching high school French. I had not studied French in school, but had consistently used it throughout my working experience and in school; in fact, I completed my first Master’s degree in a French-speaking country, largely because I felt confident enough that I would be able to communicate on a daily basis just from the French I learned in school.

I quickly realized, however, what poor Ms. Armitage and poor Mr. Fitz had probably already learned over a decade before: foreign language curriculum is horrible to teach.

Why is the Foreign Language Curriculum Horrible?

Hands down, it is awful. I think I have narrowed down the “why” to a couple of key reasons.

The first is that there is no variety in terms of time frame. For example, when I attended high school, my school followed what is called a “modified block schedule,” which means that I had one set of classes on one day, and another set of classes on the other day (color days, A days, and B days, etc.). I had the same classes all year; I just alternated which classes I attended each day. When I started teaching, I worked on a true block schedule, which is semester-style, the same as you find in colleges and universities. I had a set of students in my classes in the fall, and then had new students in the spring (or students who moved up to the next level).

The problem is that we are expected to use the same curriculum, whether it is spaced out over a full 36 weeks or just 18 weeks. French textbooks are not designed to be completed in just one semester. There is absolutely no way it can be done. Even the most highly motivated and high-achieving students would struggle to complete 10 full units in just 18 weeks. That is a unit in less than two weeks, and each unit typically includes four or five sub-units or lessons, so that is a lesson every two days, give or take.

The second is that even most online textbooks lack adequate tools for teachers to assess their students’ verbal communication skills. Some of the Spanish textbooks that I have seen do have some pretty nice options for getting their students to speak, but the French ones? In my experience, they are sadly lacking. When I was in high school, we did not have the option of simply recording ourselves into an online portal attached to our textbook. We had paper books, and speaking exercises were done in class, with a partner, as a class, or in front of the teacher. I am sure that some of the speaking exercises were recommended or suggested by the textbook, but I know that some of our speaking practice was conducted on the fly. While there are some ed tech options out there to help with speaking exercises, the best ones I have found often come with a cost that is not conducive to all students accessing them, or they cease to exist after just a couple of years.

There is, however, an additional factor that needs to be addressed here: foreign language anxiety. For a multitude of reasons, students these days are so petrified of making mistakes or of sounding silly in front of their peers that they simply freeze or refuse to participate in foreign language classes. I think the exact “why” depends greatly upon each individual student, but it is often linked to a fear of ridicule or fear of errors. The idea of resilience has been lost somewhere. Our students are so afraid that they are negatively impacting their academic experiences at school, but that is something that others have already discussed.

Lastly, and this is arguably the most important, in my opinion, is that many things covered in the curriculum are irrelevant to about half of the students in the classroom. In a French 1 class, for example, we are supposed to cover the basic things like numbers, the alphabet, subject pronouns, a couple of verbs, some basic sentence structure, and vocabulary for things like colors, school supplies, clothing, weather, food, classes, and activities. The examples that are given in a textbook for school supplies, clothing, food, classes, and activities are perfect for students in suburban and urban areas; they are far less than ideal for students in rural areas.

Current State of French Curriculum

At that last school at which I taught, I had the opportunity to buy a completely new curriculum. I looked at the textbook that I had used at my previous school, and at the same company that wrote the textbook I used when I was in high school, among others. I was less than impressed with all of them. The kids in my community were not interested in learning about the metro, opera, omelets, soccer, or peacoats…because these things were not directly relevant to their daily lives. Nevertheless, I ordered one and was resigned to hoping for the best.

After just one year, it was clear that the textbook I had selected was no better than any of the others that I had looked at, and I declined to order workbooks the second year. I began using the textbook and workbooks less and less, though I still used some small activities or assignments, just to help with some repetitive vocabulary exercises.

I began looking at my enrollment numbers. Whereas I had expected approximately 70-90 students each semester, I saw a dip towards 60 by the end of my second year. After polling my students, I learned that they were actively dissuading their younger friends, siblings, or cousins from taking my class for two reasons: it was too hard, and it was not anything that they expected to ever use. There was not a whole lot I could do about the first reason, because not everyone is gifted with languages, and not everyone is going to really put in the effort required to do well in class, period.

But the second thing? That was something with which I was frustrated, too. Determined, I set out to design my own curriculum. I sketched out a loose plan, and ran it by a couple of the other teachers to get their opinions. My goal was to make the material relevant to the students, but also to their other classes (scaffolding, not just in my classes, but to help their other teachers, as well). I even got my husband involved in helping me write my own curriculum, and he is as far from education as one can get.

Making French Curriculum Culturally Relevant

I finalized my plans and ran them by my principal. He approved, thankfully. He thought the idea was pretty innovative, but wanted to make sure the kids were going to learn enough French to actually get credit for the class. I assured him they would, and began crafting assignments to go along with my plan.

I settled on a plan that was a mix of engaging cultural content and familiar, relevant content. The cultural content still contained direct comparisons: for example, students learned about games played by kids and teens in North Africa using just whatever they had on hand, and then compared this to some of the games that they grew up playing with their friends. We listened to French music and compared it to American music. The best was when we covered North America, and they got to hear French Canadian country/bluegrass, and compared it to some of their favorite classic country artists, like George Strait and Garth Brooks. My students loved the food discussions because it meant that we got to cook in class and try a new dish with every region of the world that we covered. We made beignets, couscous, fried plantains, and more.

In addition to all of the cultural content, we also focused on content that was directly relevant to their lives. When discussing activities, we covered games and sports, but also things that are commonly found in this community, like farming and gardening. We discussed addiction and common illnesses as they related to global health. They learned about fashion and design in other countries, and compared their Hey Dudes and Ariat boots to the more typical sneakers or sandals worn by teens in other countries. When covering the weather, we learned about tornadoes and thunderstorms, because those are a real part of their daily lives. One of my favorite projects that we did was to build houses out of cardboard boxes. We looked at styles of houses commonly found in parts of Louisiana, and the kids built and colored their houses in class. They had to label the different elements of each house: windows, doors, the roof, etc. That was the most engagement I saw out of some of the students that year.

Having grown up and learned in a very suburban area, and then teaching in a very rural area, I think I have been given a unique opportunity to see how foreign language education works in both environments. They are not equal, and textbook companies should not treat them as such. For students to truly succeed in a foreign language class, I think that each of the points above needs to be address: teachers need to have more options available to them that are specific to their school calendar; textbooks need to include adequate tools that allow for tons of speaking practice that a teacher can grade easily and quickly, and ed tech tools need to be made available at reasonable cost to benefit students in low-income areas; finally, textbook companies should consider differentiating their curricula based on urban/suburban and rural communities in order to make the content directly relevant, and thus, engaging, to the students. Once these issues are addressed, I think the curriculum would be more fun for teachers to teach and more fun for the students to learn.

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