By the end of Year 4, students interact with teachers and each other through classroom routines, action-related talk and play. They exchange greetings and wishes, respond to familiar instructions and to questions such as Qu’est-ce que c’est? and Qu’est-ce que tu fais? They share simple ideas and information, express positive and negative feelings (for example, Je suis très contente; Je n’aime pas la pluie) and ask for help, clarification and permission. They interpret visual, non-verbal and contextual cues such as intonation, gestures and facial expressions to help make meaning. They make statements using the present tense and present + infinitive form about self, family and interests (for example, Je suis australien et italien; J’habite à Brisbane; Je vais partir demain). They approximate the sounds, rhythms and pitch of spoken French. They comprehend simple, spoken, written, visual and multimodal texts, using cues such as context, graphics, familiar vocabulary and language features. They use modelled sentence structures to compose short original texts such as descriptions, captions or simple narratives, using conjunctions such as et and mais, and prepositions such as sous, sur and devant. They use vocabulary related to familiar contexts and their personal worlds, and apply gender and number agreements in simple constructions (for example, une petite maison, les grands chiens).
Students know that French is a significant language spoken in many parts of the world, including Australia; that it is similar to English in some ways (for example, it has the same alphabet and basic sentence structure and many shared words) and different in other ways (such as in the use of titles, gestures, some new sounds such as r and u and gender forms). They know that languages change over time and influence each other. They identify French words used in English (such as menu, mousse) and English words used in French (such as le weekend, stop!). They demonstrate understanding of the fact that language may need to be adjusted to suit different situations and relationships (for example, formal and informal language, different text types). They explain how French has its own rules for pronunciation, non-verbal communication and grammar. They use terms such as verb, adjective and gender for talking about language and learning. Students identify ways in which languages are connected with cultures, and how the French language, like their own, reflects ways of behaving and thinking as well as ways of using language.
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