French A1: Saying Who You Are
Anyone who has finished French Foundation and can greet someone, and who now wants to say who they are without switching to English halfway — students heading for a French-speaking campus, and anyone who has to fill in a form, give their details aloud and describe their family. The twelve hours are taught hours: reading the modules and drilling the phrases. Holding a conversation takes practice on top of that, and this course does not pretend otherwise. It is preparation and not a qualification — we do not award DELF or any other recognised French certificate, and nothing here is examined by an awarding body.
What you will be able to do
- Use the six forms of être without stopping to work them out.
- Say where you are from and what you do, with the right ending for you.
- Hear and say the numbers up to a hundred, including the three that are arithmetic.
- Give your age, your number and your address when someone asks for them.
- Talk about your family using my, your, his and hers correctly.
- Ask a question three different ways, and choose the one the situation wants.
- Say no, and say you have not understood, without leaving French.
How this is assessed
Who you are, in French — a written profile and one recordingWrite a short profile of yourself in French: your name, where you are from, your age, what you study or do, one or two people in your family and what they do, and one sentence saying something you cannot do yet in French. Then record yourself saying it, once through, as if introducing yourself to someone you have just met, and finish by handing the conversation back. Submit a link to the recording alongside the written profile. A practitioner reads the profile and listens to the recording against the rubric below, and returns a written mark. If it does not pass you get the reasons, and one resubmission.
| Grade | What earns it |
|---|---|
| Pass | Every element on the checklist is present, the endings agree with the person speaking, and a French speaker could follow the recording without reading the profile first. |
| Merit | The profile reads as one person talking rather than as a filled-in form: the sentences join, the register is held throughout, and the numbers are said at something close to ordinary speed. |
| Distinction | The learner goes beyond the brief — an opinion, a reason, a detail that needed a word they went and found — and the agreement still holds across the whole piece, including in the places where the ending cannot be heard. |
Before you submit
- The profile is about you, and it is written with the accents in place.
- It uses at least four of the six forms of être, and at least one form of avoir for your age.
- Every nationality, job and adjective carries the ending that belongs to you — and the same endings appear in the recording.
- There is at least one possessive (mon, ma, mes, son, sa) describing someone in your family.
- There is at least one negative sentence written with the ne in place.
- It ends by handing the conversation back — Et vous ? or a question of your own.
- The recording is one continuous take, not sentences edited together.
- For merit: a number is spoken somewhere in it — an age, a year, a phone number — and is said as a French speaker would say it.
- For distinction: the profile says something a form could not have asked for.
Handing it in
Marked by a French teacher, or a fluent speaker with teaching experience, who marks for intelligibility, agreement and task completion at A1 and who will not mark an accent down. You will need an account to submit, so that the mark has somewhere to land. Sign in or create one. The modules are open either way.
Modules
10 modules, self-paced. Nothing is timed and nothing is scored.
- 1Être, and the six people it belongs toOne irregular verb that carries most of what you say about yourself.
- 2Where you are fromCountries, nationalities, and the ending that changes for you.
- 3What you doJobs and studies — and the little word French leaves out.
- 4Numbers twenty-one to a hundredThree of these are arithmetic, and everyone finds them slow at first.
- 5Your age, your number, your addressThe three details every form and every desk will ask you for.
- 6My, your, his and hersPossessives agree with the thing owned, not with the owner.
- 7Adjectives that agreeThe ending you cannot hear, and the one that wakes a silent letter.
- 8Three ways to ask a questionOne for speaking, one that is always safe, one for writing.
- 9Saying noTwo words wrapped around the verb, one of which disappears in speech.
- 10Putting it togetherEverything above, said as one person introducing themselves.
This course stacks
Says who they are, describes what is around them and gets through an ordinary transaction in French — the taught core of A1, with the practice still to come. It is preparation, not a DELF certificate, and no awarding body examines it.
A credential is issued when all of its artifacts have passed. It records the courses, the bands and the dates, nothing else, and no score.