Pictured above: This is a scene from a popular 1977 British sitcom “Mind Your Language”. The sitcom was about a diverse group of immigrants and foreigners learning English at an adult education school in London. Hilarity often ensued.
French
In British secondary schools during the 1970’s (when I was there) learning French was compulsory. If you were at school for five years, then you had five years of French lessons culminating in an examination (French “O” Level). I also had French lessons in Junior school for a couple of years (at least), for which there was no examination that I recall.
Junior School
I started off well. In Junior school (I would have been about 8 or 9 years old), we had an old French woman come in once a week to give us lessons. I say old, but as I was only 8 or 9, old was probably late 40’s early 50’s. Sadly, I can’t remember her name, but she was always sucking on a Herbal Lozenge and always carried a big handbag. She was fascinating.
I was entranced by her; she was French! From France! An actual French person.
I don’t recall a great deal about those early lessons (it was a very long time ago!). I can remember where we had the lessons, and I can clearly remember the first one. Mme French teacher handed out a card to each person that had a French first-name written on it. We were to adopt those names whilst in the lesson, from that point onwards. Mine was Yves.
We learnt basic French phrases such as “Je m’appelle” (my name is) and “comment allez vous ?” (how are you). The answer to “how are you” was always “com ci com ça” (so-so) accompanied by a twisting motion of the hand, which still makes me laugh to this day.
I don’t remember any difficulties learning it or being told off for not learning it; so, I guess I must have been OK!
Until…
Secondary School
As mentioned previously, French was a compulsory subject at my school. I went to a Grammar School; so, it was seen as important.
In British Grammar schools at the time, there was a fixed curriculum up until the third year you were there. Then you had a set of core subjects (Maths, English Language and of course French), but you could then choose your other subjects out of a set of options. e.g. German or Spanish.
Everything went well for the first two years. The French teacher was my first-year form teacher as well, so we all jollied along rather well. I remember getting very good marks in the examinations we did along the way (every term). I did so well that I got more marks than the class swot one term – and he burst into tears!
Then came the third year. The new subjects were chosen.
And I did choose German as one of my chosen subjects. It was a subject that you could do for a year and if you didn’t like it, you could drop it and take up Geography instead. Strange, but true.
Puberty!
Something happened. Something happened over the summer holidays between the end of the second year and the start of the third. The only thing I can think of is that puberty happened and all the energy, joy and – most importantly – the capability for learning languages just flew away. Gone. I don’t know whether it got converted into something else, but I knew one thing – I couldn’t do French anymore. And as it turned out, I couldn’t do German, either!
I found that I just couldn’t retain it. I learnt a few basic words of German but couldn’t (and still can’t) remember 90% of it.
I gave up the German after a year (fortunately I had dropped Latin as well, as I’d forgotten all that, too!) and took up Geography. I was the only one in that German class to do that. Embarrassing, much?
For three more years I tried to learn French, but it just wouldn’t sink in. I got through with just the bare minimum, scraping in with a 30 or 40% test score (the minimum pass rate). It wasn’t for the wont of trying either, I really did try, but it just didn’t click. If it didn’t click, I didn’t understand it and I lost interest fast (I’m still like that now!).
The French teacher we had for those three years was not the one we had for the first two. This was a very much older, stuffier man, very much an archetypal “old-school” 1940’s school master, haughty, looking down his nose all the time. Very strict, very staid. We did not get on.
O Levels
At the end of the fifth year, there were the “O Levels”. For each of your chosen subjects you had an examination that would go towards your official academic qualifications and contribute to getting a decent job.
Most subjects had one or two papers per subject. French had three, two written and one oral.
“O Levels”, or “GCE O Levels” as they were then, were nationally recognised qualifications. When you completed your exams, they were marked and graded A, B, C (a pass) D or E (a failure) or U (Unclassified).
I can’t remember what grade I eventually was awarded for French, but it would have been a “D” or an “E” (fail). (It wouldn’t have been a “U” as I had written stuff on the written papers!)
The oral
There were two written papers. I think I managed to get through those by some vast amount of revision and luck. But the oral was something else altogether.
The oral exam was supposed to be a half hour of conversation (in French) with an external examiner. The examiner was introduced to us as a group beforehand (in French). It was at that point that I knew this was a waste of time!
The exam consisted of the examiner asking questions, to which you were supposed to respond. Most people stayed in there with him for the full 30 minutes. I came out after 10.
For every question that he asked me, the only phrase I could think of was “dans la pupitre” (yes, the gender is incorrect). I answered every question he asked with that. After 10 minutes he told me to leave (in English). Disaster.
Languages
Similar to my ability with musical instruments, I have no ability to learn languages. My French is what I learned in Junior school and not much beyond. I’ve tried over the years, but nothing sticks.
Fortunately, wherever I’ve travelled in the World, they’ve nearly always spoken English, so I’ve been OK. I do feel a bit guilty, however. It’s not that I won’t speak it, I just can’t!
So why is there a French version of this site? Good question.
This post may explain a little more.