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Porfolio Rationale Standard Five FL 663 French Review Article
Porfolio Rationale Standard Five FL 663 French Review Article
concepts and use differing perspectives to engage learners in critical thinking, creativity, and
investigate, explain, and reflect on the nature of language through comparisons of the language
Rationale:
The French are very proud of their language. The French Academy is an organization to
preserve the French language ("French Academy," 2016). The French language has borrowed
words from other languages. Sometimes the words that are borrowed represent something that
exists in the target culture but not in French such as the example of crickets. The article
reviewed focuses on French words that were borrowed from English. The article uses three
dictionaries in its examination of English loanwords. Many English loanwords are cognates. As
my students and I analyze the cognates, we can discuss how languages evolve and change over
time. Students may have some examples of how English has changed over time. As we discuss
the changes that have occurred in English, we can discuss how other languages may have
changed over time. As we discuss how and why languages, we may discuss false cognates. We
might discuss why and how false cognates may have evolved.
Collaborating in this way may allow students to gain knowledge that would have been
out of their reach without assistance (Shrum & Glisan, 2015). Students may gain new
vocabulary as we discuss how some words have been borrowed from English. They may gain a
new view towards languages. As we continue with our discussion to see what words English
may have borrowed from French, their world view may become more inclusive as they realize
that all languages borrow words from other languages. As students make this shift in mindset
together, they assist each other as they move through their zone of proximal development. My
questions assist the more capable students through their zone of proximal development while the
more capable students contributions to the class discussion assist the less capable students move
through their zone of proximal development (Gass, Behney, & Plonsky, 2013). Both my
questions and the classroom discussion act as a scaffold as the students who are not yet ready to
to process that material on their own are guided through the discussion by my questions as well
students are likely to inquire about other related material. We can extend the discussion as we
learn where to find the answers to our own questions and evaluate the validity of the source of
the information that we find. When we do research my students often want to use Wikipedia.
As we explore the site I tell them that anyone can edit anything on Wikipedia. I ask them some
information about our school that they should know such as the principal. Then I show them the
news article about how someone changed the school information to information from a movie.
References
Brown, H. D. (2014). Principles of language learning and teaching A course in second language
https://www.britannica.com/topic/French-Academy
Gass, S. M., Behney, J., & Plonsky, L. (2013). Second language acquisition An introductory
course (4th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group.
Shrum, J. L., & Glisan, E. W. (2015). Teachers handbook (5th ed.). United States of America:
Cengage Learning.