Pedagogy

Proven educational expertise

The Cours de Civilisation Française de la Sorbonne offer varied training, simple or intensive depending on each person’s objectives – up to 25 hours of lessons per week – and over more or less extended durations: the sessions can in fact take place over one, two or three months (in summer in particular), or extend over a 12-week semester, or even an academic year. These may be day courses or evening courses, systematic teaching or specialized modules (in “business French” for example). Tailor-made lessons can be offered on request.

The education system is based on three specificities:

• Particular emphasis on grammar, in order to quickly acquire very good written practice of the language;
• An important part of phonetics, with specific work on the pronunciation difficulties proper to each mother tongue, work carried out in equipped laboratories and with reduced staff numbers
• Teaching oriented, in the form of conferences, towards French civilization (literature, art history, political life, social problems, etc.), and which is based on the philological presupposition of the close link between language and culture. Speakers can be professors from the establishment or speakers from universities, the CCFS also welcome political figures and writers.

Complete courses combining French language and civilization

The courses taught at the CCFS meet the requirements of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) and offer international students a guarantee of quality thanks to the FLE label.

Under the direction of qualified and experienced teachers, language courses take place in small groups to facilitate everyone’s learning. CCFS give international students the opportunity to gradually acquire mastery of French, both written and spoken, with courses including – among other things – an approach to major literary texts.

Phonetics laboratory courses aim to improve the pronunciation, comprehension and oral expression of international students by taking into account the difficulties inherent in their mother tongues. In addition to lessons given in class, individual sessions are offered to students by professors specializing in linguistics.

The course sessions are accompanied by conferences on French society and culture prepared by eminent specialists, to allow students to deepen their knowledge of French civilization while perfecting their oral understanding of the French language.