French articles - ni bras ni jambes

Well I typed in ni bras ni jambes and finally found lots of articles on the French swimmer who swam the channel 10 hours faster than predicted.  Take a look at http://www.metrofrance.com/info/le-nageur-sans-bras-ni-jambe-a-reussi-la-traversee-de-la-manche/mjir!Y8mtevLFWQBo/

French swimmer siwms channel with no arms or legs

When we study daily routine and reflexive verbs we look at the life of Nick Vujicic.  He is an extraordinary young man with no arms or legs.  We follow his vidoe diary of Life Without Limbs and make up our own French commentary.  I had the great honour of meeting him and giving him a hug.  He is so skinny but I guess it is hard to overeat when it takes such an effort.  For more info about Nick and his book Life wihout limits go to http://www.lifewithoutlimbs.org/

When I heard about a French swimmer who lost his limbs in a tragic accident when he was electocuted I thought it would make a great parallel text.   You can read about it here.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/19/3015723.htm

Sadly I cannot find anything in the French news but I'll keep looking. For now I am very grateful to have two arms and two legs even if they are a bit shorter than I'd like.  I'm a very average 1m60 which is the typical height of a French woman but it's a bit short here in Australia.

paper work and red tape

Today I found a load of paper work that I had entirely forgotten.  It was supposed to be back at the Curriculum Council four weeks ago - ooer.  The main gist of several pages per student was that I had to check if they were background speakers of French.  There was a simple tick box with a list of my students on it but in addition each student had to write down on every single line where they had been for each year of their lives, what were their main languages spoken and the name of each school.  The instructions were so complicated.  For each country there was a different set of scores with Australia being 0, Mauritius, 2, France 4 etc.  Then you had to add up all the columns and then declare whether or not you would say that each student was a native speaker or not.  I got so mad having to enter columns of zeroes that in the end I gave up.  They will be mad with me for getting the forms in late so they can just be doubly mad that the noughts are missing too. I have just wasted an hour of my life and the students lives too when we could have been doing something useful. I think unecessary paperwork is my pet peeve, along with people who wave their knives and forks in the air.  Wonder what are other people's pet peeves are?

First Day of Spring

It will come as a surprise to those in Europe that today marks the first day of spring Down Under. Europeans sensibly base their change of seasons on the equinoxes so change seasons around 21st  day of the month.  Australians ignore these geographical markers and change seasons regardless on 1st.
It has been a very dry winter this year, the second driest on record.  Although spring has started cold and wet, I'm glad really as we need the water.  Mind you "cold" is relative.  It was a chilly must wear a jumper and trousers 18 degrees.  Back in Paris that would have been a lovely warm day.  Why does 18 degrees feel so much colder on the other side of the planet?
It was a fun day.  Luke Simpkins MP came to award a silver Duke of Edinburgh award ( I'm the Duke of Edinburgh Coordinator) so it was very exciting for me to see it all happen after two years of effort. Also I got to announce the winner of our school competition.  Students had to design a poster to demonstrate our school Mission Statement.  First prize was an i-pod touch.  When I came to doing the judging in the July holidays there were so many other worthy entries that we decided to give away lots of itunes vouchers to the highly commended entries too. I really enjoyed calling the parents to come and see their children get prizes and asking them to keep it a secret until the big announcement. I'd love to work for the Lotteries commission and have the fun of handing out prizes all day :) Ah well dreaming is free.
Madame Griff

Around the World In 80 Days

My students have been doing a topic on travel, buildings and transport so its time for them to discover Jules Verne's great work Le Tour du Monde en 80 jours.  Most of them have seen the Jackie Chan film version but it set me wondering, " Is there a French film"  There should be after all he's a French author.
A web search led me to a young children's cartoon, but then I found the French TV Channel TF1's site of the week. I'd often thought that it would make a great TV series.  Check it out on
http://www.wat.tv/video/faites-tour-monde-en-80-jours-2ngjr_2exyh_.html

Who am I and what is this blog about?

I am a lucky ex Pom living Down Under teaching French (well) and Japanese (badly) in a lovely secondary school.  Although I am not really French- hence the title ersatzfrog, I adore all things French ( except the meat) I have lived in France when I studied Sciences Politques at Bordeaux University and then later in Paris when my husband was working there as an engineer.  I would love to share all my thoughts about French language and life with you.

Merci mes enfants

Well we were supposed to be doing French online but then my students red herringed me ( why am I so easily distracted?)  Anyway - long story short, they showed me ho to set up my own blog so here it is - the very first one!

Lots of French to follow another day....