Past Tense Overview

Context

Unit: Mastering French Communication
Lesson: 16 of 20
Duration: 30 minutes
Class size: 1
Age group: Year 11 (15-16 years)
Curriculum: National Curriculum for Languages (MFL), England

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National Curriculum Alignment

Key Stage 4 – Modern Foreign Languages Programme of Study

MFL3: Pupils develop their ability to communicate confidently and coherently in speech and writing, using a wide range of vocabulary and structures.
MFL4: They learn to use the present, past and future tenses, using regular and irregular verbs.
MFL6: They learn how to narrate events and describe experiences and ideas, and to express their own opinions.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the formation and use of the passé composé in French (MFL4).
• Use the passé composé to narrate past events accurately in speech and writing (MFL3, MFL6).
• Apply knowledge of auxiliary verbs (avoir and être) with past participles (MFL4).

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Learning Objectives

By the end of the lesson, the student will be able to:

1. Identify and explain the structure of the passé composé with avoir and être.
2. Form the passé composé for regular and common irregular verbs.
3. Use passé composé confidently to narrate a short past event orally and in writing.
4. Demonstrate understanding by self-correcting errors in tense formation.

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Success Criteria

• The student can conjugate at least five common verbs in passé composé using appropriate auxiliaries.
• They narrate a past event using the passé composé with clarity and mostly accurate agreement of past participles.
• They self-correct mistakes when prompted using teacher feedback.
• The student uses key time markers (e.g., hier, la semaine dernière) appropriately in sentences.

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Lesson Structure

1. Starter – Recap of Past Time Expressions (5 minutes)

• Activity: Brief oral questioning using flashcards with past time phrases (hier, avant-hier, samedi dernier, etc.).
• Purpose: Activate prior knowledge of talking about the past, important for framing passé composé.

Teacher prompt: "Comment dites-vous ‘yesterday’ en français?"
Success: Student responds confidently and provides multiple expressions.

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2. Introduction to Passé Composé Formation (10 minutes)

• Teacher explanation and demonstration:

  • Introduce auxiliary verbs avoir and être with examples.
  • Show formation: [Auxiliary verb] + [past participle].
  • Highlight agreement of past participle with être verbs and with direct object placement for avoir verbs where applicable (age-appropriate complexity).

• Interactive whiteboard use:
  Display examples like:

  • J’ai mangé une pomme.
  • Elle est allée au cinéma.

• Student task: Form passé composé from infinitives given by teacher both with avoir and être.

Success: Student correctly forms passé composé for 3 avoir and 2 être verbs aloud and writes them.

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3. Guided Practice – Narrate a Past Event (10 minutes)

• Task: The student will narrate a short past event (e.g., what they did last weekend) using passé composé.

• Tools: Provide scaffolded sentence starters displayed on card/board, e.g.,

  • Le week-end dernier, j’ai...
  • Ensuite, je suis...

• Teacher role: Prompt with questions and provide instant feedback highlighting auxiliary choice and past participle formation.

• Extension: Student writes 3-4 sentences to consolidate.

Success: Student narrates verbally using passé composé correctly in at least 3 sentences and produces a short written passage with minimal errors.

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4. Plenary – Self and Teacher Assessment (5 minutes)

• Activity: Use a checklist based on success criteria.
• Student self-assessment: "I can conjugate passé composé verbs…" etc.
• Teacher feedback: Highlight strengths and areas for improvement; suggest one target to work on before the next lesson.
• Stretch: Ask student to form a passé composé question or negative sentence for extra challenge, e.g., "Tu as visité Paris ? / Je n’ai pas vu mon ami."

Success: Confidence with passé composé verbally and reflective awareness of learning progress.

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Resources Required

• Flashcards/time markers
• Interactive whiteboard or clear visual display
• Sentence starter cards
• Verb list with infinitives and past participles
• Assessment checklist

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Differentiation and Personalisation

• One-to-one setting allows instant tailored scaffolding and extension.
• Use context familiar and relevant to the student (e.g., their recent activities).
• Encourage metacognitive reflection to help independent learning support.

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Assessment for Learning

• Ongoing formative assessment through questioning and error correction.
• Written sample assessed against success criteria with constructive feedback.
• Self and teacher assessment to promote ownership of learning.

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Reflection and Next Steps

• Review student’s confidence and accuracy with passé composé.
• Prepare lesson 17 to focus on using imperfect vs passé composé for narrative contrast.
• Record personalised targets in student’s learning journal.

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This lesson plan blends rigorous curriculum alignment with personalised, interactive teaching methods tailored for maximum impact in a concise 30-minute slot. It embeds formative assessment, reflective practice, and challenges for independent student progress in mastering past tense communication in French.