My students are in their second year of beginning French studies. Their ages range from 15 to 18 years old. Despite their fairly limited language abilities, their previous exposure to the topic will allow them to see how the language can be used to enhance their knowledge of Creole culture. Their language skills are still at a fairly basic level, recognizing only the most common vocabulary and verb structures. However, because of the close relation of French to English and the common occurrence of cognates within the language, they will be able to recognize and understand more of the language than they have learned in the classroom.

These students come from a wide range of cultural and socio-economic backgrounds. Because of this, the amount of exposure they have with Creoles is just as varied. They also have a wide range of learning styles, so this lesson will have to utilize many differing learning strategies in order to present this material. Most of the material will be presented visually, but the classroom discussion will suit the auditory and verbal learners and the hands-on art activity will help the kinesthetic learners. Also, the students can benefit from materials that are integrated into many different subject areas: history, geography, language arts, music, art, cuisine… This can help them to make connections with other courses they may be taking or may take in the future.

A few of the students have computers and web access at home, but this will only help them complete the post-activity questions. All of the information they will need for these activities will be accessible to them during class time in the computer lab. Hopefully these activities will instill a desire in the students to further investigate the topic as well as their own cultures.