Level B1 (Intermediate)

Upon successful completion of this course, the student will have reliably demonstrated the ability to:

Global Scale — Overall Communicative Ability
Reference: CEFR Table 1 — Common Reference Levels: Global Scale
• Understand the main points of clear standard speech on familiar matters regularly encountered in
work, school, leisure, and similar contexts.
• Deal with most situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where French is spoken.
• Produce simple connected text on topics which are familiar or of personal interest.
• Describe experiences and events, dreams, hopes, and ambitions and briefly give reasons and explanations for opinions and plans.

Reception — Listening and Reading
Reference: CEFR Table 2 — Self-Assessment Grid (B1 Reception)
• Understand the main points of clear standard speech on familiar matters regularly encountered in
work, school, and leisure.
• Understand the main point of many radio or TV programmes on current affairs or topics of personal
or professional interest when the delivery is relatively slow and clear.
• Understand texts that consist mainly of high-frequency everyday or job-related language.
• Understand the description of events, feelings, and wishes in personal letters.
• Follow clearly written instructions and informational texts on familiar subjects.
• Identify the main conclusions in clearly signalled argumentative texts.

Interaction — Spoken and Written
Reference: CEFR Table 2 — Self-Assessment Grid (B1 Interaction)
• Deal with most situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where French is spoken.
• Enter unprepared into conversation on topics that are familiar, of personal interest, or pertinent to
everyday life (e.g., family, hobbies, work, travel, and current events).
• Initiate, maintain, and close simple face-to-face conversation on topics that are familiar or of
personal interest.
• Repeat back part of what someone has said to confirm mutual understanding.
• Express and respond to feelings such as surprise, happiness, sadness, interest, and indifference.
• Make and respond to complaints; handle practical everyday demands such as finding out and
passing on straightforward factual information.
• Write simple connected text on topics which are familiar or of personal interest.
• Write personal letters describing experiences and impressions.

Production — Spoken and Written
Reference: CEFR Table 2 — Self-Assessment Grid (B1 Production)
• Connect phrases in a simple way in order to describe experiences and events, dreams, hopes, and
ambitions.
• Briefly give reasons and explanations for opinions and plans.
• Narrate a story or relate the plot of a book or film and describe one’s reactions.
• Give a straightforward description on a variety of familiar subjects within one’s field of interest,
presenting it as a linear sequence of points.
• Reasonably fluently relate a straightforward narrative or description as a sequence of points.
• Give a short, prepared presentation on a topic within one’s field, with reasons and explanations for
opinions, plans, and actions, and cope with straightforward follow-up questions.
• Write simple connected text on topics which are familiar or of personal interest, linking a series of
shorter discrete elements into a linear sequence.
• Write personal letters describing experiences, impressions, feelings, and events in some detail.

Qualitative Aspects of Spoken Language Use
Reference: CEFR Table 3 — Qualitative Aspects of Spoken Language Use (B1)
• Range: Command enough language to get by, with sufficient vocabulary to express oneself with
some hesitation and circumlocutions on topics such as family, hobbies and interests, work, travel,
and current events.
• Accuracy: Use reasonably accurately a repertoire of frequently used routines and patterns
associated with more predictable situations.
• Fluency: Keep going comprehensibly, even though pausing for grammatical and lexical planning and
repair is very evident, especially in longer stretches of free production.
• Interaction: Initiate, maintain, and close simple face-to-face conversation on topics that are familiar or of personal interest; repeat back part of what someone has said to confirm mutual understanding.
• Coherence: Link a series of shorter, discrete simple elements into a connected, linear sequence of
points.

Communication Strategies
Reference: CEFR Illustrative Scales (B1 Strategies)
• Use a variety of strategies to achieve understanding, including listening for main points and
checking comprehension by rephrasing.
• Ask someone to clarify or elaborate on what they have just said.
• Convey meaning by qualifying a word with a similar meaning (e.g., paraphrasing) when the exact
word escapes recall.
• Define features of something concrete for which the exact term cannot be recalled.
• Begin, maintain, and close simple conversation on familiar topics; use stock phrases to gain time
and keep one’s turn while formulating what to say.