ELTWeekly Issue#26, Book Review: ‘The Universal Course in FRENCH’ by Pawan Kumar

‘The Universal Course in FRENCH’ by Pawan Kumar

Reviewed by Prof (Dr) Shefali Bakshi

Mr Pawan Kumar, who is a teacher of French in Amity University, Lucknow Campus, since last three years, has written a student friendly book in which elementary or zero level learners can be well-versed with day-to-day French and its pronunciation. The book begins with a chapter on “Salutations” along with their English forms so as to make the learner involved in speaking the language right away. The second chapter concentrates on the French alphabets in their symbol form with the meaning in the Indian script. This chapter forms the base of the learner and so it is very important for the learner to completely understand and acquire the sounds correctly. The third chapter is on colloquial dialogues in a conversation form so that communicative activities like Role Play, Drilling Activity  by repeating structures can be conducted in the classrooms. These, however, have Hindi translations for better pronunciation and usage. The author has constructed small chapters of lots of variety, thus motivating the learner to become fluent in the language. The best part is the last chapter, which is based on Lord Ram’s story in French which evolves an integration of the Indian Culture in the French language. This inspires the learners to create their own short writings in French. At the grammar level, the author discusses ‘Tenses’ briefly and does a comparative study between the different tenses, which helps in story building.

The Author has taken examples from daily life so that a learner can grasp the basic knowledge in a simple way. The wonderful part of this book is that the pronunciation is given in the Hindi script; therefore any beginner can acquire the French language. Mr Pawan Kumar has written this book keeping in mind the growth of Engineering, Management, and other Institutes in smaller pockets of India. He has shown that it is not necessary to be proficient in English in order to acquire any other language. It is a boon to students who are studying in districts, towns and villages. So far, there was not a single book of such a kind for the vernacular medium.

Therefore the book has become very popular among the local learners of not only college but also school. This book can be subscribed in schools as today schools are also offering one foreign language to their students. The book is also being used in Amity University, Lucknow, Jaipur and Noida campuses, Lucknow University, and many other technical and management institutions where French has become an optional subject to be opted by the beginners. The author Mr.Pawan Kumar has made the languages very simple for first time for the Indian students

Prof (Dr) Shefali Bakshi is the Deputy Director at Amity School of Languages. She has done a Project on “A Study of Verbal Interaction in Waiting for Godot” for the M.A. degree and has ompleted her PhD thesis on “A Study of Verbal Interaction in the plays of Samuel Beckett” for the Degree of Ph.D. at University of Lucknow, India. She has conducted over 75 workshops on ELT in various parts of India for school teachers and principals.

* ELTWeekly would likt to thank Prof (Dr) Shefali Bakshi for sontributing this review.