Unit 3 - The francophone world, travel and hypotheticals
Unit 3: the francophone world and travel
Unit 3 widens the lens to travel, cultural diversity and the French-speaking world. Expect authentic texts about destinations, festivals, customs and global issues, plus questions asking you to identify purpose, audience and tone. The grammar shifts to future and conditional: future for plans (je partirai), conditional for hypotheticals and politeness (je voudrais). The subjunctive appears after il faut que, bien que, avant que and pour que.
Concepts and traps
Prepositions with places are heavily tested: à Paris, en France, au Canada, aux États-Unis, en Bretagne. Learn the country-gender map. Si clauses: si + present → future; si + imparfait → conditional. Never put a conditional directly after si. Cultural knowledge matters: la Francophonie includes Quebec, Senegal, Belgium, Switzerland and the DOM-TOM. Avoid reducing France to Paris. Reading traps include cognates that mislead (assister à means attend, not assist) and questions asking for the writer’s attitude rather than a literal fact. Listening tasks often test numbers, prices, times and directions. In extended writing, use connectors (d'abord, ensuite, cependant, donc) to show structure.
Worked example
Prompt: say what you would do with a free year.
Model: Si j'avais une année libre, je voyagerais au Sénégal et je travaillerais dans une école.
Rule: si + imparfait, then conditional in the main clause; both verbs carry the same hypothetical frame.