Abstract:
The teaching/learning of French as a foreign language in Senior High Schools in Ghana requires that the French teacher puts in place some measures to make the learner interact with others in French and also participate actively in the learning process. This study, therefore, attempts to describe some interactive strategies used by teachers of French to encourage learners to express themselves orally in the French language. Three lesson sessions are recorded at Holy Child Senior High School. However, only the last session is transcribed and analysed. In addition to that, the researcher interviewed the French teacher on some interactive strategies that could not feature in the lessons recorded. The data from the recording and the interview sessions are transcribed based on the principles of conversational analysis. The results show that the French teacher uses one or more of the following interactive techniques in a lesson to make learners interact using the French language: Question/answer, repetitions, reformulations, code switching, debate, role-play, dialogue and interactive completions. She uses each one of them for a particular reason. While using them, the teacher regulates learners’ turn taking so as to enable majority of them take part in the classroom interaction process. The teacher plays, therefore, the roles of an informant, an animator and an evaluator
