Highly diverse profiles of well-known and less well-known Francophones. Very easy vocab for novice learners with a nice drawing to go with each one. Students enjoyed learning about Django Reinhardt from the very first page of book 1. These books are full of valuable gems. The first-person, present -tense writing and biography format support comprehension.
The fascinating people featured in this series come from all over the francophone world. They will allow so many students to learn about people they can relate to, especially students who struggle to find that in traditional classes.
My 11 year-old daughter and I read several bios together before I brought the books to school. She really enjoyed them and, because of Carla's brilliant use of cognates, could understand with very little scaffolding. My French I students can read independently from these by the end of the year.
These books can be read easily by a beginner yet have content that makes them also valuable to advanced learners. The maps and beautiful illustrations support comprehension and add interest.
Unlike much of the input novice learners read, these are written in first person. I like that.
I have the whole series and am going to order additional copies. Great for FVR and for reading as a class.
I highly and enthusiastically recommend the whole series.
I am very pleased with my purchase of these books. They are easily comprehensible for beginner students. They use the same beginning verbs I have been teaching. They provide a great flood of input for students and a great springboard for student-created writing.
It was so thrilling to realize I understood all of these simple biographies of French speakers. Carla Tarini has done a beautiful job of telling the stories of women, people of color, fairly unknown scientists an artists as well as well-known heroes. The artwork is stunning. Each of the 10 subjects has a one-page bio written in the first person next to a gorgeous bio. These are worth reading and re-reading.