Arrange to meet a French friend 'dans huit jours' and you'll see them in a week. The phrase says eight days; a week has seven. French has counted it that way for centuries, and nobody has established why.
• The etymology comic - illustrated stage cards, one idea each, with short KS3/4 captions
• The word-history breakdown, Latin to modern French, dated where the record allows
• 'Huit' traced back to Latin 'octo', with the English cousins that came from it
• 'Une huitaine' and 'une quinzaine' - the nouns French built the same way
• The honest answer about why the count is eight, and what the dictionaries will and won't support
• The sources page
• A short how-to-use guide for the adult
For personal use in home education and tutoring only.
It suits KS3 and KS4 French learners, home-educated children, specialist tuition students including those with dyslexia or a weak working memory, and parents working alongside a child. 'Huit jours' is genuinely everyday French, so unlike some of the 'jour' family this one earns its keep in ordinary conversation as well as being a good story.
It isn't a numbers lesson. It assumes the learner already knows 'huit' and 'jour' separately and can read a short French phrase aloud - the work here is on what happens when the two are put together and stop adding up.
A phrase that means something other than the sum of its words is exactly where a careful learner comes unstuck, because doing the sensible thing gets the wrong answer. 'Huit jours' is worth meeting head-on for that reason, and it carries a second lesson with it: the reason for the eight isn't known, the stories that circulate aren't supported, and saying so is more useful to a child than a tidy explanation that isn't true.
I first made these for my dyslexic son.
Same topic, in L'atelier des mots: the wider 'jour' family - 'bonjour', 'journée', 'séjour', 'journal', 'ajourner' - and the light-sense words 'abat-jour', 'contre-jour', 'ajouré' and 'point du jour'.
Same root: all built on 'jour', from Latin 'diurnum'. 'Huit jours' uses the day-sense, the one behind English 'journey' and 'journal'; the light-family words use 'jour' as the light itself.
Free in the Wordhord: the English cousins 'journey' and 'journal'. And the Compendium post on why word origins help with modern languages, dyslexic learners especially.
Available now as a PDF download.
This PDF prints into two forms, and you choose which suits you.
The large cards - one idea to a page - are made to be laminated and clipped onto a binder ring. Print single-sided, laminate, trim, and punch a hole in the top-left corner, then hold them together with one ring. The cards are numbered, so a loose deck goes back in order. Once they're on the ring a child can handle them, turn them over and lay them out - which is where a lot of the understanding happens. The deck is a bag or dinner-table object: something a child picks up and works through at the table, not a pencil-case card.
The single sheet at the end holds the whole word on one page. Print it and it's ready - no laminating, no cutting. It's the print-and-go form, for the fridge or the middle of a lesson, when you want the whole story in front of you at once. You assemble the deck yourself; there's no ready-made deck in the box. You'll need a printer, and a laminator and a ring for the deck. Neither form is homework and neither is a test.
This is an educational support material. It isn't a diagnostic, assessment or therapeutic tool, and it doesn't replace specialist assessment or intervention. Outcomes vary by learner. It's built to be revisited over time rather than worked through in one go, and it isn't a complete teaching programme or a substitute for formal instruction.
Arrange to meet a French friend 'dans huit jours' and you'll see them in a week. The phrase says eight days; a week has seven. French has counted it that way for centuries, and nobody has established why.
• The etymology comic - illustrated stage cards, one idea each, with short KS3/4 captions
• The word-history breakdown, Latin to modern French, dated where the record allows
• 'Huit' traced back to Latin 'octo', with the English cousins that came from it
• 'Une huitaine' and 'une quinzaine' - the nouns French built the same way
• The honest answer about why the count is eight, and what the dictionaries will and won't support
• The sources page
• A short how-to-use guide for the adult
For personal use in home education and tutoring only.
It suits KS3 and KS4 French learners, home-educated children, specialist tuition students including those with dyslexia or a weak working memory, and parents working alongside a child. 'Huit jours' is genuinely everyday French, so unlike some of the 'jour' family this one earns its keep in ordinary conversation as well as being a good story.
It isn't a numbers lesson. It assumes the learner already knows 'huit' and 'jour' separately and can read a short French phrase aloud - the work here is on what happens when the two are put together and stop adding up.
A phrase that means something other than the sum of its words is exactly where a careful learner comes unstuck, because doing the sensible thing gets the wrong answer. 'Huit jours' is worth meeting head-on for that reason, and it carries a second lesson with it: the reason for the eight isn't known, the stories that circulate aren't supported, and saying so is more useful to a child than a tidy explanation that isn't true.
I first made these for my dyslexic son.
Same topic, in L'atelier des mots: the wider 'jour' family - 'bonjour', 'journée', 'séjour', 'journal', 'ajourner' - and the light-sense words 'abat-jour', 'contre-jour', 'ajouré' and 'point du jour'.
Same root: all built on 'jour', from Latin 'diurnum'. 'Huit jours' uses the day-sense, the one behind English 'journey' and 'journal'; the light-family words use 'jour' as the light itself.
Free in the Wordhord: the English cousins 'journey' and 'journal'. And the Compendium post on why word origins help with modern languages, dyslexic learners especially.
Available now as a PDF download.
This PDF prints into two forms, and you choose which suits you.
The large cards - one idea to a page - are made to be laminated and clipped onto a binder ring. Print single-sided, laminate, trim, and punch a hole in the top-left corner, then hold them together with one ring. The cards are numbered, so a loose deck goes back in order. Once they're on the ring a child can handle them, turn them over and lay them out - which is where a lot of the understanding happens. The deck is a bag or dinner-table object: something a child picks up and works through at the table, not a pencil-case card.
The single sheet at the end holds the whole word on one page. Print it and it's ready - no laminating, no cutting. It's the print-and-go form, for the fridge or the middle of a lesson, when you want the whole story in front of you at once. You assemble the deck yourself; there's no ready-made deck in the box. You'll need a printer, and a laminator and a ring for the deck. Neither form is homework and neither is a test.
This is an educational support material. It isn't a diagnostic, assessment or therapeutic tool, and it doesn't replace specialist assessment or intervention. Outcomes vary by learner. It's built to be revisited over time rather than worked through in one go, and it isn't a complete teaching programme or a substitute for formal instruction.
