My academic experience in France has been quite different from what I am used to at the College of Charleston. Here each of my classes meets once a week, instead of 2 or 3 times a week like at CofC. Classes are also much longer, usually lasting 2 hours each with one of my lectures being 4 hours long! Classes here often have a break halfway through for students to get coffee. This makes 4 hour lectures much more manageable. The style of testing is very different between France and the USA. At CofC I am much more used to receiving 4-5 grades throughout the semester, usually through writing assignments. Unlike in the USA, my courses in France either have 1 or 2 grades for the entire semester. Many courses have a midterm and a final exam, but some courses only have a final exam. Some French classes use multiple choice and fill in the blank style questions much more frequently than I am used to, but for one course, my final exam is a 2-hour long dissertation paper with a style of writing unique to France.

While learning in the classroom is different, I am always learning outside of the classroom as well. I have learned from the local art and history museums, but I have also been learning every time I get to practice the French language with other students. Locals are always teaching me new words, contractions, and slang, which I would not be taught in a classroom setting. I think the biggest lesson I learned from this experience has been that locals appreciate you trying to speak the local language, that people can still understand you when you make mistakes, and that it is okay to ask people to speak slowly to fully understand what they are saying.

I included a picture of the local art museum, called the Palais des Beaux Arts, and a picture of the Université Catholique de Lille campus (where they filmed Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them).