Music is a fun and stress-free way of learning a foreign language. You expose yourself to new genres and voices. You learn new phrases, hear new accents, discover plays on words, and learn vocabulary that you’ll never forget. And it makes sense – you can still remember all the words to the music you listened to while you were growing up, so if you can find even one artist you like in a foreign language, it can increase your listening and spoken comprehension in ways that a textbook cannot.

Learning through songs is also a way to spark discussions in class. Applying a song to a student’s current situation will make him focus more on what’s being said. Belgian artist Stromae’s song “Carmen” is a catchy little number that discusses the current preoccupation with smart phones and Twitter. It’s a very modern song in that aspect, but it’s also possible to use a more dated song to discuss certain themes – after all, la condition humaine est intemporelle (the human condition is timeless).

The song I’ve chosen for today is called Pomme C (Apple C  – which comes from the idea that pressing the apple button and the letter C on an Apple keyboard will copy whatever is selected so it can be pasted later. The PC equivalent is Control C). In the song, Calogero sings of a woman he’s met virtually, and for class discussions, this could just as easily be updated to more modern methods such as Tinder and other similar applications.

Below I’ve included the text and a translation. At the bottom, I’ve offered some ideas on how this song can be interpreted into a class.

 

J’ai son image
I have her picture
J’ai son email
I have her email
Son coeur au bout du clavier
Her heart at the tip of the keyboard

J’ai son visage
I have her face
Et l’envie d’elle
And the desire for her
Sans jamais l’avoir touchée
Without ever having touched her

Dois-je sauver ?
Should I save it ?
Ou bien abandonner ?
Or give it all up?

Pomme, c’est un homme et une femme
Apple, it’s a man and a woman
Et c’est tout un programme
And it’s all a program
Un ciel artificiel
An artificial sky

Pomme, qui m’allume et qui me quitte
Apple, who turns me on and who leaves me
On s’aime trop vite
We love each other too quickly
Nos vies c’est le virtuel
Our lives are virtual

Elle m’écrit
She writes me
Mais mon écran
But my screen
Formate les sentiments
Formats the feelings

Mais j’imagine qu’une machine
But I imagine that a machine
Ne peut que faire semblant
Can only pretend
Ma déesse elle
My goddess, she
N’est pas vraiment réelle
Isn’t really real

Pomme, c’est un homme et une femme
Apple, it’s a man and a woman
Et c’est tout un programme
And it’s all a program
Un ciel artificiel
An artificial sky

Pomme, qui m’allume et qui me quitte
Apple, who turns me on and who leaves me
On s’aime trop vite
We love each other too quickly
C’est le vice et le virtuel
It’s a vice and it’s the virtual

Un peu d’amour, copié-collé
A little bit of love, copied and pasted
Un peu d’amour, pomme c
A little bit of love, Apple C
Un peu d’amour téléchargé
A little bit of love, downloaded
Un peu d’amour à sauver
A little bit of love to save
Mais l’amour n’est pas virtuel.
But love is not virtual

Pomme, c’est un homme et une femme
Apple, it’s a man and a woman
Et c’est tout un programme
And it’s all a program
Un ciel artificiel
An artificial sky
Pomme, qui m’allume et qui me quitte
Apple, who turns me on and who leaves me
On s’aime trop vite
We love each other too quickly
C’est le vice et le virtuel
It’s a vice and it’s the virtual

Dois-je sauver
Should I save it
ou bien dois-j’abandonner ?
Or should I quit?

*****

– Have you recently touched on computer vocabulary in your class? This song could make a great cloze activity – just erase the terms the students have learned (copier/coller, imager, clavier, télécharger, etc.), and allow them to fill them in via a cloze activity.

– Dating websites are more popular (and more esoteric in man cases) than ever before. How have these sites and applications changed the dating world? How has it changed the way we communicate with each other?

-This song covers a lot of virtual aspects – are the students familiar with text speak?

 

Do you have any suggestions for using this or other sings in a classroom setting?