I have been using Francais interactif as the basis for my curriculum since 2012. I had split it into two years, Chapters 0-6 for Level 1, 7-13 for Level 2; the goal was to provide them with close to a year's of university level French in 2 years of HS instruction. Remember: there was no French 3. Also relevant: I began my career teaching university French, and have taught dual enrollment, and I'm particularly sensitive to the fact that quality WL experience in high school means the ability to test out of WL in college (and earn some costly credits for free). So I've always wanted my high school students to get the most bang for their buck.
Problem: It was too much for 90% of my students. Cramming an entire 2nd semester of college French into one year of high school French was too much, even with adapting instruction and assessment to proficiency-based and the goal of Novice High. The amount of themes was daunting. Working around the month and half of testing that goes in April and May in Ohio was a nightmare, and we could only scratch the surface of the last few chapters/themes. Many of my students have low reading levels, or history of low academic engagement (low GPA, credit deficient), and they simply did not have the learning strategies or literacy skills to succeed in a L2 classroom moving at that pace. Additionally, they HATED the media chapter - Chapitre 9 - of Francais interactif. Every year. They would be marginally interested in discussing films and learning how to plan a movie outing in France/Quebec, but had no interest in discussing news or other media use. This past year, I left it out entirely.
Insight: I had a French 3 class for 2017-2018. As the year progressed, I noticed that while most of my students could read at a very high level in French (I use authentic resources from the beginning of French 1 on, they are flooded with textual input, and their reading comprehension generally is very good), their interpersonal and presentational skills were fossilized at Novice Mid - Novice High. In my push for "covering" so many themes in levels 1 and 2, I had not taken the time to help ALL of my students - not just the higher achieving ones - develop their productive language skills.
Solution: Do more with less in Level 2. Level 1 is fine, we comfortably work with the first 6 chapters, leaving aside most of the grammar instruction of Francais interactif (although I will do lessons in context for some of the points). But with Level 2, we will take our time, reviewing the themes from Level 1 and structures we need to communicate.This will help the students whose proficiency levels are lower as they enter Level 2, giving them support and establishing a more comfortable experience for them . I will spend more time doing interpersonal communication practice with students and less time worrying about "covering" themes, which will lower affect (anxiety about keeping up) and increase student self-confidence.
Here's what the curriculum unit map looks like now:
Reflection: I think this creates an experience for Level 2 learners that will simultaneously provide comfort and support for students who need it, but opportunity to stretch higher for those who are able. It removes the stress of trying to cram in so much vocabulary and introduce structures so quickly that most students are not able to gain more than a superficial familiarity with the relevant language. I hope that this will set more students up for success, and result in fewer students giving up during the second semester because they feel irretrievably lost.
NOTE: If you are interested in which structures/tenses I DO introduce and when, you can examine the Francais interactif chapters to get a general idea, or shoot me an email/Twitter DM, I'd be happy to explain in more detail.