Middle school in French is le collège.
Fais attention! This is a false cognate! It does not mean “college” (université) in French. Middle school covers four years in France, unlike three years for middle school or junior high in the United States.
A middle-school student is called un collégien or une collégienne,
and students attend le collège from the age of 11 until about 14 or 15. Les collégiens can still eat lunch at school or at home, but they will stop calling their teachers maître or maîtresse. (That’s for little kids!). They now only use monsieur, madame, or mademoiselle.
The levels of le collège are:
| French system | American system equivalent |
|---|---|
|
la sixième (6ème) |
Grade 6 |
|
la cinquième (5ème) |
Grade 7 |
|
la quatrième (4ème) |
Grade 8 |
|
la troisième (3ème) |
Grade 9 |
Do you see how the grades count down in French as a student progresses? This is very different from the US system where the grades count up?
In the first year of collège, French students must choose a foreign language to study. They often choose between German, English, or Spanish. In cinquième, students can choose to add Latin or Greek; and in quatrième (equivalent to 8th grade in the US), students must choose a second foreign language to study! German, English, and Spanish are common, but there may be more or fewer language options available at a particular school.
The last year of middle school is the most difficult, and some students may need to repeat this level if they fail. There is a national exam at the end of troisième (9th grade in the US) called le brevet. When they pass middle school, students receive their first diploma, and they need this to be able to enter le lycée – high school.
