Bordeaux: Fantastique Trip France
4 Days from £695pp
based on 30 students with 3 free teacher places
Combining rich cultural activities and an immersive language experience, Bordeaux is a fantastic location for a French language school trip.
The city is well-known for its world-class wine industry, lively arts scene, and historic architecture, and it offers the ideal setting for practical learning.
With the help of your own local curator, students can discover the region around Bordeaux, taking a deep dive into its culture and learning through real-world scenarios.
Our MFL teachers have carefully selected the language exercises to offer a real world setting with unique cultural experiences.
Bordeaux’s culinary scene will play a big part in their learning adventure. Savour regional delights, like the famous canelés pastry, and take advantage of guided market visits where your students can converse in French with local vendors.
As specialists and former MFL teachers, we know how important it is for students to experience real-world learning in a real-life context, and so our itineraries make this a key priority. We also ensure that students discover a region’s culture through insightful activities to better understand how the people, the language, the history, and the traditions work harmoniously together.
Our language trips are designed by specialists with your key learning objectives in mind.
Throughout your trip, a specialist local language tour leader will guide you, leading engaging activities, and ensuring that your key learning objectives are met. Your students will also benefit from our various pedagogical activities. These on-the-go sessions provide the ultimate classroom without walls, allowing your students to engage in targeted workshops and tailored teaching in local settings, all with an enhanced educational focus. With a maximum ratio of 15:1, your students have every opportunity to deepen their learning and build their confidence in real-world settings.
Below is an example of what a 4-day, 3-night trip to Bordeaux might entail, but for a deeper insight, be sure to talk with your travel specialist and look through our optional activities brochure.
What's included
- Return flights from London to Bordeaux
- Access to language school facilities and staff
- Local language school tour leader providing outstanding knowledge of the region’s culture
- Staff rooming based on same gender teachers sharing multi-bedded rooms
- All excursions, activities and entrance fees as specified in the itinerary
- Full board basis
- All transportation in France, including airport transfers, in a modern, air-conditioned vehicle
- Peace of mind with our unique Travel Disruption Support, protecting your group should the unexpected happen
- Loyalty Scheme with a range of benefits and discounts
- Unique no surcharge guarantee
Day
1
Day 1
Flying into Bordeaux, the city will soon come into view and your group will get their first glimpse of what awaits them on their French cultural adventure. From the airport, the city centre and Garonne River is just a short coach journey away, with the character of the city becoming more present as you get towards the centre.
Once you arrive and settle in at your hotel, you’ll head to the Newdeal Language School for a welcome meeting with your local language school tour leader. They are a language specialist that is local to Bordeaux and know the region’s culture better than anyone. As you explore the city, they’ll be there to assist you with all lessons and activities, and provide your students with a deeper insight into the French language and culture. They’ll also talk you through the upcoming language workshops and what your students can expect from their time at the school.
Featuring 362 listed monuments within the city, Bordeaux is second only to Paris in the preservation of its historical heritage. To truly get acquainted with the city and its rich history and architecture, your students will finish their day with a pedagogical tour of the city. Providing commentary in French, your language school tour leader will show you the city’s highlights, including the historic centre, the Cathédrale Saint-André, Place des Quinconces, Le Miroir d’Eau, Place de la Bourse, and a climb up Pey Berland Tower. There are also plenty of parks and gardens to discover along your way.
Day
2
Day 2
This morning, students will return to the Newdeal language school for two 45-minute language workshops. Focussing on the terms and phrases that they’ll be using in today’s activity, these workshops will aim to boost your students’ confidence and understanding of conversational French. With these linguistic skills fresh in their mind, it’ll be time to put them to practice with a fun, pedagogical activity.
Students will take to Bordeaux’s famous markets to explore the stalls and utilise their conversational skills to barter with the vendors. Working with the language school tour leader, each group will be given tasks to complete such as sourcing items from a shopping list, asking vendors questions about the different produce, bartering prices down, and making purchases in French. As their confidence builds, they may even find a new favourite treat, or a souvenir to take home with them.
To finish the day, students will visit Bordeaux’s Musée d’Aquitaine for a fascinating insight into the history of Bordeaux and the wider Aquitaine region. Spanning from prehistory to modern times, the museum’s collections document significant chapters that defined the region’s history and shaped it into what it is today.
Day
3
Day 3
This morning, students will return to the Newdeal Language School for a 45-minute language workshop, this time focussing on the essential vocabulary and grammar needed for today’s activities. This will also be a great opportunity for students to ask questions about their experience in the markets yesterday and how they might find ways to improve their conversational French.
As teachers, we know that learning French isn’t just about the language, it’s also about experiencing the culture and how the two work harmoniously together. That’s why this afternoon, your students will take part in a French cooking workshop. With a focus on famous Bordeaux dishes, such as cannelés, crepes, or quiches, they’ll learn the techniques, discover the ingredients, and prepare some delicious food to excite their tastebuds. Using what they learnt from this morning’s workshop, students will also learn a variety of cooking terms to add to their vocabulary as they provide the correct instructions to the chef, and describe the look and taste of the food afterwards.
In the afternoon, students will have the opportunity to practice their French with a fun game of Board game Olympics. Students will split into teams and rotate around three or four different board games, with each team member competing to win points for their team. Following an initial activity to learn the key French terms and phrases, students must play the games in French to win. Students will learn through fun and repetition, and the winning group may be awarded a local Bordeaux treat.
Finally, students will end their first day in France with a traditional game of pétanque. This classic French game will allow them to improve their technique, to socialise, and to have fun practicing their French.
Day
4
Day 4
To see out the end of your trip, you may have a few final hours of free time in the morning before you depart for the airport. This will depend on the time of your flight but, if you have some free time, we recommend either some last-minute souvenir shopping, or visiting a local historical landmark which you may have missed earlier in the week.
Trip notes:
This trip itinerary is just one example of a trip to Bordeaux. We have a wide range of activities to suit different academic interests, budgets and abilities.
School Trip Planning Hub
We know that the real job of selling a school trip is down to you and your colleagues so we've collated some helpful resources for you to use to make sure you not only get the buy in from your students and their parents, but also that you have all the details you need to ensure a simple planning process.
Launching Your School Trip
