FrancoManie 2026: French Music Games, Free Contest, and AATF Discount for Teachers
FrancoManie 2026: How to Teach French with Music (Webinar Recap + AATF Member Discount)
French teachers have a full plate, so we were grateful that so many of you joined our recent webinar. We showed how to use authentic French music and videos in class, played a live listening game, and previewed FrancoManie 2026, our fall French music contest.
Missed it? Here is a quick recap, plus the AATF member discount: $60 a year for Roxxem Pro, with a free two-week trial.
Quick Takeaways
- FrancoManie runs October 26 – November 13. It is an 8-song bracket, free for teachers and students to join.
- Roxxem is built on authentic French content. Students learn from the music and videos they already love.
- Teachers save 3+ hours of prep a week. Student engagement rises about 45%.
- AATF members pay $60 a year for Pro, with a free two-week trial.
- About $700 in gift cards goes to the top classrooms and students.
What Is Roxxem?
Roxxem is a platform for teaching languages with music, videos, and other authentic content. It was started by a language teacher who saw engagement drop during Covid. Students didn't care about their textbooks, but they were spending five to seven hours a day on music, video, and social media.
So he built lessons around that content. Today, more than 2 million users and 4,000+ districts use Roxxem, and many of the playlists and units in the library were created by teachers.
How to Find French Songs and Videos for Your Lesson
Every video in the library is transcribed, so you can search it in ways that match your lesson plan.
- By vocabulary topic: family, hobbies, daily routines, and more.
- By grammar point: filter for the past tense, for example, and see which videos use it most.
- By maturity rating: you control what your students can see.
- By difficulty: every item is rated on the CEFR and ACTFL scales, so you can pick anything from a nursery rhyme to a fast, advanced track.
- By theme: there are playlists aligned to the AP French themes for upper-level classes.
Roxxem's French Music Games
We played a round of Whac-a-Word together using a song from this year's FrancoManie lineup. It is a fast, Kahoot-style listening game with leaderboards. Students hear the song, see the lyrics with a missing word, and choose the right answer.
Some attendees found it a bit fast. These settings make it easier:
- Slow the song down.
- Choose which words are missing.
- Use power-ups for extra variety.
Roxxem has other games for other skills:
Game | What students practice |
|---|---|
Whac-a-Word | Live listening, fill in the missing word |
Sentence Snake | Line-by-line listening and sequencing, slower and good for part of a song |
Vocab Harvest | Matching vocabulary from the song |
Quiz Ninja | Comprehension: what a word or lyric means |
Every song and video also comes with editable slides, handouts, assessments, and learn lessons. They get you 80 to 90 percent of the way to a finished lesson, and you can change anything you like.
Assignments and Analytics
Many teachers assign Roxxem content as homework. You can assign a specific video or game, or set up a sandbox assignment: each student spends 15 minutes a week with French content they choose, such as music, a movie, a podcast, or a news video.
Roxxem tracks grades, and it also shows where your class sits by ACTFL level and which topics and songs your students like most. That makes it easier to build a lesson around what they already care about.
FrancoManie 2026: A Free French Music Contest for Your Class
FrancoManie is our fall French music contest, run in partnership with Mania Musicale. Mania Musicale's March bracket draws tens of thousands of classrooms worldwide. Teachers asked for a smaller version in the fall, when student energy tends to dip. FrancoManie is that version.
How it works
- Eight songs face off in head-to-head matchups until one champion song is crowned.
- Students and classes vote on their favorites and fill out a prediction bracket.
- Games played on the contest songs earn points for students, classrooms, and schools around the world.
Key details
- Dates: Monday, October 26 through Friday, November 13.
- The songs: All eight are past winners or top finalists, vetted for maturity and popular in classrooms before.
- Prizes: About $700 in gift cards for the top three classrooms and students, plus pizza parties and more.
- Cost: Free for teachers and students to join. Classroom-vs-classroom competition needs a Pro subscription.
Get ready before October 26
- Create a free Roxxem account.
- Have students create free accounts and join your class.
- Introduce the bracket and the songs.
- Play a round of Whac-a-Word so students know the games.
Free vs. Pro, Plus the AATF Member Discount
Much of Roxxem is free: the video library, the song-based games, teacher accounts, voting, and individual student participation in FrancoManie.
Pro adds detailed assignment tracking, adaptive learning, slide and lesson generation, extra game features, and classroom participation in contests.
AATF member offer: Roxxem Pro is $60 a year for AATF members, and you can try it free for two weeks.
Frequently Asked Questions
When does FrancoManie 2026 start? It runs from Monday, October 26 through Friday, November 13.
Is FrancoManie free? Yes. Teachers and students can join for free. Competing as a class against other classes requires a Pro subscription.
How much is the AATF member discount? $60 a year for Roxxem Pro, with a two-week free trial.
Is the music appropriate for school? Yes. All eight songs have been vetted for maturity, and Roxxem also lets you control what content your students can see.
Can I use this with a beginner class? Yes. You can slow songs down, choose which words are missing, and filter by difficulty level.
Thank you to everyone who joined. We know how much work you put in, and we're glad to be part of your classroom.
Learn how Roxxem uses IRT to measure language proficiency through everyday practice, with levels mapped to CEFR and ACTFL.