The term picture files goes back for me to the late Tracy Terrell’s book Dos Mundos. My several thousand pictures (cut from magazines) are categorized into about 40 categories with subcategories e.g. emotions/depressed.
Sorry I do not have handy the date or lesson # for this lesson (I am so far behind in transcribing these lessons), but I wanted to show how one can deal with cultural issues while staying in the language. This activity was done around May of 2019, something over half of a school year in terms of time in class here.
Pictures were selected and grouped into eight categories: one was Grand-pere (me), then the story La Cabane Magique, then fairy tales, then life in France, then life in the family, then foods, then clothing, and finally life in America.
With each picture shown a bit of dialogue occurred to go over what was depicted, answer questions (she asks in English at this point but I respond in French). On the easel she takes the number of the picture (they are numbered on the back) and writes it next to the appropriate category.
The purpose is not only to comprehend French but to engender questions regarding the pictures of French life, cultural similarities and differences, and so forth. If this is done in French, it serves as input. My job is to select pictures of intrinsic interest and to make the input comprehensible.
We both learned a new word: crocher = to check off, which itself led to a very brief discussion of knitting and the connection.