Bon voyage!

Building up a strong vocabulary and plenty of practice are important when preparing for the French exam, writes Yeats College teacher Stephanie Keane

The Junior Cert Higher Level French Paper comprises of the following sections. I have included an approximate time to be spent on each question.

Allow 10 minutes to read over your work. Do not leave any answer blank in the Listening Comprehensions or the Reading Comprehensions. You never know you might be correct!

THE LISTENING SECTION TIP FOR PARENTS/GUARDIANS

A good tactic to improve your student’s listening skills is to put the CD that comes with the Junior Cert exam papers on in the car once or twice a week, either going to or coming from school.

TIPS FOR STUDENTS

• The CD with your Junior Cert papers contains the Listening Comprehensions. When you place it into your computer, an option will come up to view the scripts for each year.

• You should listen to the Listening Comprehensions with the script on the screen in front of you. Try and do this for 15 minutes once a week.

• Pull out vocabulary from the script and place this

vocabulary into a vocabulary copy. Vocabulary is key in this part of the paper as the same words tend to come up over and over again.

• Attempt each question - don’t leave blanks.

READING COMPREHENSIONS TIP FOR PARENTS/GUARDIANS TIPS FOR STUDENTS

• You should be completing a couple of comprehensions each week from the Junior Cert papers in class or yourself at home.

• Improving comprehension skills comes from practice,

practice, practice.

•I also highly recommend translating at least one comprehension from French to English every week. This will greatly improve your comprehension skills.

• Attempt each question - don’t leave blanks!

VOCABULARY

Having a good base of vocabulary is essential to achieving a high grade in French.

TIP FOR PARENTS/GUARDIANS

You could test your student on their vocabulary and highlight the words that they don’t know. It is easiest to test them from French to English (just spell the word out if you don’t speak French). Vocabulary lists are available in your student’s text book either at the back of the book or at the end of each unit. If not, you can access vocabulary on this website: http://tinyurl.com/5wpj3x. Simply scroll down the page to see the different categories. The categories that they should know are as follows:

Towns Countries Expressions of time Animals Holidays

The environment Technology

The human body Clothes

Sports Numbers House Food Accidents School Jobs Weather Signs

TIPS FOR STUDENTS

• While you’re doing your reading comprehensions and listening comprehensions you should have your vocabulary copy which I mentioned above. Transfer into that any word that you had to look up in a dictionary. You should be learning 35 new words a week.

• You should be looking at the vocabulary lists that I mentioned above in the TIPS FOR PARENTS/GUARDIANS section.

THE WRITTEN SECTION

You have two written pieces to complete for this section. The first piece is either a note or a postcard. The second piece is either an informal or a formal letter. The informal letter comes up every year. The formal letter is optional. Include each task, as there is a certain amount of marks for each task and you will lose marks if you leave one out. You cannot tell whether the note or the postcard is going to come up but I would imagine that you will be asked to write a postcard this year. 2018 was a note, 2017 was a note, 2016 was a postcard, 2015 was a note, 2014 was a postcard, 2013 was a note, 2012 was a postcard. The informal letter will come up every year. REMEMBER GRAMMAR IS VERY IMPORTANT IN YOUR WRITTEN SECTION

TOP TIP!

To practise your grammar, a good website to look at is: http://www.frenchinaclick.com/games

I suggest that you learn the following expressions and practise with previous papers. You can apply the same format to the postcard and informal letters using expressions from your textbook or notes from your teacher.

SAMPLE LETTER 2018

It is the month of May and you are looking forward to the summer holidays.

Write a letter in French to your pen pal, Christine. In your letter: thank her for her letter and birthday present give her some news about one of your friends say something about a film you have recently seen say that you are going to spend a week in Italy with your family ask her about her plans for the summer.

Grammar error checklist - written French

VERBS –

✔ Have you got the correct tense? Summary of tenses:

Le présent - Je donne = I give and I am giving Passé composé - J’ai donné = I have given/I gave (one time) Le futur simple - Je donnerai = I will give

Le futur proche – Je vais donner = I’m going to give L’imparfait - Je donnais = I used to give (continuous past)/I was giving Le conditionel - Je donnerais = I would give Je pourrais donner = I could give Je devrais donner = I should give Have you got the correct ending to your verb? For example, my parents should be followed by the ‘they’ form of the verb. To + any verb (e.g. to give - donner) is the infinitive of the verb, ‘it’ is generally followed by the ‘he’ form of the verb. Just ask yourself should this verb have the “I, You, He/She, We, You (plural) or They” ending. E.g. My parents think that. Wrong: mes parents pense que – correct: mes parents pensent que NOUNS

Is your noun masculine or feminine? Don’t forget definite articles. Have you been consistent using le/ la/les/d’ E.g. School or du/de la/des/de l’ Wrong: école – correct: l’ école ADJECTIVES ✔ Watch placement of adjectives The majority of adjectives follow this placement rule: English: The sporty girl French: The girl sporty The sporty girl: la fille sportive

There are some exceptions: Beauty Age Good/ bad Size – BAGS

These follow the English placement rule.

The small girl: la petite fille ✔ Watch agreement of adjectives Adjectives change in French depending on what they are describing.

They may be describing something or someone that is masculine, feminine and singular or plural.

Girl: je suis heureuse

Boy: je suis heureux ACCENTS ✔ Getting an accent wrong is the equivalent to a spelling mistake so check them all. RELATIVE PRONOUNS – QUI/QUE

✔ Have you written the correct relative pronoun? To say which or that, use either QUE OR QUI

Use que if next word is a subject. Le stylo que tu as… (The pen that you have…)

Use qui if next word is a verb. Le chat qui est sur la table…(The cat that is on the table…) In English we often leave out who/which/that. We say: There’s the boy I met at the party Rather than:

There’s the boy who I met at the party.

In French the words qui and que can never be left out. Also this rule applies for verbs like penser. In English we often say, I think Jane is kind...instead of, I think that Jane is kind Wrong: Je pense Jane est gentille - correct: Je pense que Jane est gentille. PREPOSITIONS ✔ Have you used the right preposition, e.g. de, pour, avec… ✔ Check if the verb used needs a preposition. There are several verbs in French which are followed by the infinitive of the next verb. The main ones would be pouvoir (to be able to/can), vouloir (to want to) and devoir (to have to). Students tend to place the second verb in a different format instead of the infinitive. E.g. Il veut aller au spectacle mais il ne peut pas sortir parce qu’il doit étudier. There are other verbs in French which are followed by à plus

the infinitive.

E.g. J’aide ma mère à passer l’aspirateur -I help my mother to hoover There are other verbs that take de plus the infinitive. E.g. Il a cessé de fumer - He has stopped smoking. Finally there is also a more complicated list of verbs which take à before the object and de before the infinitive. These verbs are associated with verbs of ‘communication, that is asking, advising, telling, allowing, etc.’ Eg: J’ai demandé à ma soeur de m’aider avec mes devoirs – I asked my sister to help me with my homework

QUESTIONS ✔ Have you turned the subject and verb around? And used a hyphen? E.g. Avez-vous mon livre? AVOIR EXPRESSIONS ✔ Know your expressions with avoir.

Avoir – a number of phrases using the verb avoir exist in French.

Avoir faim/soif – To be hungry/thirsty Avoir chaud/froid – To be hot/cold Avoir raison/tort – To be right/wrong E.g. Tu as tort – you are wrong Avoir peur de – To be afraid of Avoir l’air – To seem E.g. Il a l’air triste – he seems sad En avoir marre de – To be sick of Avoir du mal à – To have a pain in Avoir de la chance – To be lucky E.g. J’ai de la chance – I’m lucky Avoir le droit de – To have the right to E.g. On n’a pas le droit de fumer (smoke)

OBJECT PRONOUNS ✔ Me, Have you, you him, used her, us object etc. pronouns correctly? French front of object the verb. pronouns are placed after the subject and in E.g. She is looking at him Wrong: elle regarde à lui – correct: elle le regarde Unless the second verb is an infinitive then it is placed before the infinitive. For example: Je vais la voir – I’m going to see her. NEGATIVES Making sentences negative in French is a bit different than in English, due to the two-part negative adverb and the some- times difficult issue of placement. ✔ NE COMES AFTER THE SUBJECT, E.G. I, YOU, HE, SHE… PAS COMES AFTER THE FIRST VERB

E.g. I didn’t do my homework Wrong: je n’ai fait pas mes devoirs – correct: je n’ai pas fait mes devoirs FRENCH DROPPED ‘E’

✔ You need to drop the ‘e’ when the following words are followed by a vowel: de, je, le, me, ne, que, se, te E.g. I believe that he Wrong: je crois que il – correct: je crois qu’il EXPRESSIONS OF QUANTITY ✔ Use ‘de’ or ‘d’ not ‘des’ with most expressions of quantity E.g. I have a lot of books Wrong: j’ai beaucoup des livres - correct: j’ai beaucoup de livres Son frère – can mean his or her brother. E.g. I like my school Wrong: j’aime m’école – correct: j’aime mon école