Revising

I'm finding it a bit dull revising for my French and German exams. What do you find useful when revising languages? Are there any techniques to make the vocab stick, or whatever else, which have worked for you? I've tried spider diagrams for essay plans (in the writing exam) and they are a bit more interesting. Anyone have some more suggestions which help them revise?

Reply 1

kellywood_5

17

You could try making flashcards for the most difficult vocab and getting people to test you on it, or playing a card game where you put them all face down and have to turn them over two at a time to try to match the French/German and the English. For the grammar, we used to play a game in class where you choose a verb, get a dice and each number represents a different person and tense. You throw the dice twice, so if, for example, 1 was je and present, 2 was tu and perfect, 3 was il and imperfect, 4 was nous and pluperfect, 5 was vous and future and 6 was ils and conditional, and you rolled a 3 and then a 6, you'd have to conjugate the verb in the il form of the conditional tense. Don't know how well that would work for German though. It's more fun if you do with friends and then you can turn it into a proper game with sweets or something for the winner.

Reply 2

leannemarie

11

I've been watching French news (quite interesting!) and doing a Spanish listening everyday, I have a lot of vocab to learn but I started it at Easter and will restart again soon! I just go over it again and again until it gets in my head - there's no easy way around it. I've written all the areas that I want to research for essays, which I'll do in the few days before my exams. I'll probably brainstorm them or just write down bullet points because I find that's best so that you don't get overloaded with information. I went over essay phrases that I use in essays and wrote my favourite ones out so that I remember them, other than that I'm not really sure what else I can do or how to make it interesting! It's hard to revise for the translation (Unit 6), and it's mainly a question of vocab, so I'll go over the past papers I've done to check what stupid mistakes I've made previously.

Reply 3

strangebutbeautiful

leannemann

I've written all the areas that I want to research for essays, which I'll do in the few days before my exams.

leanne - just wondering, it might be different for german, but are you just picking random areas to research? beacuse i havent a clue which areas of vocab might come up on the 6c paper and am a little worried i wont know enough vocab! does anyone know, are there specific areas the exam boards tend to use? ta.

Reply 4

Trundle

2

How are you revising for the essay in Unit 6? Are you learning plans for certain topics? If so, which ones?

Reply 5

leannemarie

11

I've just gone through past questions so I can see what's come up before and then I'll probably just brainstorm each area like immigration, science, technology etc. I'm not learning essay plans because it's unlikely exactly the same title will come up twice so it seems like a bit of a waste of time to me. I might find out a few facts for each topic but it depends how much time I have. I just need to get generally up to date with current affairs etc!

Reply 6

Trundle

2

leannemann

I just need to get generally up to date with current affairs etc!

All that French news should help! :p:

Do you watch it on TV5? I watch France 2 on there sometimes at 7.30. I always laugh when they say English words in the middle of a sentence or it is a report from the UK. The other week they said "Birmingham" and I was almost in hysterics. Sad, I know :rolleyes:

Reply 7

leannemarie

11

Trundle

All that French news should help! :p:

Do you watch it on TV5? I watch France 2 on there sometimes at 7.30. I always laugh when they say English words in the middle of a sentence or it is a report from the UK. The other week they said "Birmingham" and I was almost in hysterics. Sad, I know :rolleyes:

Yeah but the French news I watch is only 10 minutes and only concentrates on about 3 things so I still don't seem to know anything! I think it might be TV5, I can't remember, it's a link from the BBC site because we got rid of sky. I did a listening today and they said "Seasonal Affective Disorder" which I found really funny and one of my Spanish listenings mentioned 'La universidad de Cambridge' - that was definitely one of the funniest things I've heard in a listening!

Reply 8

brimstone

7

leannemann

I've been watching French news (quite interesting!)

If you can understand it that is!

Reply 9

leannemarie

11

brimstone

If you can understand it that is!

I'm ok with French, but on our last day when we had to go to lessons, our Spanish teacher put Spanish TV on for us. It was a programme about newts and other such creatures, followed by a cookery programme! That was harder to understand (and far more boring!)

Revising

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