Need help with Spanish GCSE

I’m currently in Year 11, I have my mock exams in 3 weeks time. I’m struggling with Spanish.

My current grade is a D/C and I want to improve that to at least a B. My problem is that I don’t know how to revise for a language. For Biology I just sit down, open the revision guide and write down notes and it somehow gets into my brain.

Spanish is different, I struggle to learn new words. I’m not a listener so audio tapes don’t help me. Any advice from A/A* students would be greatly appreciated.

I’m currently in Year 11, I have my mock exams in 3 weeks time. I’m struggling with Spanish.

My current grade is a D/C and I want to improve that to at least a B. My problem is that I don’t know how to revise for a language. For Biology I just sit down, open the revision guide and write down notes and it somehow gets into my brain.

Spanish is different, I struggle to learn new words. I’m not a listener so audio tapes don’t help me. Any advice from A/A* students would be greatly appreciated.

Wow! That’s a lot of advice! Thanks a lot for it!!

I’m doing AQA Spanish and the text book I have has a verb table at the back with the different conjunctions. I also have a CGP revision book with a list of words (4 double A4 pages) that I need to know for the exams. I don’t know how to tell the difference between a regular and irregular verb, could you tell me how?

For my speaking exam, I have a role play section (2mins long), a photo card section (3mins long) that I get 10-15 mins to prepare for before the exam and finally a conversation (5-7mins long) which will be based on a theme that I’ve chosen. I’m not great at speaking I guess, I get 50%-60%.

But for the listening I’ll definitely check out that website and listen to some audio tapes that came with my revision book.

For the examiner reports, do they repeat questions/topics where people do good in or not so good in? Someone did tell me that reading examiner reports will give me an idea on what things will be on the test.

And I’m definitely not going to do Spanish for A-level, I’m more of a science/maths person. But thanks a lot for the detailed answer! Hope you get the A* in your A-level!

I got an A* in Spanish GCSE and one of the non-audio ways I revised was by making flash cards with a picture clue on one side and a term on the other! So for example a picture of a jewellers on one side and “joyeria” on the back! It’s more about memorising the exam content than being fluent!

To cut it short, a regular verb follows the correct pattern of whatever tense you're conjugating it into. For example, in Spanish, to form the present tense of tomar (to take), it would be:

tom-o (I take)
tom-as (you [singular] take)
tom-a (he/she/you [polite singular] take)
tom-amos (we take)
tom-áis (you [plural] take)
tom-an (they/you [polite plural] take)

..this follows the correct pattern of forming the present tense verbs ending in ar, which is -o, -as, -a, -amos, -áis, -an.

An irregular verb, however, doesn't do this. Take tener (to have) - it should be ten-o, ten-es, ten-e, ten-emos, ten-éis, ten-en in the present but it's not. It's instead:

tengo
tienes
tiene
tenemos
tenéis
tienen

Some verbs are irregular in one tense but regular in another. Unfortunately there's no pattern to them and you have to learn them. You don't need to know all irregular verbs, however - just be able to recognise them if one comes up. To recognise one, you need to know how to form the present tense, the preterite tense, the future tense, the imperfect tense etc. (basically whichever tense is being used) and then see if it follows the rules it should.

Yep, examiner reports do. They give a description for each answer what many students did right or did wrong. They're very helpful and many GCSE students don't know they exist.

For your speaking then, what you need to do is practise, practise, practise. Do you have a Spanish conversation teacher at your school? If not, see if your teacher can go through the process with you a few times during break/lunchtime etc.

Thank you very much. I hope you get what you want at GCSE Spanish! If you're a science/maths person you should be able to recognise patterns well, and that's basically the foundation for language learning. Aim high!

Ah okay, regular verbs seem alright, just need to remember the pattern and apply it to whatever ending it’s got.

That’s annoying for the irregular verbs, my textbook has a verb table for both regular and irregular verbs and the different conjunctions for each verb in each tense. So I’ll look through that table and learn the patterns for the different tenses.

And yeah I do have a conversation teacher at school during lunchtime but she only come every Tuesday lunchtime for 30mins and I’m not sure if that’s enough for me so I’m looking at getting a private tutor to come to my house. I haven’t attended the conversation classes but I definitely will when I go back to school.

Also one last question, there is a huge list of words that are part of my syllabus. Do I need to know EVERY SINGLE WORD for the exams?? Because that list is damn long (4 double A4 pages).

Thank you very much!

Yes, definitely attend the conversation classes - some of my friends skipped theirs and came out with Ds overall - it's vital you practise for the speaking exam.

You don't need to know every single word, but look through the sheet and see which words you would be able to recognise and which you wouldn't. If you star the words you don't know, perhaps compile that onto a sheet and split them into sections, and test yourself every couple of days? That's what I'm doing for A Level Spanish and it's helping a lot

That’s exactly what my teacher told my class about conversation classes, those who go will be the ones with top grades and those who don’t won’t do as well.

That seems like a good idea, right now I’m using an app called “Memrise” I’m trying to learn like 10 new words a day and I’ve also set my phones language in Spanish! I’ll do what you said today when I’m revising Spanish.

Thanks again for your advice!

I love Memrise! It's such a good app, and it really does help as it tests you on your weaker vocab. Keep going with that until exam time and you'll do great

No problem

I'm in Year 10, and we got taught in Year 9 to memorise sentences by making little cards, but writing down the first letter of each word on them. We get to use these as little help cards when doing an end of topic speaking assessment, but they could come in handy for revising.

I’ve got 25 days until my Spanish reading mock exam, 250 words hopefully!

Good luck with your A-levels! You deserve top grades!

I got an A* at GCSE Spanish and I'm predicted an A* for Spanish A Level so hopefully I know what I'm talking about Basically for GCSE languages it's a game of understanding the exams. Depending on what board you're on, you should have a definitive list of all vocab which could come up in languages.. it's not necessary to learn them all by heart (I hardly ever looked at mine!) but if you go through it and see which words you have NO idea what they mean and memorise what they do, the reading comprehensions should become easier.

Also, for listening, it's about getting the overall grasp of the question, however they do try to catch you out - you need to learn how to form and recognise the negative in Spanish, so if they say "nunca como fruta" in a listening exam, and the question is "do they eat fruit?" don't say yes simply because you heard "como fruta". That's the most common way of catching people out to be honest. I know you're not a listener but that component makes up part of your grade so you need to practice that more. Use websites such as lyricstraining which can train your ears to hear the word you're looking for. It makes all the difference.

I don't know what speaking exams are like nowadays but for me it was a case of memorising the questions that could come up by heart and repeating them. I managed to remember around 100 paragraph-long answers for all the questions that could come up throughout both French and Spanish GCSE, so I doubt you'd have to learn that much but it's definitely manageable. We were also given a card upon which there was a picture we had to describe, and I learnt a pattern of what to talk about (something along the lines of the weather, what's in the foreground/background, what the people are wearing, how many people are in the picture, etc etc.)

Look at the examiner reports every time you do a past paper (you have to do many, many past papers - even if it's from the old spec it's still testing similar skills) and see what the majority of students got right/wrong for each question - they repeat lots of similarly styled questions year after year so they can spot the average students from the higher than average students. I know you're aiming for a B but learning A/A* techniques, especially for the writing exams, would be very helpful as if anything goes wrong during the other exams you have some form of support to fall back on which can score you many extra points and make the difference between a C and a B. Some really aren't confusing, and you don't have to learn the subjunctive tense or anything, but the odd connective and/or opinion is very well liked.

Finally, don't panic too much if you're not carrying the language any further past GCSE. Yes, I'm sure you want to do well, but ultimately a C and a B grade, in a subject that you're dropping, does not make much difference whatsoever. The grades you get in the subjects you enjoy, and the grades you will get if you do A Levels/BTEC are the things that really matter. Just try your hardest, that's all that matters

I’m currently in Year 11, I have my mock exams in 3 weeks time. I’m struggling with Spanish.

My current grade is a D/C and I want to improve that to at least a B. My problem is that I don’t know how to revise for a language. For Biology I just sit down, open the revision guide and write down notes and it somehow gets into my brain.

Spanish is different, I struggle to learn new words. I’m not a listener so audio tapes don’t help me. Any advice from A/A* students would be greatly appreciated.