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What's the best way to revise a language?

russianroullette

2

I'm doing French GCSE. Any help?

Reply 1

iamkund

8

Flash cards, revision notes, creating sentences using previous vocabulary (fitting new bits in good for memory too), and recording your voice during speech (helps identify errors and mispronunciation).

Reply 2

Jiamenguk

If its GCSE, make yourself a excel spreadsheet of words and swim in it, worked for me, lol

Reply 3

superwolf

18

Skive off school, go watch foreign movies. Tried and tested.

Reply 4

zee757

10

Listen to french radio or like french tv, or read like a french newspaper or journal, worked for me, like you pick up the french words and ur like formulating sentences in your head trying to make sense of what they are saying or what the sentence says if your reading something,
really helped me...got an A :P hahaa
:biggrin:

!

Reply 5

Lollyage

14

I don't

I do German and I don't really see what I can do other than write notes before oral exams. And I'm still not doing too badly :biggrin:

Reply 6

Aelred

2

Go to your exam board's website (is it AQA?), find the specification and see if there is a list of grammatical structures you need to use to get grades C and above. Then practise making up sentences that include those structures. If you have to do a presentation for your oral, make sure you use all three tenses: past, present and future, and try to include as much complex grammar as you can. Remember that when you come to do the oral, in each section (presentation, discussion, conversation) you need to use three different time-frames to get more than 3 out of 6 for range/complexity. The future is usually the hardest one to include, so when you prepare for each of the topics, try thinking up ways of ensuring you include a future tense (for instance: if you get asked "what is your daily routine?", you could say "normally I do XYZ, but next year it will be different because..."

If there is a list of "language tasks" (there is for AQA), go through it and again, practise making up sentences using the C-A* grammar.

Your exam board may also publish a list of vocabulary on its specification (AQA does, I don't know about the other boards). Read examiners' reports on previous exams, I found that very helpful because they tell you the kinds of things they like to see (use of verbs in forms other than "I", linking phrases/conjunctions etc.)

For the listening exam, I'd suggest you listen to French radio. Little and often (maybe 15 minutes a day) should be enough. Of course the speed will probably be such that you don't understand everything, or maybe even not much at all, but after listening to it for a few weeks, you should start to find that you begin to understand more and more. And more importantly, you'll get used to the speed - so then when you come to sit the exam, you'll find it easy by comparison because the speed will be much slower.

Reply 7

Sapientia

11

Flashcards. Use an SRS (spaced repetition system), you just bung any new vocabulary in there and you're sorted, the program figures out when exactly is best for you to revise a word. I use Anki which is very simple to use and effective. It also has web compatibility so you can upload your progress and do it off the machines at school.

Reply 8

Cutiek8i

Record yourself saying your oral questions, then put them onto a CD. This way, you aren't looking at your book for the questions (which has the temptation of looking at the answers too!), and you can play them to yourself over and over again and answer to them aloud. :grin:

I did this and got an A :proud:

hopefully it will help you too! :p:

x

Reply 9

Sapientia

11

Cutiek8i

Record yourself saying your oral questions, then put them onto a CD. This way, you aren't looking at your book for the questions (which has the temptation of looking at the answers too!), and you can play them to yourself over and over again and answer to them aloud. :grin:

I did this and got an A :proud:

hopefully it will help you too! :p:

x

This is a good idea. The only fault I can see is if you have a bad accent. But I guess that's not a big deal if the only reason you want to get good is to jump through exam hoops. However, if you want to attain genuine fluency, I think this should be avoided for pronunciation purposes. Depends how serious you are I guess :smile:

Reply 10

Friends-Addict

I read Harry Potter in Spanish for my GCSE. Its good coz it translates almost directly from English. So, you have the English and Foreign Lanuage book next to each other and when you come to a difficult work you can look it up in the english book (or a dictionary..but that is a bit harder with made-up words!)
That way you also learn new vocabulary, its fun (if you like Harry Potter), and also it gets drummed into your head, subconscously.
You can just order it off the internet, only lie £5-10
But dont just rely on this, other things like revision notes and flash cards and stuff are great too.
And it doesnt have to be Harry Potter either. Thats just what i did.

Good luck though.

:biggrin:

Reply 11

GilmoreGirlsFan

i will second the reading a book in a foreign langauge!- i also read the first harry potter book in spanish for my gcse and there were several words on the reading paper that i recognised from that- helped me out quite a bit.
But don't rely on that alone- have you done a mock yet? what was your weakest area? I know for me it was the oral so I stayed behind at the end of one of my lessons to ask my teacher if she'd mind practicing with me now and again- I ended up practicing at least once a week from jan-may and got 39/40 in my oral- bit of an improvement from 18!!!
Also do as many past papers as you can- and read the examiners report :smile:

Reply 12

generalebriety

16

See my signature.

Reply 13

cuche

11

With penpals: http://www.penpalamis.info/

Reply 14

russianroullette

OP

2

Anyone who does French - what is the translation of "nous sommes", "nous allons" and "nous avons"???

I've written about four or five pieces for my oral which I know off-by-heart; just stuck on where to put these in :s-smilie:

Reply 15

littleshambles

14

russianroullette

Anyone who does French - what is the translation of "nous sommes", "nous allons" and "nous avons"???

I've written about four or five pieces for my oral which I know off-by-heart; just stuck on where to put these in :s-smilie:

I don't know about nous sommes, but nous allons is "we go/are going" and nous avons is "we have", I believe.

Reply 16

Anatheme

18

littleshambles

I don't know about nous sommes, but nous allons is "we go/are going" and nous avons is "we have", I believe.

"Nous sommes" means "we are".

Reply 17

littleshambles

14

Anatheme

"Nous sommes" means "we are".

Ah I see, we never got that far in French :colondollar:

Reply 18

krutikullas

1

I have revised how to write and remember words that we have learned in class so far ; Chronology, Reformaiton, Reign, Monarch, Papist, Heresy and Middle-Way. I did this by drawing them in my books to memorise what it would look like if i were to see it even if it is a men or a thing.

Reply 19

Masterchief 117

4

Etre Je suis = I am Tu es = You are (Informal/Singular)Il/elle/on est = He/she/one is nous sommes=We are Vous etes= You are (Formal/Plural)Ils/elles sont=They(MA)/They(F) are AVOIRJ'ai=I have Tu as =You have (Informal/singular) Il/elle/on a =He/she/one hasNous avons =We have Vous avez= You have (Formal/plural)Ils/elles ont =They(MA)/ They(F) have ALLERJe vais=I go Tu vas=You go (Informal/Singular)Nous allons=We go Vous allez=You go (Formal/plural)Ils vont=They go

What's the best way to revise a language?

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