A Level French Essays

I didn’t study that but I can give some French essay tips

1. Simple is good! I tried to do several points per paragraph but really just strip it back, give a point, some evidence and then explanation.

2. Linking phrases (eg tout d’abord, premièrement, contrairement, penchons-nous ensuite sur…)

3. Intro and conclusion (they don’t need to be works of art - I took English and History and found it odd not to have to do anything super special). It can sometimes be useful to find an angle or an argument on the question

4. I did Edexcel and and they were kinda strict on the content. Really read what the question is asking, every single word.

5. Use literary/cinematographic vocab (eg focalisation internelle, gros plan - all camera angles - la bande sonore, l’intrigue)

Thanks so much for the tips, very useful !
I do AQA French
Do you think memorising intros would also be quite useful?
What books/ film did you study ?

I did AQA French with La Haine for the film and No et Moi for the book. I ended up doing about 25 essays altogether in the run up to exams and by the time I'd done about 10 for each I had practically memorised the introductions that I knew were effective and punchy and answered the question in a way that made it clear I knew what the rest of the essay would talk about. I would definitely put 10/15 mins into writing out what you think would be a good generic intro for both book and film that you can adapt into other questions easily and ask your teacher to mark it to make sure everything is right grammatically and if so, memorise it !! I added some of my most complex phrases into the intro so that the examiner already gets a "strong candidate" vibe from the introduction which should put you in good stead for the rest of the essay. Hope that helps !!

There is an excellent website called étudier.com which most French students use to prepare their French bac. However, French essays follow a very strict format which is less evident in the English system so that you may not need the introductory paragraphs which situate the author in his social economic background or literary movement, helping to explain how he or she came to write in their particular style or with their particular view of the world and it’s politics.
I literally just typed in l’étranger and got hundreds of essays either theme based or résumés, a random example being the following:
https://www.etudier.com/fiches-de-lecture/l-etranger/
You can either have access to the site for free if you upload something that you have written or pay to use it.
Another free revision source is the bac français https://www.bacdefrancais.net/l-etranger-camus.php
If you click on the summary of the opening chapter and If you feel up to it listen to the associated video it really does explain the underlying themes extremely well and is great practice for your French listening comprehension !

Amazing! Thanks so much for this .
This is exactly what I was looking for, some french websites that students in France use to study literature