French or Spanish A Level

I have no idea which I want to do next year. I have always been the same academically, if not very slightly better at French. I tried an AS paper 1 and in French I got just a B and in Spanish I got 2 marks off a B. I know my Spanish speaking is better than French but my French writing is better. For reference I’m also planning to do biology, chemistry and maths. In the future I think I want to go into science, maybe biology. Thanks in advance for any advice.

Reply 1

DerDracologe

17

I dont take either but from what you’ve said you are better at writing in french and speaking in Spanish- this seems to be the only factor which you’ve presented other than the marginal difference in ability. I would suggest looking at which exam board your school does for Spanish and French and then you can either look up the exam structure (how much of it is weighted to speaking vs listening and reading vs writing and translation) or I can look at this for you (although you’re probably aware from the past papers). Then you can see which plays more to your strength. If they are equal (unsure of how it works exactly as i dont take either myself) then maybe look into which would be more helpful for career prospects. Happy to help further if you need it and I hope you found this helpful. Have a great day :smile:

Reply 2

melancollege

18

Original post by Bubbles2538

I have no idea which I want to do next year. I have always been the same academically, if not very slightly better at French. I tried an AS paper 1 and in French I got just a B and in Spanish I got 2 marks off a B. I know my Spanish speaking is better than French but my French writing is better. For reference I’m also planning to do biology, chemistry and maths. In the future I think I want to go into science, maybe biology. Thanks in advance for any advice.

I did both at GCSE but only did French at A-Level with Chemistry, Maths and Further Maths as my other ones.

Linguistically, they're fairly similar in difficulty and I'm sure which you find harder will be because of personal preference and past experience (we're not comparing Frisian with Japanese); however, there are three things that I can suggest looking into for the A-Levels themselves:
1) The IRP (Individual Research Project). This forms a good part of your speaking exam and is where you choose a topic that is related to your language or the countries that speak it. If you have a particular interest relating to one more than the other, this could be a factor. For example, I did mine on comparing the histories and legacies of the Haitian versus French Revolutions. Say you have a particular artist, footballer, musician, historical event, etc from a French-speaking or Spanish-speaking country, this could be a topic of an IRP. (Note: I was AQA, I'd assume most exam boards also had this but I haven't checked).
2) The books / films studied. This is more dependent on your school / college but you will have to study at least one book and another book / film. The book our French class studied felt so much longer than the book that my friend's Spanish class studied (I think it was genuinely like five times longer but that may have been hyperbole on my friend's behalf). I think our teacher just happened to choose one of the longer books and the Spanish teacher chose one of the shorter ones. If you are able to, find out what your school / college are reading for each and see if either interests you more. There are likely translations if you have the time as you will have to write essays on them).
3) The topics covered in the reading / writing paper. I'd say this is fairly self-explanatory - check the specifications and see what you like.

In terms of utility, I wouldn't say there is a clear difference either and depends on what you want to do with it. I am assuming you're aware that universities ask for only three A-Levels now so there is little benefit in doing a fourth but I did a language as a fourth and I really liked it. Your others would likely be much more relevant to Biology.

Reply 3

sound-famous-

13

I'd say the main thing to think of is which language you'd prefer to know. Both languages open many different countries across the world, but maybe consider where you would like to travel/live/work in the future?

Reply 4

FloraRowbury

1

Hi I just did French and Spanish Alevel and I also didn’t really see much difference between my marks. Although I did find Spanish grammar slightly easier to understand. I wouldn’t base your decision too much off of what you were good at in GCSEs as I found the skills needed at Alevel to be very different. Personally the main reason I enjoyed Spanish lessons a bit more was because I really liked the book and film we studied. So maybe have a look at what books and films you’d study and base it off that? The point above above special interests in either language’s culture for the IRP is also really important. Hope that helps :smile:

Reply 5

charmaine.d

13

Original post by Bubbles2538

I have no idea which I want to do next year. I have always been the same academically, if not very slightly better at French. I tried an AS paper 1 and in French I got just a B and in Spanish I got 2 marks off a B. I know my Spanish speaking is better than French but my French writing is better. For reference I’m also planning to do biology, chemistry and maths. In the future I think I want to go into science, maybe biology. Thanks in advance for any advice.

hi !! i took both at A level and found that I was always uncannily slightly better at french, by like 1-3 marks each time on the exams. i found spanish speaking more "natural" in a sense. writing in spanish is a lot easier compared to french, since most of the time it tends to be a word for word translation. i'm choosing to study french at uni since it was the first language i started learning and it just appeals to me more. it's a difficult decision to make but i guess it just comes down to personal preference

i always love seeing people interested in languages but taking a language as a 4th subject might be an unwanted burden if you wanted to go the more sciencey route. it depends on the reputation of your sixth form/college if they'd let you study 4 subjects right off the bat, usually they'd have to look at your gcse grades to see if you could handle 4 subjects.

are you aiming for any particular unis in which 4 A levels might be helpful you your ucas application ????

learning a language in school is a great opportunity and makes learning it more accessible than self studying (obviously not in every case but !! having a language teacher you can speak to about little grammar/vocab bits you dont get is suuuper helpful), just worried that you might get burned out ☹️ every subject at A level is harder than gcse so it's extra effort you'd have to put in to maintain good grades for each.

most colleges/sixth forms will let you drop/swap a subject within the first month or so if you decide you don't want to continue - i think this could be a good option for you if possible !!!

good luck !!!!!

Reply 6

izE_

3

Original post by Bubbles2538

I have no idea which I want to do next year. I have always been the same academically, if not very slightly better at French. I tried an AS paper 1 and in French I got just a B and in Spanish I got 2 marks off a B. I know my Spanish speaking is better than French but my French writing is better. For reference I’m also planning to do biology, chemistry and maths. In the future I think I want to go into science, maybe biology. Thanks in advance for any advice.

I'd recommend looking at the course content for each to see which interests you more since there's more focus on history/culture etc at A level and you might find that one sounds more appealing. same goes for the film and the text that you'll study.

Reply 7

hannah.178

1

i did french a level and knew a lot of people in my french class who also took spanish. The majority of them found spanish easier because of simpler grammar structures and the grade boundaries for spanish are also lower than french, making it slightly easier to attain higher grades in spanish than it is in french (this applies to the AQA exam board though so i’m not sure about others!) At the end of the day i would choose the language you have more interest in, however, i will say that french is harder to find enjoyable things to watch/listen to in order to train your brain as there’s loads of spanish shows on netflix but not so much in french which made it harder for me to immerse myself in the culture.

(edited 1 month ago)

French or Spanish A Level

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