FRENCH - OPINION WRITING

LC2010HIS

Hey
I have: Telephone portable, poverty, violence ,drugs and transition year for these questions.
Is this enough or do i need more?

MavisDavis

No, I'm sorry, but that's not enough. Where'd you get the idea to narrow it down so much anyway? The French paper is not predictable by any means.
Don't learn topics, learn phrases and know your tenses inside out. The diary entry is a very good bet as you can learn some excellent phrases for it and it's usually quite open.

Have a look at sports, alcohol, education, racism, unemployment...tbh, the list is endless for vocabulary. Focus on tenses and idioms!

kev9100

MavisDavis wrote: »

Don't learn topics, learn phrases and know your tenses inside out.

That's some very good advice. If you just learn off themes and you're unable to manipulate them, you're taking a huge risk.

fufureida

Where can I find these phrases and idioms u speak of?

fufureida

And how about the Question obligatoire? How does one approach that?

MavisDavis

In your French book, on Skoool.ie, from your teacher. They're little things you should have been picking up all along.

Eg.

Je suis en accord avec cette déclaration - I agree with this statement.

C'est-à-dire - that is to say.


You approach the obligatory question like any other question: read the two options, pick one and answer it. There's no big secret to it.

LC2010HIS

Our teacher hasnt given us any more handouts :mad: hes useless

MavisDavis

LC2010HIS wrote: »

Our teacher hasnt given us any more handouts :mad: hes useless

What book do you have?

It's not about teachers giving you handouts to learn off, it's about building your vocabulary and being able to have a good go at anything they throw at you in June. There's no quick fix solution.

LC2010HIS

MavisDavis wrote: »

What book do you have?

It's not about teachers giving you handouts to learn off, it's about building your vocabulary and being able to have a good go at anything they throw at you in June. There's no quick fix solution.

bac superieur?

MavisDavis

LC2010HIS wrote: »

bac superieur?

Is there a section on writing opinion questions? Or useful phrases?

Perhaps you would consider buying a French revision book - Less Stress, More Success or something.

Or you could find some useful things here (though a lot of it is conversational):

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/french-phrases.html

http://french.about.com/library/express/blexdico-a.htm

Pick out some phrases, write them down, learn them. Use Google yourself if you need more. It's really easy to find things.

Some more examples:

De nos jours- these days.
Cependant- however.
À mon avis- in my opinion.
Au contraire- on the contrary.
Certains pensent que- some people think that.
Selon les journaux - according to the newspapers.
En ce qui me concerne - as far as I'm concerned.
J'ai l'impression que - I have the impression that.
Autant que je sache - as far as I know.
Il faut qu'on soit sage - One must be wise (regarding drugs, alcohol, whatever).

Here is a useful guide to the French exam, while I'm at it:

http://www.rte.ie/exams/french%20notes/french.pdf

LC2010HIS

MavisDavis wrote: »

Is there a section on writing opinion questions? Or useful phrases?

Perhaps you would consider buying a French revision book - Less Stress, More Success or something.

Or you could find some useful things here (though a lot of it is conversational):

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/french-phrases.html

http://french.about.com/library/express/blexdico-a.htm

Pick out some phrases, write them down, learn them. Use Google yourself if you need more. It's really easy to find things.

Some more examples:

De nos jours- these days.
Cependant- however.
À mon avis- in my opinion.
Au contraire- on the contrary.
Certains pensent que- some people think that.
Selon les journaux - according to the newspapers.
En ce qui me concerne - as far as I'm concerned.
J'ai l'impression que - I have the impression that.
Autant que je sache - as far as I know.
Il faut qu'on soit sage - One must be wise (regarding drugs, alcohol, whatever).

Here is a useful guide to the French exam, while I'm at it:

http://www.rte.ie/exams/french%20notes/french.pdf

yup there is! just looked. and i have the less stress!
Thanks a mil!
But is it possible to get it all learnt?

MavisDavis

LC2010HIS wrote: »

yup there is! just looked. and i have the less stress!
Thanks a mil!
But is it possible to get it all learnt?

That's up to you and the amount of work you're willing to do. Try to learn a few each day. Maybe write them out on flashcards so you can take a look just before you go into the paper.
If you think you might forget some, make sure the first thing you do when the exam starts is write out the most important ones on a piece of paper. That way, they're right in front of you when you have the comprehensions done and move on to the composing (assuming you do the paper in order).

Check your book for a diary entry writing section, it's a very easy one to pick up marks in!

LC2010HIS

MavisDavis wrote: »

That's up to you and the amount of work you're willing to do. Try to learn a few each day. Maybe write them out on flashcards so you can take a look just before you go into the paper.
If you think you might forget some, make sure the first thing you do when the exam starts is write out the most important ones on a piece of paper. That way, they're right in front of you when you have the comprehensions done and move on to the composing (assuming you do the paper in order).

Check your book for a diary entry writing section, it's a very easy one to pick up marks in!

does the diary entry always come up? planning on writing on it anyway but it would save me alot of time if it did

MavisDavis

LC2010HIS wrote: »

does the diary entry always come up? planning on writing on it anyway but it would save me alot of time if it did

Put it this way: it's never not come up. I'm not saying anything is set-in-stone, but it'll likely be there. 99.9%, like.

Don't forget to learn a positive and negative version!

LC2010HIS

MavisDavis wrote: »

Put it this way: it's never not come up. I'm not saying anything is set-in-stone, but it'll likely be there. 99.9%, like.

Don't forget to learn a positive and negative version!

im praying for it but an understandable one cause i say a deadly one somewhere and was stumped:o

tracker-man

I sometimes wonder why somebody would ask for such help, when they haven't even opened their book to see what is in it

"Our teacher isn't giving us any more hand outs, he's useless"
I don't think the problem is your teacher mate. We get handouts from Bac Superior, everything you could possibly want is in there if you would just learn it! You are looking for a magical solution that doesn't exist in Less stress books and handouts, imo.

On a positive note, go back to basics, practice tenses, redo the exercises in the book. Learn 3 phrases a day between now and the exams, prepare a few topics and there is no reason why you shouldn't get a good grade in french.

fufureida

tracker-man wrote: »

I sometimes wonder why somebody would ask for such help, when they haven't even opened their book to see what is in it

"Our teacher isn't giving us any more hand outs, he's useless"
I don't think the problem is your teacher mate. We get handouts from Bac Superior, everything you could possibly want is in there if you would just learn it! You are looking for a magical solution that doesn't exist in Less stress books and handouts, imo.

On a positive note, go back to basics, practice tenses, redo the exercises in the book. Learn 3 phrases a day between now and the exams, prepare a few topics and there is no reason why you shouldn't get a good grade in french.

What I don't get is I always get As in written exams yet in comprehensions I fail miserably???

fauxshow

In the opinion essays if you look through the past papers they sometimes ask quite personal things like about your family, whether or not you're proud of your neighbourhood etc. The idea of this is to stop students writing down reams of learnt off stuff about the recession, alcohol etc. Useful phrases to learn off would be quite general ones to do with young people, parents etc. These will also come in handy for the Diary Entry

(FYI, the diary entry didn't come up in 2000, but every other year it has. My French grind recommends preparing just the diary entry and the 75 word reaction opinion essay and leaving out all the formal and informal letter/email stuff, too much vocab to learn! In the unlikely event that the diary entry doesn't come up, you can just do two of the reaction essays instead)

If you're struggling with reading comprehensions, all I can say is PRACTISE! They're worth 30%, more than the oral! Do all the past papers and correct them with the marking schemes on examinations.ie and ask your teacher if they have any past mock papers and can photocopy the comprehensions from those. If you can crack them, you'll do really well. I used to be terrible at French and I focused all my efforts into doing comprehensions and worked really hard at them, and I went from barely being able to string a sentence together to getting an A1 in my mock.

There's still time to pull it together and improve a lot for the Leaving Cert! I hope this has helped without being too long-winded, good luck!