To ask for your advice/suggestions/experience of the French DALF exam?

[Pariswhenitdrizzles]

Hi all, I’m looking into doing a DALF French course and just wanted to post on here (mainly because AIBU gets lots of traffic) to ask if anyone has any experience of this and any advice or suggestions about how to approach it.

I studied French at university about a decade ago, and as part of that, I lived in France for a couple of years. At the moment, I keep up with practising French pretty much daily - mainly reading books and newspapers and listening to music and news/culture podcasts, and watching French films and TV. I also speak French fairly regularly, as I’m part of French meet up groups, often with native speakers, and I have a few French friends I speak to.
I don’t often get the chance to practise writing French though (e.g. writing in different styles, such as formal French).

I’m really keen to do the DALF - either the B2 or C1. I think I’m fairly fluent, but I’m not totally sure which of these levels suits me best, so I’ll get my level assessed before making any decisions.

I’m then planning to do a DALF prep course - it’s a weekly course that lasts for about 10 weeks - and then I’ll make a decision after that on when to do the exam.

Although I don’t desperately need to take the DALF now, my main motivation to do it is curiosity as to whether I’m capable of passing it (if I put the work in, of course!) and also because I think the DALF will really help me with opportunities such as working in France and in French-speaking roles, and I would like to live in France and use French in my job.

Thanks all.

Don’t have much help am afraid but bumping for you.
I used to have more information on this but not for a long time. Remembering my daughter doing the delf b2 and passed but struggled with the grammar part and didn’t get a good result for that.
i did the TCF ( new name now)which I needed for nationality, but only says if you get B1 level. Was fairly straightforward ( I did badly on the written section which is probably my strongest area, due to not thinking about the exam having a French keyboard where i stupidly couldn’t find any puncation! Stupid i know).
DElf/ Dalf are for life i think.
i used https://apprendre.tv5monde.com/fr to practise but think it is to B2 level but help.
Go for it and good luck

I did the DELF B2 a couple of years ago, I do have the added advantage of living in France and at that time was quite immersed in French with a French partner and colleagues, although my job is to speak English. It was okay and I got a decent pass. Personally I found the listening test the hardest, but I always do, if I don't know what they're talking about initially it takes me a while to get into the conversation, also because I know I'm weak in this area I panic.

I remember my French partner at the time looking at the reading comprehension exercise and finding it quite difficult, he said it was very nuanced.

I think keep up the level of investment that you have now and go for it, the worse thing to happen is you won't pass and the best thing is you get a qualification.

Thanks everyone, this is really helpful. Thanks also for the TV5 Monde link - just had a look at the resources there and I think they’ll be so useful.

I’ve just had a call with a local languages institute, who offer brief assessments of your spoken French level over the phone.

They were very helpful and they said they think I would be best suited to doing the DELF B2 exam, and then depending on my results and my overall objectives, I could then perhaps try the DALF C1.