Year 8 French - I have to wade in and help - what books?

[gramercy]

Ds is the best at French in his year, according to his teacher.

Well, if he's the best, I'd really hate to see the worst.

I was just testing him last night and... his level of knowledge is awful . He can say things like "Je mange une pomme" or "J'ai mange une pomme" (with acute accent, of course) but when I said, ok, say "they ate two apples" or "we eat ten apples" he was completely floundering.

I am determined to intervene and teach him some grammar myself. I have seen the Galore Park books. Would anyone recommend them? Do I need the answer book as well (I did O Level French ahem several decades ago). Is level one too easy?

Any help very much appreciated.

Try subscribing to Mary Glasgow magazines, they have 2 levels of mags one for ks 3 and one for ks 4, very relevant for teenagers, they also have online web actvities that you can practice, overall I'd say really good, we get them here in Dubai where my kids are in Year 7 and 10, both in top sets for French, other topics not so straightforward, I write some posts on living with GCSE's in a site called doindubai.com nothing on French but really good study tips that could be used for any subject, hope this helps.

This thread resonates so much with me. DD is yr 9 and 'good' at French but hasn't a clue about verbs. In fact I took matters into my own hands at the weekend and wrote out notes for her on er, ir and re verb endings, irregular verbs etc. What amazed me is that they are taught the past tense ie J'ai mange, but she doesn't even know what the verb avoir is let alone how to conjugate it She even had trouble identifying the difference between nous and vous. And this is a bright child..