25% of the GCSE is the speaking exam and there's basically nothing to revise with?

[dinky10]

Just realised how much the speaking is actually worth and I'm a bit annoyed nobody flagged this earlier. DD has had about two practice goes with her teacher all year. Everything else has past papers, textbooks, YouTube — speaking has nothing.
We looked at a French tutor but it's £35+ an hour and she'd realistically need a few sessions to make a difference. Then she found an app that does mock speaking exams with AI — picks up her actual exam board and tier and runs through the whole thing. She's been doing a few every evening this week and says it's actually helped her feel less terrified about it.
For context the paid version costs less than 15 minutes with a tutor. The app is called Tête-à-Tête AI if anyone wants to look it up.
Honestly my main gripe is with the school though — how is a quarter of the grade something they barely practise in class? What are other schools doing?

The thing is (and I am a tutor!) a lot of tutors for MFL IME are not focused on the GCSE or A level quals. That's fine of course – lots of people want to learn to speak the language better, and a really good way to do that is to engage with a native speaker – whether than be as a tutor, in a French convo club, by going to the country. But if you are looking to pass the exam, especially if time is short, a focus on exam technique and what you actually need to include to do well is key. So in that way, a skilled and experienced teacher (whose french may well not be of native-speaker standard; mine certainly is not) may be more useful.

(should add that I am very much not touting for business! as usual in mid-April I am busier than I can manage tbh).

I am not the OP but I imagine her answer would be (at this stage of the game) that she wants her DC to pass the GCSE at the best grade she can. Even if she gained a 9 tho that wouldn't leave her able to speak French, tho ofc it is a start, and a great one.

Too true.
(I studied french beyond A levels, as part of my degree. A*s /first class marks but although I can read it competently I am a million miles from being a fluent speaker)

I don’t think you’re right that there is ‘nothing to revise with’. Revision of question words (this is so important so they can understand what they’re actually being asked!), vocabulary, tenses, good phrases that can be ‘recycled’ for most scenarios etc is all stuff they can do that will help them enormously. I think your DC needs to be proactive here.

However, I agree that there isn’t enough practice with ACTUALLY speaking out loud. My DC has tended to have practice asking questions to each other in pairs in class but that’s pretty much as far as it goes.

However, there’s still a LOT of work that your DC can do to prepare themselves.

No, it is a site I have used for my child. Why would that be an ad? I named a price, because the OP named a price in her original post.

I think the pp meant was the op an ad for the app tbh

Our schools employ native speakers who run 1:1 or 1:2 speaking sessions every week for GCSE and A Level outside of classroom time - normally lunch breaks etc. They do exam prep. Thought that was the norm.

MFL teaching in English schools is basically rubbish and the GCSE syllabus has far too much focus on reading and writing. My kids were told to memorise answers for the speaking questions! That's not speaking.

I once tutored a grammar school year 11 who brought some written work she'd done to show me, and I thought her French was great. But when she read it out loud she couldn't pronounce anything, it was appalling.

Other countries do MFL teaching way better than us, with a focus on teaching speaking from a young age instead of waiting until secondary school then so much focus on unnecessary reading/writing/grammar. If you go to France, being able to spell and write out verb conjugations will not help you to communicate.

As far as OP is concerned I would certainly look for a tutor but get them to focus solely on practising the specific speaking skills needed.

it was the same in 1994!

To clarify I know the syllabus wasn’t the same but back then it was worth 25% and I don’t remember any specific speaking practice.

Learn some key phrases like: "can you rephrase the question" and "can you repeat the question". Even if she understands the question this can help give her some thinking time.

Also have some high level phrases to slip into the conversation. Something to do with food, family, hobbies, school etc

MFL teaching in English schools is basically rubbish and the GCSE syllabus has far too much focus on reading and writing. My kids were told to memorise answers for the speaking questions! That's not speaking.

@bonbonours I agree that MFL teaching is sadly not what it might be (nor is it allocated the time it needs). In fact speaking is 25% of the marks so should be 25% of the lesson focus. Memorising answers is less likely now as for AQA at least you cannot choose a theme so you don't know what you may have to answer. Learning useful phrases is worthwhile tho.

The read-aloud aspect is interesting – that is a new task in the speaking exam this year as you may be aware. I conduct speaking exams on a freelance basis and the read-aloud has been very interesting. Some excellent, some not. I think it’s actually a good task (note – candidates are marked on pronunciation rather than accent so no need to be French to do well).

Wow! Private school?

No. State schools. Was also the same when I was growing up.

That's unusual IME @clarrylove

The school I taught in had a German assistant for a year but I think she was connected to a colleague. Otherwise not. Nor in any state school I know well, sadly.

DD did French GCSE in 2022, and DS is doing his German speaking exam today. 🤞😬
Both of them wrote out a ton of anticipated questions on cards and practised either on their own or with me asking the question and them practising the answer. However I couldnt correct any pronunciation or grammar.

For the last few days, hes basically been in his room speaking German. I dont know if they were recommended an app because I havent been aware that hes using it.

@Clearinguptheclutter I did French and German gcses in 1994 and practiced speaking with my sibling who had done the same gcses. Im more envious of gen z being able to practice listening past papers because I always thought that was the hardest.