Customer Reviews

GCSE French Interactive Vocab Tester - DVD-ROM and Vocab Book

I got this for my son who is doing GCSE French, but after a cursory hour or so it was quickly discarded. It is useful for getting a idea of how native French speakers pronounce the words, and discovering new words, but without the context of using the words in conversation, it can be quite dull.

The accompanying booklet is useful for listing words, but doesn't really provide much more than a phrase book would.

Possibly a useful revision aid just ahead of an examination, but in comparison to the admittedly more expensive Rosetta Stone which engages the student by asking them to speak the words along with accompanying pictures not particularly effective in extending vocabulary.

My daughter had a change of teacher in yr11 which demoralised her, but she still wanted to do well as she was hoping to do French A level. This was recommended to me by a friend who teaches in a private school: she said students using this had made great progress in consolidating their vocab.

It took her a few weeks to bite the bullet and try it out but, she has now asked for the Spanish one. She said the cd rom is great for interactive, independent study. You can set up the activity to recognise French vocab, translate English into French or work from audio. The best thing about it is that you can set it up to focus on words you do not know or are shaky on thereby personalising the study session.

Recommended, but get it in yr 10 or early yr 11 so they can get over the shock of home study!

The problem I have with this GCSE vocab tester is that it's not linked to a board and, in an effort to be comprehensive I expect (there are 94 pages of vocab grouped into the GCSE topic areas), there is probably too much vocabulary and also some rather bizarre inclusions. The "common and useful words" section is particularly weird, and in other sections such as clothes there are words that I have not used as a fluent French speaker perhaps ever "le slip de bain" (swimming briefs) or "en réclame" (reduced), and which I doubt would feature in any exam. In my experience as a teacher of French of many years standing, the boards do tend to stick to the lists they provide. The lists here are in accurate French but don't seem to necessarily feature commonly tested words and also it's a shame for verbs that just the infinitive is given as, even if using as support for coursework, foundation candidates may struggle to change the verb.

In the lists there is some attempt to differentiate between higher and foundation candidates, but again the choices seem a bit arbitrary. The actual DVD rom is quite good for a motivated student to test themselves and hear the correct pronunciation, but I can't help thinking that using the lists of vocab provided by the boards and inputting them into a flash card generator, such as the excellent quizlet, might not be a more efficient use of student time. This could be of interest to a highly motivated and intelligent student but for anyone wanting to grade boost I would say other sources of help would be more effective - a pity as I was hoping to be able to recommend to the students I teach.

This GCSE French Vocab Tester is reasonable enough for an exercise targeting vocab lists to ensure that exam requirements are being met before a GCSE French oral, and - thanks to the included disc featuring the words being pronounced - helps provide accurate target pronunciation for a nervous or struggling student. It's not an extensive study of French Vocab, but does a decent job of covering the basics needed for the specific purposes of GCSE listening/oral papers.

Got this French Interactive Vocab Tester on the advice from the head of Languages at my nephew's school, to try and help supplement his French course. He has found the DVD rather helpful as he can hear the way the words are meant to be pronounced. He has found the layout of the textbook straight forward and the various subject groupings he feels are well organised, the text book in itself is adequate but the real extra value is in the DVD-ROM. I have noticed since using the DVD my nephew's confidence, in saying certain phrases and `keywords' has been boosted, which is good.

This is a straightforward GCSE vocab tester.

For most GCSE French syllabuses there is a vocab list which is the bare minimum required to pass the test.

So this wouldn't be worth purchasing as they are normally available on-line for free from the examination board.
(for example AQA provides past papers and a 71 page specification booklet with vocab on their website)

But this has the added advantage of have an accompanying CD with the vocab being pronounced.

For that reason it's a very useful resource.

Recommended?
bien s�r

A last minute panic meant my daughter wanted some additional help with learning French for her GCSE. Came out of the exam crying having convinced she had failed. Imagine her delight at getting an A grade, as was predicted B or C. The accompanying CD was so good to download and she was able to listen to the vocabulary as when it suited her.

This would be a good resource for an exam student looking to improve their pronunciation skills prior to a French oral exam, and for anyone looking for a resource to extend a basic French vocabulary.
As mentioned by others. where it is less useful is in being specific to the demands of individual examination boards.

That aside, it still has its merits - the interactive DVD means that an element of personalisation can be applied, and the self-testing elements are useful.
As a generic resource it is one of the better ones on the market, and more affordable than many. It will suit the audio-visual learner who likes to self-direct their learning and who dislikes poring over pages of vocabulary.

Daughter need it to help with her revision of her GCSE'S - she is finding it a great help hopefully towards a great result.

this has helped my teenage son get to grips with vocab for his French exams. I enjoyed the refresher so it's equally good for parents or siblings to learn from. Easy format to work from and clear instructions as to how to proceed.