Help - That French Vocab Is Driving Me Crazy!

If this is you, then here are some suggestions which I hope will help.

Firstly, you`ll have to learn what the French words mean in English, so I suggest you use a ruler to go through each word in the list, saying the French word to yourself, then the English word - out loud or in your head, whichever you prefer, and remember that you generally do not pronounce `t` or `d` or `s` at the end of French words (using a ruler will help to focus your attention on the word in question). Do this several times, then cover up the English and test yourself on the meanings of the French words. If some words are still causing you problems, highlight the relevant words, then repeat the process of saying the French and the English to yourself for these words and test yourself again.

When it comes to learning how to spell the words, there are various strategies you can adopt.

1) Firstly, highlight any patterns you can see in the words. Some common spelling patterns in French are -in, -on, -en, -ant, -ique, -ette, -ille, -if, -eux.

2) Split the list of words up into two or more smaller groups of words. You can do this in any way you wish - perhaps according to the meaning; the length of the word (e.g. one or two syllable words in one group, three syllable words in another and so on); how they are spelt (e.g. French words that are very like the English in one group, words with double letters or the same spelling patterns in them in another); what you associate with them (e.g. for animals you might want to split them up according to whether you predominantly associate the sense of sight/ hearing/ smell/ touch with them); gender or number (e.g. masculine, feminine, plural). It does not matter how you split up the words, all that matters is that you do it in a way that makes sense to you - be creative!

3) When you have decided how you want to split up the words, rewrite the list of vocabulary accordingly. To help you remember the gender of the word and to save you writing out `le/la` or `un/une` each time, you can use blue to write down masculine words and pink (or red) to write down feminine words. You can do this on the computer, if you want.

4) Next to each word you can put the number of letters in brackets and the number of syllables e.g lapin (5) (2) - the former will help you spell them and the latter will help you pronounce them, which is very important in French, as you do not pronounce every letter!

5) Now you can start to learn the words in one of the groups. Put a ruler under the first word e.g. lapin, and on a separate sheet of paper copy that word down 5 times, each time checking back to the original list that you are spelling it correctly. So you write down `lapin` once, then you check back to your original list (have you spelt it correctly? If not, correct it). Then you write it down a second time and check the spelling with your original list and so on. Again, use blue for masculine words and pink/red for feminine words, so that as you`re learning the spellings, you are also automatically learning the gender of the word.

6) Once you`ve practised spelling all the words in the group, write on a separate piece of paper the English for each word, then write the first letter of the French word and the number of letters in that word (if you want to write the no. of syllables as well, then do, but that`s optional) e.g. rabbit - l (5).

7) After you`ve done this for all the words in the group, write out each word in full, using the initial letters you have written down and the number of letters in each word to help you. You can then test yourself again with no clues to help you.

8) In addition to the above, or as an alternative, you can record the words onto your mobile phone or onto the computer (again, split them up into smaller groups first). Record the words in this way: `rabbit/ lapin/ 5 letters/ 2 syllables/ l-a-p-i-n`, then record the words again, but leave a gap so you can insert the spelling after the initial `l`. Some dyslexic pupils I`ve taught have found this to be a helpful way to learn vocabulary.

This process does demand a little discipline, but by splitting up long lists of vocabulary into smaller chunks, choosing different colours for different genders, and giving yourself a little bit of help when it comes to the spellings of the words, it will be far easier to learn vocabulary and you`ll find that your learning is much more thorough as well. Give it a try and see what happens!