DELF A2 flashcards
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32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.
- Épreuve de compréhension de l'oral
- The DELF A2 listening test lasts about 25 minutes and is worth 25 points. It contains three exercises, and each recording is played twice.
- Note minimale éliminatoire
- A score below 5 out of 25 in any one of the four skills is eliminatory, even if the total of the four skills reaches the pass mark of 50/100.
- Soixante-dix, quatre-vingts, quatre-vingt-dix
- French tens above sixty: 70 is soixante-dix, 80 is quatre-vingts, 90 is quatre-vingt-dix. Note that 71 is soixante et onze but 91 is quatre-vingt-onze.
- Moins le quart
- 'Huit heures moins le quart' means 7:45. 'Moins' subtracts minutes from the hour, while 'et quart' and 'et demie' add minutes to it.
- Quinze jours
- 'Quinze jours' means two weeks, not fifteen separate days in ordinary use. Likewise 'dans huit jours' means in one week.
- Numéro de téléphone en français
- French phone numbers are read in pairs of digits: 06 12 34 56 78 becomes zéro six, douze, trente-quatre, cinquante-six, soixante-dix-huit.
- Ça fait combien ?
- This question asks for a total price: 'how much does that come to?'. The answer often adds the payment method, such as 'en espèces' or 'par carte'.
- Ne… plus, ne… jamais
- Small negative words decide the meaning of an audio message: 'plus' means no longer, 'jamais' means never, 'rien' means nothing, and 'personne' means nobody.
- Librairie
- A false friend: 'librairie' means bookshop, where books are sold. A library, where books are borrowed, is 'une bibliothèque'.
- Actuellement / éventuellement
- 'Actuellement' means currently or at the present time, not 'actually'. 'Éventuellement' means possibly, not 'eventually'. Both appear frequently in DELF reading texts.
- Prière de / interdit de
- Common notice formulas: 'prière de' means please do something, and 'interdit de' means it is forbidden. Both are followed by an infinitive, as in 'interdit de fumer'.
- Ne… que
- A restrictive structure meaning 'only': 'Je ne bois que de l'eau' means I drink only water. It is not the ordinary negative of the verb.
- Objet :
- The subject line of a French email or letter. It sits at the top and states in a few words the reason for writing.
- Cordialement
- A formal closing formula used in letters and emails, close to 'Yours sincerely'. Informal equivalents such as 'Bisous' or 'À bientôt' are reserved for friends.
- Date 12/03/2024
- French dates run day, month, year. So 12/03/2024 is 12 March 2024, not 3 December 2024.
- 3,50 €
- French uses a comma as the decimal separator: 3,50 € is three euros fifty. Thousands take a space rather than a comma, as in 1 500 euros.
- Deux tâches en 45 minutes
- DELF A2 written production lasts 45 minutes and contains two tasks of about 60 to 80 words: describing an experience, and writing an invitation or message.
- Passé composé avec être
- Verbs of movement and change such as aller, venir, arriver, partir, entrer, sortir, monter, descendre, naître, mourir, rester, tomber, devenir form the passé composé with être, and the participle agrees with the subject.
- Imparfait ou passé composé
- The imparfait sets the background, describes habits and states; the passé composé reports single completed events that move the narration forward.
- Ça te dit de… ?
- An informal invitation meaning 'do you feel like…?'. It is followed by an infinitive, for example 'Ça te dit de venir samedi ?'
- Je t'invite à…
- An invitation structure followed by an infinitive or a noun: 'Je t'invite à ma fête samedi à 20 h' or 'Je t'invite à dîner chez moi'.
- Connecteurs temporels
- Sequencing words that order events in a written text: d'abord, ensuite, puis, enfin. They make the narration easy for the examiner to follow.
- Formule d'appel formelle
- A formal letter opens with 'Madame, Monsieur,' and closes with 'Cordialement' or 'Je vous prie d'agréer mes salutations distinguées'. Friends get 'Salut' and 'Bisous'.
- Respect du nombre de mots
- Each writing task states a target of about 60 to 80 words. Staying far below or far above that range costs points on task fulfilment.
- Trois parties de l'oral
- The DELF A2 oral has three parts: a guided interview of one to two minutes, a monologue of about two minutes, and an interaction exercise of two to three minutes.
- Entretien dirigé
- The examiner asks about your identity, home, family, studies or work, and hobbies. Answers should be short complete sentences rather than isolated words.
- Structure du monologue
- Introduce the topic, develop two or three ideas with an example each, then conclude. Use time connectors and past tenses to describe a personal experience.
- Exercice en interaction
- A role-play in which you must obtain missing information by asking questions about price, time, place or quantity, then react to the answers you receive.
- Comment dit-on… ?
- A repair phrase asking the examiner for a word. Similar rescue phrases are 'Pouvez-vous répéter ?' and 'Je ne comprends pas'.
- Vous ou tu à l'oral
- Address the examiner with 'vous' for the whole test. 'Tu' appears only inside a role-play when the card says the other person is a friend.
- La liaison
- A final consonant pronounced before a word starting with a vowel: 'les_amis' is said [lezami], 'vous_avez' is said [vuzave]. Missing liaisons lowers the pronunciation mark.
- Consonne finale muette
- Most final consonants are silent in French: 'petit' [pəti], 'grand' [ɡʁɑ̃], 'vous' [vu]. The letters c, r, f and l are the usual exceptions.