NCEA L1 French cheat sheet

NCEA Level 1 listening tasks are delivered in spoken French at near-normal speed; each passage is usually played two or more times, so use the first hearing for gist and later hearings for detail.

Numbers are a high-frequency trap: distinguish 60 (soixante), 70 (soixante-dix), 80 (quatre-vingts), 90 (quatre-vingt-dix) and pairs such as 15 (quinze) versus 50 (cinquante).

Listen for time markers that signal tense: aujourd'hui plus present, hier plus passé composé, demain plus future (aller + infinitive).

Negation is heard as a two-part frame: ne ... pas, ne ... jamais, ne ... rien, ne ... plus; missing the second element reverses the meaning you record.

Liaison and elision change word boundaries: les amis sounds like 'lezami', il a sounds like 'ila', and j'ai seize ans runs together, so match sound to written form before answering.

Question stems indicate what to capture: où asks place, quand asks time, combien asks quantity or price, qui asks person, pourquoi asks reason (often answered with parce que).

Register matters: tu and its verb forms signal a friend or peer; vous signals an adult, stranger, or plural group - this often answers 'who is speaking to whom' items.

Prices and quantities follow French number + noun order (deux billets, trois euros cinquante), so record the number before the item, not after.

Spoken interaction tasks are graded on communication and fluency as well as accuracy: a short pause with a clear message scores better than silence while hunting for the perfect form.

Use the present tense of regular verbs by dropping the infinitive ending and adding -e, -es, -e, -ons, -ez, -ent (parler gives je parle, nous parlons, ils parlent).

Passé composé is formed with avoir or être plus past participle; aller, venir, arriver, partir, entrer, sortir, rester, monter, descendre, naître, mourir, tomber and retourner take être, and the participle then agrees with the subject.

Near future is aller conjugated plus infinitive (je vais visiter); this is the standard Level 1 way to talk about plans without learning a full future paradigm.

Ask questions three ways: rising intonation (Tu aimes le sport ?), est-ce que (Est-ce que tu aimes le sport ?), and inversion (Aimes-tu le sport ?) - inversion is the most formal.

Pronunciation rules that carry marks: final consonants are usually silent (petit, grand), but a final consonant before a vowel is pronounced through liaison (un petit ami).

Nasal vowels occur in on, an/en, in/ain and un: bon, grand, vin, brun; keeping them distinct from oral vowels is a common accuracy point.

Polite formulas for interaction: s'il vous plaît, excusez-moi, je voudrais, pourriez-vous répéter, merci beaucoup, au revoir - using them shows control of register.

Skim first for gist and text type (menu, email, notice, article, advertisement), then scan for the specific detail each question names.

Cognates and near-cognates give fast meaning: restaurant, musique, téléphone, ordinateur, information; false friends need care - actuellement means currently, not actually, and librairie means bookshop, not library.

Articles carry gender and number: le/la/les, un/une/des, du/de la/des for partitives; the article on a noun in the text tells you the gender to reuse in answers.

Adjective agreement follows the noun: petit/petite/petits/petites; irregular forms include beau/belle, vieux/vieille, bon/bonne, heureux/heureuse.

Negation frames in writing are ne ... pas, ne ... jamais, ne ... rien, ne ... personne; a question asking what someone does NOT do depends on spotting the second word.

Time and frequency expressions locate events: d'abord, ensuite, puis, enfin, le lundi (every Monday) versus lundi (this Monday), souvent, parfois, rarement.

Numbers and dates in text: French dates use day + month (le 5 juillet), months are lowercase, and 70/80/90 follow the soixante-dix, quatre-vingts, quatre-vingt-dix pattern.

Inference questions ask what is implied, not stated; the answer must be supported by a detail in the text, so quote the supporting phrase mentally before choosing.

Level 1 writing tasks are marked on communication of the message, range of language, and accuracy; a short accurate text with varied structures scores above a long error-prone one.

Regular -er verbs in the present: parle, parles, parle, parlons, parlez, parlent; the -ent ending of ils/elles is silent, so spelling it correctly is an accuracy mark.

Passé composé: avoir or être plus past participle; regular participles are -é (parler), -i (finir), -u (vendre); irregulars include fait, dit, écrit, pris, venu, allé.

Questions in writing need a question mark and one of the three forms: intonation, est-ce que, or inversion with a hyphen (Parles-tu ... ?).

Connectives raise range: et, mais, parce que, donc, puis, ensuite, cependant, par contre, d'abord, enfin - use several rather than repeating et.

Partitive articles express unspecified quantity: du pain, de la viande, de l'eau, des légumes; after a negative they become de (je ne mange pas de viande).

Formal letter or email frame: Monsieur/Madame, Je vous écris pour ..., Je voudrais ..., Cordialement or Je vous prie d'agréer mes salutations distinguées.

Accents change meaning and are part of spelling: a (has) versus à (at/to), ou (or) versus où (where), sur (on) versus sûr (sure), and the cedilla in ça and garçon.