A Level French: The Complete Guide

A Level French is a different qualification from GCSE, not a harder version of it. The vocabulary lists disappear. You are expected to read authentic journalism, argue a position in French, study a novel or a film in depth, translate in both directions, and carry out a piece of independent research that you then defend in conversation. Nobody hands you the topics.

This guide sets out what the course actually asks for, what the exams look like on every board, and the handful of details that quietly decide grades. If you are still at GCSE, start with the GCSE French guide instead.

The shape of the qualification

Every A Level French course in the UK is built from the same four blocks, even though the boards arrange them differently:

  • Listening and reading: authentic audio and texts, with the questions themselves set and answered in French. This is the first shock for most students coming from GCSE.
  • Translation, both directions: French into English, and English into French.
  • A written response to works: essays on a set literary text and/or a set film, written in French, closed book.
  • Speaking: a discussion from a stimulus card, plus a presentation and discussion of a research project you chose yourself.

Speaking is worth 30% on every English and Welsh board. That is a much larger share than most students expect, and it is the component where preparation makes the most difference, because a good deal of it is known in advance.

Content: the themes

You study a set of themes covering the society, politics, culture and history of the French-speaking world. The exact list depends on your board. AQA works through family, technology, volunteering, diversity, marginalisation, criminal justice, heritage, music, cinema, youth politics, protest and immigration; Edexcel narrows to four, including a full theme on the Occupation and the Resistance.

The themes are not general knowledge. They are the source of everything: the reading texts, the listening passages, the translation content, and the material you draw on in speaking. Studying them badly costs marks in every paper at once.

Translation, both ways

Translation is worth 20 raw marks at AQA, 40 at Edexcel and 40 at Eduqas, split between the two directions. CCEA examines it in both directions too. It is the most trainable part of the qualification and the part students most often leave until last.

Two things worth knowing:

At AQA, the English-into-French passage comes with a supporting text in French. The specification is explicit that students "will be provided with a supporting text in French, giving them some of the vocabulary and structures which they will need for the translation." This is often described as an AS-only feature. It is not. Learning to mine that supporting text for the exact tense, preposition and register you need is a straightforward way to pick up marks.

Translation into English is marked on English, too. A version that shows you understood the French but reads as nonsense in English does not score full marks. Read your answer back as though you had never seen the original.

There is a separate page with six practice passages in both directions, with model answers and a commentary on what each one is testing.

The works paper, and the mistake that costs whole essays

You write about a set literary text and/or a set film. Here is the detail that catches students out every year, and it is consistent across three boards:

You cannot answer on two films.

  • AQA: students must study either one text and one film or two texts. The paper instruction is to answer either two questions from the texts section, or one from texts and one from films.
  • Edexcel: students "must not answer questions on two films", and the second essay must not be on the same literary text as the first.
  • Eduqas: two works are studied, "one of which must be a literary work".

So at least one literary text is compulsory. A student who has quietly studied two films has no legal combination on the day. Check this in your first term, not your last.

Both essays are closed book. You may not take a copy of the text or the film into the exam. The word guidance is around 300 words per essay at AQA and Eduqas, and 300 to 350 at Edexcel (guidance, not a hard limit), but a 150-word essay cannot cover enough ground to reach the top bands.

The marks per essay differ sharply and are worth checking: 40 at AQA, 50 at Edexcel, 20 at Eduqas. At AQA each essay is marked 20 for critical and analytical response and 20 for language. That fifty-fifty split is worth internalising: a brilliant argument in poor French scores about the same as thin analysis in excellent French. Most students are much stronger on one side than the other and revise only the side they are already good at.

Listening: you control the recording

This is the single biggest practical difference from GCSE, and it changes how you should practise.

At A Level the audio is not played to the room a fixed number of times. You have your own recording and you control it. AQA states that "students will have individual control of the recording"; Edexcel's specification says students "may stop, revisit and replay sections as they wish"; Eduqas allows candidates to "stop, rewind and listen to the recording as often as they like" within the overall time limit. The Edexcel International A Level says the same of Units 2 and 4.

The constraint is the clock, not the number of plays. That makes listening a time-management problem rather than a memory problem. Practise deciding quickly which questions are worth a third replay and which are not, because students who replay everything twice run out of time on the reading section, which carries more marks.

Speaking and the independent research project

Speaking is 30% and has two parts on most boards: a discussion from a stimulus card, and a presentation plus discussion of a research project you chose yourself. Both have their own page here (the stimulus card and the research project) because both are more tightly specified than most students realise.

The project is yours. You choose the subject. It must relate to a country or countries where French is spoken, and you research it from French-language sources. Your teacher can guide the choice but cannot design the material for you. At Edexcel, the examiner's own report notes that the first time the teacher-examiner and the candidate discuss the project is in the exam room.

Your notes will not help you with French. This surprises people. The form you take into the room records your findings in English: up to ten key points at Eduqas, six to ten key findings at Edexcel, and up to ten key points in English or Welsh at WJEC. It is a memory aid, not linguistic support. Eduqas states it plainly: the pro-forma "will not provide linguistic support in French." So the French itself has to be rehearsed until it is yours, not written on the form.

The presentation is short and strictly capped. Two minutes at AQA, Edexcel, Eduqas and WJEC alike. The discussion that follows is four to five times longer. Students routinely over-prepare a polished two-minute speech and under-prepare the ten minutes of unscripted conversation that actually carries most of the marks.

One more constraint that trips people up: at AQA, you may not base your research on the same literary text or film you write about in the works paper. Eduqas has the same rule.

Board by board

AQA (7652)

Paper Length Marks Weighting
Paper 1: Listening, reading and writing 2h 30m 100 50%
Paper 2: Writing 2h 80 20%
Paper 3: Speaking 21 to 23 min inc. 5 min preparation 60 30%

Both translations sit in Paper 1: 10 marks into English, 10 marks into French, each on a passage of at least 100 words. Paper 1 also contains a listening summary and a reading summary, both written in French, with a 90-word ceiling.

Paper 2 is two essays of 40 marks each on your set works. Paper 3 is a 25-mark card discussion followed by a 35-mark research project. For the card, you are given two cards drawn from two different themes and choose one; you then have five minutes of supervised preparation, and you must ask the examiner two questions arising from the card. For the project, the completed Candidate Record Form is the only material you may have with you.

Pearson Edexcel (9FR0)

Paper Length Marks Weighting
Paper 1: Listening, reading and translation 2h 80 40%
Paper 2: Written response to works and translation 2h 40m 120 30%
Paper 3: Speaking 21 to 23 min inc. 5 min preparation 72 30%

The translations are split across the two written papers: French into English in Paper 1 Section C (20 marks, around 20 minutes), English into French in Paper 2 Section A (20 marks, around 30 minutes). Paper 2's two essays are worth 50 marks each.

Speaking is internally conducted and externally assessed, in a window in April or May rather than on a fixed national date. Task 1 is worth 30 marks: on the day the invigilator offers you a choice of two sub-themes in English, you pick one, and you receive a stimulus card carrying two opposing statements. You choose one statement during the five minutes' preparation. Task 2, the research project, is worth 42 marks: 12 for the presentation and 30 for the discussion.

Form RP3 records six to ten key findings in English and must reach the examiner at least three weeks before the assessment. You may refer to it during Task 2 but may not add notes to it. On notes for Task 1, the specification and the teacher-examiner booklet are not worded identically: the booklet restricts the one side of A4 to Task 1. Check with your centre rather than assuming.

Eduqas (England)

Component Length Marks Weighting
Component 1: Speaking 21 to 23 min inc. 5 min preparation 60 30%
Component 2: Listening, reading and translation 2h 30m 100 50%
Component 3: Critical and analytical response in writing 2h 40 20%

Component 2 splits 30 listening, 30 reading and 40 translation, both directions, 20 marks each, minimum 100 words per passage. That 40% translation share within the paper is the highest of any board, which makes translation drilling unusually valuable if you sit Eduqas.

Component 1 runs in the opposite order to AQA and Edexcel: the research project comes first (a two-minute presentation worth 10 marks, then nine to ten minutes of discussion worth 30) and the stimulus card second, worth 20 marks, with five minutes' preparation and five to six minutes of discussion including one unseen supplementary question.

Component 3 is two essays of 20 marks each, not 40. If you have been practising to an AQA-style 40-mark scheme, the bands are not the same.

Note for anyone still looking at AS: the Eduqas AS has been withdrawn, with the final award in summer 2027. The A Level is unaffected.

WJEC (Wales)

WJEC is modular, which makes it structurally unlike Eduqas despite the two being sister boards. Five units, with the AS units counting 40% towards the A Level:

Unit Length Marks % of A Level
Unit 1 (AS): Speaking 12 to 15 min + 15 min preparation 48 12%
Unit 2 (AS): Listening, reading, translation and critical response 2h 30m 84 28%
Unit 3 (A2): Speaking 11 to 12 min 72 18%
Unit 4 (A2): Listening, reading and translation 2h 100 30%
Unit 5 (A2): Critical and analytical response in writing 1h 30m 40 12%

Two consequences worth planning around. First, the translations are separated by a year: French into English or Welsh at AS (minimum 70 words), English or Welsh into French at A2 (minimum 100 words). Second, the works are separated too: the film is examined at AS in Unit 2 with an essay of around 300 words, and the literary text at A2 in Unit 5 with an essay of around 400 words, closed book. Translation into and out of Welsh is permitted, and so is Welsh-medium entry.

CCEA (Northern Ireland)

CCEA's GCE French is also modular, with six units: three at AS and three at A2. The AS units carry 40% of the A Level.

Unit Length % of AS % of A Level
AS 1: Speaking 11 min 30% 12%
AS 2: Listening, Reading and Use of Language 2h 40% 16%
AS 3: Extended Writing 1h 30% 12%
A2 1: Speaking 15 min n/a 18%
A2 2: Listening and Reading 2h 45m n/a 24%
A2 3: Extended Writing 1h n/a 18%

Translation is examined in both directions and across both years: French into English in AS 2 Section B (around 130 words), English into French in AS 2 Section C (short sentences), and English into French again in A2 2 Section B (around 130 words). CCEA does not publish raw mark totals per unit in the specification, so work from the weightings and from past papers.

Cambridge International (9898): the outlier

If you are taking Cambridge, note first that A Level French 9716 has been withdrawn. The final examination series was June 2024. It has been replaced by A Level French Language and Literature 9898.

Paper Length Marks Weighting
Paper 1: Reading 1h 30m 40 ~33%
Paper 2: Writing 2h 40 ~33%
Paper 3: Literature 2h 40 ~33%

This is a genuinely different qualification from a UK domestic A Level, and students moving between systems should understand how:

  • There is no speaking paper and no listening paper. The syllabus notes only that candidates should be given "ample opportunity to develop and practise their communication in speech" during the course. None of it is assessed.
  • There is no translation in either direction.
  • Literature is a full third of the qualification, answered entirely in French, with a passage-based question and an essay.
  • Paper 2 is two essays of 300 to 400 words: one argumentative or discursive, one descriptive or narrative.
  • 9898 is an A Level-only syllabus. The AS counterpart is a separate syllabus, French Language 8028, and the syllabus states that candidates "cannot carry forward" their 8028 results into 9898. The AS and the A Level are not two halves of one route here.

Set text lists are published per examination year, so take them from the current syllabus rather than from an older paper.

Edexcel International A Level

Also modular, and also structurally distinct. Four units. IAS is Units 1 and 2 (code XFR01), the full IAL is all four (YFR01):

Unit Length Marks % of IAL
Unit 1: Spoken expression and response 8 to 10 min + 15 min preparation 40 15%
Unit 2: Understanding and written response 2h 30m 90 35%
Unit 3: Understanding and spoken response 11 to 13 min 40 15%
Unit 4: Research, understanding and written response 2h 30m 90 35%

Units 2 and 4 share a structure: 20 marks listening, 30 marks reading and grammar, 40 marks writing. There is no translation anywhere in the IAL. Grammar manipulation takes its place, which is a substantial difference in what you need to drill.

Research is handled differently rather than dropped. Unit 4 is named for it: its Section C is an essay of 300 to 400 words on a topic, literary text or film researched in advance. Unit 3 asks you to declare a debatable issue of your own choosing on an Oral chosen issue form at least three weeks beforehand, then present and defend it. What the IAL does not have is the UK boards' marked presentation of a researched project with cited French-language sources. Speaking is assessed twice, at 15% each, so it still totals 30%.

Dictionaries

Not permitted. AQA, Edexcel 9FR0, Eduqas, WJEC and Cambridge all state this explicitly, and AQA and Edexcel extend the ban to speaking preparation time. The CCEA specification and the Edexcel International A Level specification for Units 3 and 4 do not address it either way, so confirm with your centre if you sit those. Either way, plan your vocabulary revision on the assumption that you will have nothing to look things up in.

What actually moves grades

A few things come up again and again in feedback against the mark criteria:

  1. Tense range, deployed deliberately. The gap between a B and an A is very often the subjunctive, the conditional perfect and the passive appearing where they belong, not sprinkled in, but used because the sentence needed them.
  2. Essays that argue rather than summarise. Retelling the plot of the novel scores in the lowest bands. The question asks you to take and defend a position about the work.
  3. Idiom in the translation into French. Word-for-word English produces grammatical French that no French speaker would write. Learn the handful of structures that differ: il s'agit de, faire plus an infinitive, depuis with the present, ce dont.
  4. Speaking that develops. Answers that stop after one sentence cap the interaction marks however accurate they are. Every answer needs a reason, an example, or a concession.
  5. Never leaving a blank. Partial credit exists in translation. An imperfect attempt that conveys some meaning scores; a gap cannot.

Practice and free resources

Getting help

If you want to work on this with someone, I teach A Level and IAL French one to one across Edexcel, AQA and Cambridge International specifications. You can read more on the French tutoring page, or start with a free 15-minute call: we look at where you are, what your board actually asks for, and what to work on. No package required.

Specification details on this page are taken from the awarding bodies' own published specifications and assessment materials. Specifications are revised from time to time, and prescribed works lists change by examination year, so always confirm the current requirements with your board and your centre.