French not good?

Mordecai · 08-05-2006 1:33am #1

I have just heard a rumour that the french dept. in trinity is severely lacking: no focus on the oral side and an aloof staff? Say it ain't so! I want to go there in September to do franglais.

nutball · 08-05-2006 1:58am

I only took French for a year and bit before transferring to a different course, but I would say that those are fair criticisms, yes. Hopefully there's someone around with more experience of the department than I though.

shay_562 · 08-05-2006 6:29pm

I'm also not hugely qualified to help, since I'm just finishing my first year of involvement with the department (I take it as an elective course within BESS), but my impression is that the department is pretty woeful at times - I think I actually speak French worse now than I did when I was sitting my leaving cert. From talking to other people, both in Business/French, European Studies and general French-related TSMs, this seems to be a fairly widespread opinion, although I've heard great things about the Italian and Russian departments.

Love · 09-05-2006 5:30pm

I'm a first year TSM student, and I am certain that my oral French was better before my Leaving Cert.

Stargal · 09-05-2006 9:38pm

Think again ma cher. C'est une terrible idea to do French in Trinity.There are beaucoup des problemes with the department, parce que the staff expect everyone to be fluent in it, and thus teach it comme l'anglais, rather than as a foreign language; as 97% of the students coming in aren't fluent, it doesn't work. The drop out rate is very high (environ 6-8 students major in it for 4th year, when 84 people start it at the beginning of first year).

Aussi the staff border on incompetent. And by border, I mean, are.

On the oral side, things aren't that bad (Je suis trés tempted to make an inappropriate joke here but I'll leave it). For 1st year, you'll have a class once a week with a teaching assistant aimed at improving oral skills. Pretty useful.

Most of the lectures are given in French (e.g. French history, literature etc). This will be a bit intimidating for the first lecture you go to but after that you get used to it and it does improve your French a lot

PS: Je suis un peu enivré, donc c'est pas the most articulate thing I've ever written.

Hitchhiker's Guide to... · 09-05-2006 11:55pm

they do have a terrible reputation, don't they?

nutball · 10-05-2006 1:21am

In their favour, certain staff members have been known to entertain students in the wine cellars under College on occasion. Presumably in order to get them sufficiently locked not to realise what a lousy department it is.

Mordecai · 19-06-2006 5:00pm

Em, and if you want to do English as well, how does the going away thing work? Doing English in France wouldn't be any use, would it? Do you just leave English for a year?

IzzyWizzy · 22-06-2006 2:47am

It really is awful. It's so bad that I would have left after first year but couldn't afford to start over somewhere else. They blame the students for not having a high enough level of French to start with, which is not fair at all IMO. The Leaving Cert level isn't that high, it's not the students fault. Many staff members use humiliation as a tool, as if we were still in 1900. It is totally inappropriate in a college setting, and does not work. All it does it put people off French for life, as it did to me, and I would be one of the better students on the course. I know loads of people that dropped out in first year.

Then there is the fact that all (or nearly all) of the classes are taught in English which is completely useless when you're doing a French degree. Why not conduct them in French? That way the students would be comfortable listening to it and talking in it, so the one hour a week oral class wouldn't be such torture. And torture it is, when it's the only time you ever hear or speak French. The assistants are usually either condescending assholes or really timid (not always, to be fair I had a cool one last year) and NOBODY in the class ever wants to talk so everyone sits in an uncomfortable silence as the assistant just sits there, except for that one show-off in every class who is half French/Belgian/Swiss or grew up in one of these places. Every oral group has one.

The literature they pick in the first 2 years is utterly crap, with all the French classics that exist they pick complete tripe that nobody is interested in and most lecturers think their opinion is the only one. Sometimes it's like a class of robots and the one individual who dares voice their opinion is just stared at by everyone else. That was my class last year. Some of the staff are totally incompetent and have a level of French barely above most of the students. I suspect this is why the classes are taught in English. It has a few good points I suppose, the standard is certainly high, and there are a couple of good lecturers such as Rachael Hoare, but all in all I think it's pretty bad.

DemonOfTheFall · 22-06-2006 4:05pm

Sounds like my leaving cert english class!

Kwekubo · 23-06-2006 1:47pm

Wow. Not a glowing review. And I thought I read somewhere that College officials intend to divert funding away from English/French etc in coming years?

fiveone · 29-06-2006 11:05pm

I would have to disagree with the accusation of having too high a standard of french for beginners. I am experiencing the reverse of that situation, namely a language department pandering to lazy students. The way I see it is that if you are spending half of your academic time studying this language, there's little excuse for you not to make that push at the start to attain a certain degree of competence. Learning is something you do yourself, and this is emphatically so with a language. The majority of it happens outside the classroom. I have no experience with the french dep so I cant really say, but they're there to stimulate interest and help you along, not baby you. Then again, if that isnt happening, fair enough. But dont blame the leaving cert for making you incompetent.

IzzyWizzy · 06-07-2006 8:57pm

Actually FYI I didn´t even DO the Leaving Cert, I did A Levels, and am far from incompetent (I have been speaking French since I was 6) but it is blatantly obvious that people are not prepared for the course when they enter it, whether they are partly to blame or not and it´s nearly always the Irish students who are weak compared to the Northern Irish, English and overseas students. This leads me to the conclusion that the Leaving does not get them to a high enough standard for college, which is what many people have said. It´s hard to be competent when you barely know the basics. There were people in my class in first year who had never seen the past historic tense and had a sketchy knowledge of the subjunctive. I think the lecturers should take this into account and be more encouraging instead of complaining that they are thick and lazy.

NADA · 06-07-2006 10:55pm

Does the same go for German?

shay_562 · 07-07-2006 1:47am

There were people in my class in first year who had never seen the past historic tense and had a sketchy knowledge of the subjunctive.

Sounds like LC syndrome alright. At leaving cert level, the subjunctive only needs to be known to the level of being able to recognise it (and even then, all most teachers will tell you is "Look for 'que' and pick a verb right after it") and use one prepared phrase in an essay to make it seem like you know it inside-out ("Il faut que le gouvernment fasse face aux probleme du..." can be used on virtually any exam paper), and the past historic can be skipped entirely at a maximum cost of less than 1%, so many teachers will skip it. And yet it's still taught more thoroughly than Irish...

*Not saying the ****ness of the LC is an excuse, but when people are very clearly coming into college with a lower level of French, setting the bar too high is pointless and achieves little.

Stargal · 10-07-2006 2:45am

lydonst wrote:

I would have to disagree with the accusation of having too high a standard of french for beginners. I am experiencing the reverse of that situation, namely a language department pandering to lazy students. The way I see it is that if you are spending half of your academic time studying this language, there's little excuse for you not to make that push at the start to attain a certain degree of competence.

Come down from the moral high ground there dude. The issue is not about students being unwilling to put in the work - it's about the huge gulf between the level of French that the majority of people have after the LC and what is being taught by the Department. The jump from the LC standard to reading Sartre, Colette et Camus (for example) in first year is massive.

There is a huge drop-out rate for French in Trinity, coupled with a very small number of students who end up majoring in it in 4th year TSM - putting it down to student laziness is disingenous.

I have no experience with the french dep so I cant really say, but they're there to stimulate interest and help you along, not baby you. Then again, if that isnt happening, fair enough. But dont blame the leaving cert for making you incompetent.

If you can name me one course in Trinity where students are 'babied' then I'll be very impressed.

John · 10-07-2006 4:04am

stargal wrote:

If you can name me one course in Trinity where students are 'babied' then I'll be very impressed.

Midwifery. Wait, that's not the students being babied is it?

fiveone · 10-07-2006 10:10pm

Im not taking moral highground, I'm just speaking from certain experience. Learning a language requires work, theres nothing inherently difficult about it. And to be honest with you I do think laziness is a factor - that is, the laziness of an english speaker moreso than that of a "typical student" per se, though it still applies. You can't tell me you can actually sit in a class and expect to learn a language by someone teaching you, it just helps you along. Compared to european students, and I know im being very general here, the standard of foreign language learning is extremely poor. Of course there are factors causing this, being an island and all, having english etc. (but then consider Irish even..) It just grates to hear people bitching about courses when if they wanted to learn a language they could do it themselves and thats just it, end of story. I mean c'mon guys its a course, tutors are human and so on. You dont have to let it get to you, there are ways. IMO that in itself is the worst aspect of the leaving, that you expect to sit there and be spoonfed.

edit:

babied..? well, how about arts in general?

punka · 10-07-2006 10:26pm

babied..? well, how about arts in general?

I don't see how putting an emphasis on independent study and expecting students to be mature enough to put in the hours in the library constitutes babying.

French IS difficult in Trinity, and it's roughly equivalent in terms of standard to that demanded by Oxbridge Modern Languages - where you're expected to be fluent on entry and virtually no time is spent on language learning. While I don't think Trinity French expects their incoming students to be fluent, from what I can gather an extremely high standard is expected, far more than is required by Leaving Certificate French and beyond what most students could manage. To be honest - this is the standard that university departments SHOULD be aiming for as a prerequisite - but the problem is that the Leaving Certificate language courses don't prepare students adequately. In an ideal world, all modern language programs would be the same level in terms of difficulty as Trinity French - but until the Leaving Cert language programs are fixed up, being so demanding on incoming students is a bit unrealistic.

fiveone · 11-07-2006 11:13pm

Im still not convinced. Ideally, call me romantic, you should already be fairly interested in the subject, and by that I mean actually want to "put in the hours in the library." Look at the guys doing science, work is demanded and its done, and consequently its taken more seriously. I think that doing a subject purely for the degree is completely the wrong way to go about it. Whats more, no course expects pure fluency. You chose to be there, its fair enough that you meet the required standard. Otherwise your just doing your orts degree.

And yes the leaving cert is utterly useless, but if you were interested in the subject you probably knew that while sitting the exam. I think what I'm saying is fair. Its completely possible, so just do it. Its about motivation and that is obviously where french is failing to connect with the students, from my perspective at least. But ideally you should be motivated by yourself and not the department, so quit bitching! If its at the level you say it is, then I take it the course itself is not whats at fault here.

Crash · 11-07-2006 11:48pm

Look at science - alright, the work is there, but a large part of it is structured. part of that has to make a difference.

shay_562 · 12-07-2006 12:15am

If its at the level you say it is, then I take it the course itself is not whats at fault here.

No, that's exactly the opposite of what's being said. The level of a course being too high is just as bad as it being too low, for the reasons outlined above about drop-out rates and whatnot. The course should be better tailored to the needs of students, and not just assume a level of proficiency that clearly isn't being met. To use economics (because it's the only course I know in-depth enough to discuss) as an example, it's taught in first year as if people have never done the subject before. By your logic, this kind of a course is somehow inferior to one that assumes everyone entering the college had better than A1 standard economics from their Leaving Cert (which is exactly what happens with the French department).

Thankfully French forms an extremely minor part of my course, but if I had picked it as a major subject, I'd have been penalised for not realising, after 6 years of being taught mediocre French, that I was supposed to have spent my summer teaching myself to speak fluent French. That's not to say that I wouldn't have spent my summer teaching myself French if that was a stated requirement, but I would have assumed that A1 standard French in the major national exam would be the starting point for university level French, and that I'd be better off learning in a structured environment than half-assedly trying to teach myself.

By the time you're 4 weeks into Michealmas term and hopelessly lost in your course, it's a bit late to turn around and realise that you should have spent the summer studying, which is why people drop out, which is why (to get back the point at which, sometime long ago, I started) the course is at fault here, and not students who didn't and couldn't have known any better.

punka · 12-07-2006 11:25am

lydonst wrote:

Im still not convinced. Ideally, call me romantic, you should already be fairly interested in the subject, and by that I mean actually want to "put in the hours in the library." Look at the guys doing science, work is demanded and its done, and consequently its taken more seriously.

That's NOT what you were arguing though - you said that students are 'babied' in arts courses. Now, I don't in any way want to denigrate science courses, but it seems to me that there's a lot more hand-holding in those courses, where things are a lot more structured, as opposed to arts courses where the student for the most part is expected to take the initiative in doing work.

But ideally you should be motivated by yourself and not the department, so quit bitching!

Yes, ideally this would be the case - but it's NOT. Unfortunately a lot of this can be attributed to the fact that students don't research the courses they're choosing properly, and by the time they realise they don't actually want to do them, it's often too late to switch.

lilmizzme · 24-05-2007 9:55pm

soo....was the general consensus, we don't like french in trinity??It's number 2 on my CA0 but Im having serious doubts after reading this thread!

Mordecai · 25-05-2007 1:01pm

After my first year of French in Trinity, I disagree with most of what has been said here. The key thing for French is to like it and to know that literature is a key part of the course.
Teachers are competent and it is in the nature of third level education that you have to work hard yourself. It's so easy to sit back and do nothing but this is how people fall behind. Even if this does happen, you can easily catch up over the summer.
Do French, it's lovely.

lilmizzme · 25-05-2007 8:06pm

But what standard is expected of you going in?At the moment, Im hoping for a B2, B3 in Honours Level French, would I get through the first year?

IzzyWizzy · 25-05-2007 8:13pm

I think it just depends on the person. I've been doing French for years and absolutely loved it at school and the course in Trinity put me right off it, as was the case for many people. It's hard to even pinpoint why exactly.

lilmizzme - a high standard is expected. I got an A in A-Level French (where you have to do literature) and I found it pretty tough. Not that I did badly or couldn't keep up but they do expect a lot of you. They expect your grammar to be really good*, to a higher level than I believe the Leaving gets you to and they expect your spoken French to be good as well. As for your grades, I didn't do the Leaving so I don't know but I'd say if you're not one of the best in your year at school you'll be struggling in college tbh.

*although the grammar lectures/classes in first year are very helpful if your grammar is a bit shaky

nervous_twitch · 26-05-2007 2:42am

I too have just finished my first year in TSM French and I thoroughly enjoyed it - don't let these kind of threads dissuade you. For the most part, I found the negative posts in here to be pretty much unfounded; I dunno if its just a personal thing, the fact that I'm in first year, or down to the current staff etc.
I didnt find that the standard was too high, and I'm no genius; leaving cert French (anything above the c1 requirement) would certainly be enough to get you through if you are passionate about the language. Don't choose the course if you simply want a language qualification, I found most of the work I put in was fuelled by my love of the language and my desire to attain some sort of fluency.
As has already been pointed out, 3rd level education is up to you - what you put in is what you'll get out, and imo the staff bear little or no relevance to your progress,particularly in a language.

Course is hugely literature-based, so it helps to have an interest in that kind of thing. Just worth mentioning, you do a course in Contemporary France and one on Language Study, both of which last all year and have an exam in Summer. This was probably my biggest gripe, I found myself studying things so far removed from where my interests lie (language-learning)

But go for it, if you like French and are prepared to put the work in, its great.

IzzyWizzy · 26-05-2007 10:42am

Course is hugely literature-based, so it helps to have an interest in that kind of thing. Just worth mentioning, you do a course in Contemporary France and one on Language Study, both of which last all year and have an exam in Summer. This was probably my biggest gripe, I found myself studying things so far removed from where my interests lie (language-learning)

The Introduction to Language Study was one of the best parts for me. I thought it was really interesting. I think people hated the fact they were forced to pass it when they didn't ask to do it. I would have liked to have had a course on French Linguistics in first year since not all of us are crazy about literature. Yes, I expected quite a lot but I didn't expect literature to be practically the only thing on the course. Obviously if you really like it, you won't have as much of a problem with the course as people who aren't that keen.

I find the lecturers do make a difference in a subject like this where you're expected to attend all the classes and participate. I realise I did get some of the worst lecturers in first year (and second year) so maybe other people had a different experience. It's just hard to keep motivation and confidence when you're constantly being told your French isn't up to scratch and being criticised all the time. I was talking to the main culprit and he told me himself my French was excellent but he liked to only pick on the stuff that was a bit weak and never praise the stuff that was good. What's the point in that? For 90%+ of people it just makes them lose confidence. I also thought the grammar work was really boring and repetitive compared to the stuff we were doing in my other subject (another language).

Maybe it has changed since I was in first year but most people in my year definitely didn't like it much. Loads of people dropped out (including the class rep!) and out of about 90 people starting French there are less than 10 majoring in it in 4th year. Most people who were intending to major in it ending up changing their mind. I'm sure there are people who love it but I don't think the negative opinions are unfounded at all. I read (probably on here) that the French dept gets more complaints than all the other depts put together.

radioactiveman · 26-05-2007 11:52am

Yes, I expected quite a lot but I didn't expect literature to be practically the only thing on the course.

I majored in french a few years ago (not saying when:) and I have to say I found the same thing. I didn't have any problem with the language part of the course in the first year and the support they gave us was fairly good. Actually if you work hard you should be able to build up your language skills even if you get a B or a C in leaving cert (it's fairly straightforward even though it might be a lot of work). The main difficulty I had was with the literature modules we did. The french department expect you to study it as you would english literature - the whole point of the language courses is to prepare you for this. You can be caught off guard if you choose french in trinity based on how you've found it for the leaving cert - I loved learning the actual language but I found the literature part of the course very difficult at times.
One of the main reasons for this was also the fact that some of the lecturers were very difficult in the seminars we had. They tended to have a very specific view of what was correct and what was not correct and they could be downright hostile in class at times. A lot of the time you're left to your own devices which can be daunting. If literature is a strong area for you this is ok but for weaker students it could be a problem:)

The exchange part of our course was also a shambles it has to be said. I actually got no advice whatsoever on the courses I should be doing in france. I ended up picking the courses over there myself, but in my opinion this should have been overseen by the french department. When I got to the college, they had never heard of our co-ordinator (!) and the co-ordinator he had told me to get in contact with had retired!
I had practically no contact with the french dept. all year, and when I got back our co-ordinator deducted 10% from my marks, and also from the marks of my *other* TSM subject - and entered them definitively into the college computer system. At the time I was a little intimidated by him (young and foolish!) and I didn't question this but if I was in the same position again I would never accept it.
The subjects I chose on erasmus corresponded well to what we were doing at home, but because nobody does TSM type courses in france (at least not in the college I went to) it was like doing the major components of two degrees, of course through french (by the way the exams over there are 4 hours long:). I know a lot of people go away, have a nice year and get brilliant marks from the other university (which might warrant the 10% deduction) but it should have been better organised.

To be honest I wouldn't do it again, I'd choose a course like business or computing with a significant language component but that's just a personal choice. I didn't enjoy it really.

gaybitch · 21-09-2008 8:43pm

Really very sorry to resurrect an ancient thread, but I'm starting English & French TSM next week and I don't really know what to expect.

After reading this read, I'm a bit more confused, because the opinion is so divided from absolutely negative to absolutely positive!

Has anyone done French & English and does anyone have any information on subject choices, hours, erasmus options, books, tips etc?

French not good?

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