French in Maynooth?

Lola1987

Hi there,
I used to be in Maynooth, I was doing psychology but I ended up dropping out last year because I didn't like the course. I went back to college this year to study French and Film Studies in Trinity(only because I thought it would be handier to transport-wise). I feel I've made a very bad decision and think I should have stayed in Maynooth. I find Trinity extremely unhelpful, especially the not-so-student-friendly French Department. Does anyone know if the French Department in Maynooth is any good? Are they helpful? How many hours a week is French and what way do the hours breakdown?
Just wondering because I'm going to see if I can transfer back into Maynooth...
I love French but you don't really learn any grammar in Trinity, they assume everyone knows everything because alot of the students have come from private schools and have extremely high levels of French, whereas if you haven't had such opportunities your pretty much screwed..like me..lol.
Any information would be very much appreciated
Thanks x

Michellenman

I'm taking French in Maynooth, 1st year at the moment but loving it.

Difficulty-wise it's grand. I got a C in my leaving and I can manage it no problem.

There's 6 hours a week. 3 hours of lectures (semester1: Civil rights in France, French cinema [these are part of the same module and take up six weeks each], 2nd hour is 20th French poetry and then a third hour of 20th century literature.)

The civil rights/French cinema module requires an assignment for each topic. Then we have a choice to do an assignment in poetry or literature and whichever one you don't do you take as an exam in January. There's is also an exam based on the tutorial work done during the year(25 sentences based on the tenses learned in the grammar classes and a 75 word min. opinion piece) in January.

There's then 2 one hour tutorials a week. One is Grammaire and the other is Expression Ecrit. There's work to be handed up each week for each of these that counts towards your final grade. The classes are small, 8-12 people max.

Everyone has a language lab. each week too. It's an hour long and you spend most of it speaking and learning colloquial French terms and practicing for Oral exams. As far as I know French is the only language in Maynooth that has an oral exam in January.

The oral is discussion of a newspaper article (given to you 30 mins beforehand) for 5 min and then you're everyday life (family, college, job etc) for a further 5 mins.

The people running dept. are nice enough. Professional but friendly. Willing to help. They'll help you to find work and accommodation etc. for the mandatory 3 month (at least) stay in France.

Any other questions just ask. Hope it helps.

Lola1987

I got a B2 in my leaving cert and I'm like the worst person in my class, it is scary how fluent these guys are. The biggest problem I'm facing is the grammar. In trinity they don't really teach grammar, they have a lecture on it, but the tutorials don't touch on it. They have a "self access" grammar thing that your supposed to do by yourself, which is basically their lazy ass way of getting out of teaching a grammar class. Do you's cover grammar well?
Grr I feel so robbed, I had to pay 5000 euro to go back to college and now I'm getting screwed out of an education because of this incompetent french department and I have to pay 30 euro a week for grinds on stuff I should be getting taught in my course anyway :mad:

Michellenman

Grammar is covered well I think. Mine has certainly improved a lot. We get generally 4/5 grammar exercises a week to complete for the following week which are corrected and graded and then you're given a chance to look over them in the class and to ask any questions you might have, corrections and notations made on the page. The tutors are so nice and will help you with any problems you have. As far as I know most of them are Native French speakers. My three are all French, so they know their stuff :pac:.

There are a good few people who are fluent here too. At least six of my friends from that class are either French themselves or have a French parent.

There's only about 65 in the year.

Lola1987

Wow that sounds really good!
65, thats deadly, our class is really big, about 100-120 or so.
Poo I wish there was some way I could transfer back to Maynooth but Trinity isn't even semesterised so it looks pretty impossible Can't afford to pay full fees again...crud

bleuhh

Hey guys, thought I'd open this thread to discussion again. I took a year out from college as I didn't like my course last year and I want to focus on studying Irish and go on to teach that. I got a C1 in HL French in the Leaving Cert but it has been 2 years since i've been doing it. My question is, would it be far too difficult to pick it up again I think French and Irish would be two strong subjects to do my PGDE in after my Arts Degree. But i'm worried that I'll find French extremely hard as I have nearly forgotten the basics at this stage.

Any other suggestions on other subjects to study in Arts, keeping in mind that there is an extreme over supply of some teachers e.g. English and Business, in the country.

Cheers!;)

Michellenman

I only had a HL C3 going in to French in 1st year (the minimum basic requirement for the course is HLC3) and I haven't had any trouble. I've done 2 years in Maynooth and am now on an Erasmus year in France. While the course doesn't begin and the very basics, some time is spent revising leaving cert stuff to ensure everyone is on a similar level. If you contact the Alliance offices in Dublin I think they run summer/night courses which would help with relearning stuff you may have forgotten.

bleuhh

Michellenman wrote: »

I only had a HL C3 going in to French in 1st year (the minimum basic requirement for the course is HLC3) and I haven't had any trouble. I've done 2 years in Maynooth and am now on an Erasmus year in France. While the course doesn't begin and the very basics, some time is spent revising leaving cert stuff to ensure everyone is on a similar level. If you contact the Alliance offices in Dublin I think they run summer/night courses which would help with relearning stuff you may have forgotten.

Oh that's good to know! It has been two years since I done French, so I will be a little rusty I suppose you do have like 2 weeks to choose which subject you want to do so that's really good as well! I'm working full time for the year so that will not be happening unfort! What's erasmus like? What uni are you based in? Thanks so much for the info!