Q&A: Self-Teaching A-Level Languages

Learning another language can be a challenging task, with many obstacles to overcome, including structuring your learning, and getting enough practice in between study sessions. Lots of people find that difficult in a normal class, so it would be crazy to try and go solo, right? Well, this week’s post delves a little bit deeper into my experience of doing just that.

Q) Why did you decide to self-teach A-Level French and German?

A) I’d decided by about Year 9 that I wanted to have a career in languages, and so as my GCSEs drew to a close, I started looking at university courses in MFL. Unsurprisingly, most language degrees require you to have studied a language at A-Level, although there are also some brilliant “ab initio” programmes out there, which let you study a new language from scratch. Regardless, the courses I was looking at needed a language, and my college didn’t teach them at post-16. After spending some time looking at other colleges that did some French and German A-Levels, I decided that the best solution for me was to stay at my secondary school’s Sixth Form college, and to self-teach the courses.

Q) What goals did you set for yourself? Were they the same for both?

A) That’s an interesting question. I’m not sure I particularly set specific goals for myself at the beginning of Sixth Form. I knew I was aiming for high grades in the exams, but beyond that, I hadn’t really thought about it. After completing a mini-assessment at the end of each unit of work, I gave myself smaller, interim targets for improvement, which varied from mastering the passé simple in French, to improving my understanding of Germanic architectural styles. But they were all very small, intermediary goals, so that I could achieve my main goal of getting those high grades. Whether I actually do or not is yet to be seen!

Q) What strategies and resources did you use?

A) There was one other person studying German alongside me at my college, and after a little deliberation, as well as several conversations with the MFL coordinator at my school, we decided that we were going to stick with the same exam board we used at GCSE, which, for us, was AQA. So we looked at the specification for A-Level German, and we decided we were just going to follow the course using the resources that they recommended, which involved studying from an online platform, as well as standard physical textbooks, plus hard copies of the literature and film works. It seemed sensible to do the same for French, so that’s what I did!

Q) Were there any particular challenges? How did you overcome them?

A) Actually, all things considered, it was fairly plain sailing. It took me a little while to get used to planning and marking my own work, which, of course, would normally have been done by a member of staff, but once I got into a good routine, that was okay. The challenges tended to come when I wasn’t expecting them. For example, when I was initially buying the course resources, it took a while for my college to process the order, and so I was a few weeks late in getting the resources I needed to get going. Thankfully, I was able to make up the time over the weekends and holidays, but I would recommend getting hold of any teaching aids well in advance of when you plan to start. That’s not even to mention the difficulty I had in getting hold of the target-language film and literature works – let’s just say online shopping in a different language is quite tricky!

Q) How did you practise speaking if you didn’t have a teacher or class?

A) Good question. As I say, there was another student taking German A-Level alongside me, so we actually had a fairly good routine of doing speaking activities together in class time; on occasion this did mean we had to rearrange the week’s teaching plan to fit the periods we had free together. As for French, well, I was in frequent contact with the college’s MFL coordinator, so I managed to get a little practice here and there, but eventually I got to the point where I needed an external tutor. For me, this was less because I needed teaching, per se, and more because I needed a speaking partner so that I could complete my course as fully as possible. I actually used Viva for this, and I can highly recommend their services!

Q) How did you stay disciplined and consistent in your study schedule?

A) Actually, the secret to staying on track with my study was that I didn’t always stay consistent! I had a rough weekly schedule, which incorporated the five key disciplines of language study: reading, writing, listening, speaking and translation, usually in that order. However, if I had other priorities, such as film or literature work, which properly began after Christmas in Year 12, I was free to reshape this schedule, and swap out hours here and there, to suit what I needed to get done in a week. On some occasions I even substituted a French lesson for a German one, in order to “catch up” to where I was supposed to be. It was really all about flexibility. A rigid timetable is only useful if you can guarantee you’ll stick to it. For me, even though I tried, this wasn’t really feasible.

Q) How did you prepare for your exams?

A) When it came to mock exams in Year 12 – after having worked hard to make sure that my college was going to organise exams for me – I happened to be away on a (fully authorised!) trip to Germany at the time the exam timetable was released. I took some work away with me, and did a little bit of revision of my other three subjects whilst I was over there, but my main focus was, naturally, on German. Fortunately, I’d been revising the relevant content for all four subjects in small chunks throughout the year anyway, so there were no horrible surprises in terms of the content I needed to know about.

Q) What did your revision look like?

A) In terms of specific revision techniques, I’m particularly fond of quizzes. I made heavy use of term-and-definition flashcards, which I was then able to digitally convert into a multiple choice quiz. With the development of AI, I was also able to get my computer to generate quizzes for me, and I made a point of carrying these out in my target languages, particularly for the literature and film content, with which I particularly struggled.

Q) What advice would you give someone for taking on a self-taught language?

A) I think my key points would be as follows:
1) If it’s something you want to do, don’t let impracticalities get in your way. There’s always a possible solution – you just need to find it!
2) Communicate with the people around you. It’s not a let-down to need to ask for help. Doing it independently doesn’t mean you are on your own. Use other people to help you practise, if you can.
3) Make sure you have some form of study plan. Both a long-term and short-term plan would be good. For me, these were the two-year scheme of work, and the weekly teaching plans, but they can be in whichever format you want…
4) … But don’t be scared to go against your plan if you have other priorities. As long as you keep a record of how many hours you’ve completed out of your short-term plan, and how many you have left to do, then you can be flexible in how you go about getting them done.
5) Most importantly of all, have fun with it, and be proud of your achievements! Studying a language is a challenge at the best of times, so to be self-studying one shows dedication. Good luck!