PRE-U FRENCH PAPER 3 PART I

Grammatical Structures for Essay Writing

1. INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

Il sagit de It is a question of
Au premier abord ( premire vue) At first sight
Il sagit dabord de First we need to
Une situation de plus en plus inquitante An increasingly worrying situation
A court terme In the short term
A long terme In the long run
Il faut quon se demande We have to ask ourselves
Il existe There is / are

2. ADDING IDEAS

En plus (dailleurs) (en outre) Moreover

De mme Likewise
Comme consquent As a result
En raison de Owing to
Non seulement [] mais galement [] Not only [] but also []
En tant que tel As such

3. ADDING MORE IDEAS

Plus inquitant encore More worrying still

En plus il est noter que
Il faut aussi tenir compte du fait que
Dun ct (dune part)
De lautre (dautre part)
Souligner le fait que
Il convient de mettre laccent sur
Sil en est ainsi
Furthermore one should point out that
One must also bear in mind that
On the one hand
On the other hand
To emphasize the fact that
Its worth stressing that
If this is true

4. PRESENTING COUNTER-ARGUMENTS

Ceci dit Having said that

Cependant (pourtant) However
Nanmoins Nevertheless
Par contre (en revanche) On the other hand
Quoi quil en soit Regardless of that
Mais en ralit But in fact
Toujours est-il que The fact remains that
Personne nignore que We all know that

5. INTRODUCING PERSONAL OPINIONS

mon avis In my opinion

Pour ma part As far as Im concerned
Je soutiens que I maintain that
Que je sache As far as I know
Jestime que I consider that
Cela me conduit penser (dire) que That leads me to thing (say) that
Justement, je dirais que As it happens, Id say that

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6. EXPRESSING SUBJECTIVE OPINIONS, DOUBT, ETC. (+ SUBJUNCTIVE)

Il est essentiel que Its essential that

Il est normal que Its normal that
Il est tonnant que Its surprising that
Il nest pas certain que Its not certain that
Il se peut que It may be that
Il semble que It seems that
Je ne suis pas persuad que Im not convinced that
Je ne crois pas que I dont believe that
En ralit je doute que In fact I doubt that

7. EXPRESSING BELIEFS, EVIDENCE, FACTS, ETC. (+ INDICATIVE)

Il me semble que (je crois que) It seems to me that (I think that)

Il est sur et certain que Its obvious that
Il est vident que Its clear that
Tout porte penser que Everything leads one to think that
Force est de constater que One cannot help stating that
Il ne fait pas de doute que Theres no doubt that

8. INCLUDING OTHERS VIEW POINTS

Il y en a qui pensent que There are those who think that

Nombreux sont ceux qui disent que
Certains soutiennent que
Dautres diront que
On a tendance croire que
Mais les avis sont partags sur ce point
Et lide trane un peu partout
There are many who say that
Some people maintain that
Others will say that
One tends to believe that
But opinion is divided on this matter
And the view is quite widely held

9. GIVING EXAMPLES

A titre dexemple By way of example

Considrons par exemple Let us consider for example
Plus prcisment More specifically

10. CONCLUDING REMARKS

En somme To sum up
Tout compte fait All things considered
Jen viens conclure que I come to the conclusion that
Tout bien rflchi After careful thought
A tout prendre Taking everything together

JCW
Nov 2015