How best to revise for Spanish - all levels

For all papers, knowing your verb endings and especially accents on the verb endings will really help. Examiners can remove marks if a missed accent creates a different word – so be really clear with them! Note how patterns often repeat in Spanish verb endings, e.g. always end in -mos for “we” or in an –n for “they”, and use this to your advantage.

If you’re running out of revision time, ensure you have a range of tenses rather than perfecting just one. You can also prioritise common verbs and learn them by heart, with a focus on “I”, “he/she” and “we” forms as a very last resort.  Prioritise verbs that can be used in many written or spoken contexts e.g. salgo “I go out”, salí “I went out”, saldré “I will go out” (note that two of these forms are irregular).

Set phrases are your friends.  Examiners don’t distinguish between your own writing and well-placed set phrases (even clichéd ones!), so include them. This is a smart way to increase your tense variety too.  Some examples:

• Según lo que creo = “according to what I believe / the way I see it”
• Si pudiera, me gustaría + infinitive = “If I could, I’d like to …”
• Cuando sea mayor + future tense = “when I’m older…”
• Se me da bien + infinitive / singular noun = “ _ _ _ _ suits me”

For the oral, preparation is key. Have those verbs and set phrases ready to go, but also remember to be alert for keywords that’ll help you to orient your answer.  Your aim is to be responsive to the question – your answer should be relevant – but it’s also possible to steer many questions back to areas where you feel comfortable with vocabulary and structure.

When revising vocabulary and time is tight, prioritise what you think you will actually say/write in an exam.  This means not worrying about lists of food, or illnesses, or hobbies. Of course more is better, but in an exam you usually need to provide and justify opinions – so you need variety for that. There’s a reason three of the four set phrases above are about providing opinions!

Don’t tell the truth if it’s too hard. The aim isn’t to tell the truth in the exam – it’s to use good Spanish. Your favourite sport might be weightlifting, but la halterofilia is hard to remember – and el golf is worth exactly as many marks! Be ambitious with your grammar, but if time is tight, play it safe for content.

For all papers, knowing your verb endings and especially accents on the verb endings will really help. Because IB language B encourages discussion of topics beyond the self at all levels, well-conjugated verbs in the yo, él/ella, nosotros and ellos/ellas forms are most likely to be needed.

Consider making lists (or mind maps) of key vocabulary for the exam.  Themes in the five topic areas all have specialised vocabulary – which you will be expected to recognise, use, and contextualise.  You may find it useful to write your own lists – this aids the memory process – but sites such as Quizlet do already have similar lists available, split up by theme.

Set phrases are your friends.  These have three benefits for the ab initio IB.  They expand your grammatical range in an efficient way (examiners will reward these phrases even if rote-learned, provided they’re deployed appropriately). They can help you make an essay “feel” like an appropriate text type.  And chunks of theme-specific vocabulary can be embedded in them.  For sophisticated grammar, consider phrases such as:

• Según lo que creo = “according to what I believe / the way I see it”
• Si pudiera, me gustaría + infinitive = “If I could, I’d like to …”
• Cuando sea mayor + future tense = “when I’m older…”
• Se me da bien + infinitive / singular noun = “ _ _ _ _ suits me”

Remind yourself of key features of text types. This is another chance to build learnable lists (including those set phrases).  Note down the key features of each text type and have them ready to go.  Essays for ab initio are short, but you still need to tailor them to the text type. Short nods to the required format will realistically be enough.

For the oral, preparation is key. You’ll need to relate your visual stimulus to one of the themes, so refer to the vocabulary and set phrases list mentioned above, and practice making them applicable to possible images. Luckily, for all conversation, the same information you need for the oral is probably transferrable to the essay as well!

Don’t tell the truth if it’s too hard. The IB sometimes asks quite specific questions, and it may well be difficult to make your real-life experiences relate to the question.  So, in that case, just lie!  Your textbook probably has good examples of content-rich texts you can adapt and mimic for this purpose.

For all papers, a good bedrock of grammar will be needed. Whilst it’s possible to be flexible a little with speech, knowing how the grammar works can help in both directions: you will be rewarded for it when speaking and writing, and it’ll make your reading ability both stronger and more efficient (less need for guesswork!).  Some useful things to know are the subjunctive, conditional phrases (see below for a trick), using se for passive sentences, and control of long, complex sentences for more formal text types.

Set phrases are efficient boosts for your grammar.  We all know that mastering grammar is a very big ask – and the more you can produce independently, the better!  But we all know time can run away from us. There is no shortcut around being familiar with the grammar structures mentioned above (and others), but there are shortcuts for producing them. Using some all-purpose set phrases can give your speech and writing extra variety and vigour.  Some possible examples (though it’s best to make your own list, as you’ll remember it better!):

• Se ha visto que …= “we have seen that / It’s been noted that” (a se form of passive)
• Si hubiera sido el caso, habríamos notado = “If that had been the case, we would’ve seen” (an example of a complex conditional phrase)
• Nos sirve de ejemplo = an elegant alternative for por ejemplo
• Tras haber considerado el asunto = “After having considered the matter”
• Note: subjunctive trigger phrases are recommended too, but not included here. Pick your own favourites!

Consider making lists (or mind maps) of key vocabulary AND examples for the exam.  There is learnable specialised vocabulary for the five core themes (and you can find pre-made sets on Quizlet, though try to look specifically for HL/SL and not ab initio), but students often forget that the IB rewards direct knowledge and engagement with the target culture.  So when you need to provide evidence, try and do so from the Spanish speaking world.  This is pretty easy to research – just google the topic and head to the “News” tab.  Or, if you’re really desperate, check your textbook (the downside is that this may be out-of-date).

Remind yourself of key features of text types. This is another chance to build learnable lists (including those set phrases).  Note down the key features of each text type and have them ready to go.  The bonus for longer essays, HL especially, is that you can also prepare a template based on text types you’d like to use. A pre-made structure will save you headaches in the exam, and stop you from rambling (it’s more common than you think!).

HL Only: Literature. The IB requires strong knowledge of your text, and being able to contextualise a given passage within a wider work.  So, being able to locate events in the text is necessary.  This is both literal (where in the story is it?) and metaphorical (what themes or symbols does it show? How does it portray a character/place/situation?). You can practice by selecting extracts for yourself at random and asking the following questions:

• What’s happening? And why does it matter?
• How are the events in this extract affecting the characters?
• What themes or symbols are we seeing here?
• Is there any context we need to address?

You will probably have prepared notes over your studies for the text – use them!  The key thing is to apply those notes to the given stimulus and, when appropriate, to match it to your knowledge of the text as a whole.

For all papers, a good bedrock of grammar will be needed. Some useful things to know are the subjunctive, conditional phrases (see below for a trick), using se for passive sentences, and control of long, complex sentences for more formal text types. Complex grammar and significantly clearer engagement with the culture (plus some literature/film) are what make the step up from GCSE, and you need it for everything: speaking and writing in an obvious way, but being able to untangle complex structures when reading/listening will make your answers in those two papers more efficient.  

Set phrases are efficient boosts for your grammar.  We all know that mastering grammar is a very big ask – and the more you can produce independently, the better!  But we all know time can run away from us. There is no shortcut around being familiar with the grammar structures mentioned above (and others), but there are shortcuts for producing them. Using some all-purpose set phrases can give your speech and writing extra variety and vigour.  Some possible examples (though it’s best to make your own list, as you’ll remember it better!):

• Se ha visto que …= “we have seen that / It’s been noted that” (a se form of passive)
• Si hubiera sido el caso, habríamos notado = “If that had been the case, we would’ve seen” (an example of a complex conditional phrase)
• Nos sirve de ejemplo = an elegant alternative for por ejemplo
• Tras haber considerado el asunto = “After having considered the matter”
• Note: subjunctive trigger phrases are recommended too, but not included here. Pick your own favourites!

For the oral, preparation should be split between the topic card, and your research project.  Your research presentation is learnable … so do it!  It is also worth role-playing questions you may be asked – not just the obvious ones, but also some “nightmare” questions that might test your knowledge.  The conversation card rewards familiarity with the Spanish-speaking world, so it’s worth having a few facts, opinions and questions for each topic.  You might find it useful to put these on cue cards.

For your text/film options, this is another element of the exams that’s relatively controllable. Remind yourself of key characters, themes, events, and symbols that occur – and if you have time after those priorities, a brief knowledge of the historical context of the work is always useful. A good strategy can be to practice making essay plans as part of your revision – you will have time to sketch an outline of your essay in the exam, promise! – as the range of questions is fairly limited. You may be asked about a character’s actions or personality, or the presentation of a theme. Questions on style are less common, but worth practicing.  When outlining your essay, gather key quotes and evidence – the more you use them, the more readily you will be able to deploy them in an exam.