High school students in first general and technological classes had the choice this Friday, June 14, between two subjects: an essay and a text commentary.
There are more than 530,000 to compose this Friday, June 14. Since 8 a.m., throughout the country, general and technological first year high school students have been taking the French written test. Until midday, students must complete a text commentary or an essay.
This test is just an appetizer: the French oral exam will take place, depending on the establishment, between Monday June 24 and Friday July 5.
Each test will count for half of the final grade. An evaluation which will be used for obtaining the baccalaureate, but also in post-baccalaureate registration files, in particular via Parcoursup.
For the general series, the proposed topics were:
• Object of study: the novel and the story from the Middle Ages to the 21st century, with a text commentary around an extract fromEdward by Claire de Duras
• Object of study: poetry from the 19th century to the 21st century, with 3 dissertation topics to choose from:
– Subject to. Work: Rimbaud, Douai notebook, from “Première soir” to “Ma Bohème (Fantaisie)”.
In the poem “Sensation”, Arthur Rimbaud writes: “I will go far, very far”. In your opinion, does the Cahier de Douai respond to this project?
– Subject B. Work: Sponge, The rage of expression.
According to one critic, La rage de l’expression shows “writing at work and watching itself work”. Does this quote shed light on your reading of the work?
– Subject C. Work: Hélène Dorion, My forests.
In My forests, Hélène Dorion writes: “my forests tell a story”. How does this quote inform your reading of the work?
For the technology series, the topics offered were:
• Object of study: the novel and the story from the Middle Ages to the 21st century, with a text commentary around an extract fromAnimaby Wajdi Mouawad
• Object of study: the literature of ideas from the 16th to the 18th century, with 3 subjects to choose from around which you are asked to write a contraction of text and an essay:
– Subject to. Rabelais, Gargantua, chapters XI to XXIV. Text after Manon Paulic, “The challenge of education” in “Will AI replace us?”, Le Un, n°432, February 1, 2023.
Essay: can a good education do without “storing knowledge”?
– Subject B. The Heather, The characters, book XI “Of Man”. Text by Mélanie Semaine, “Let’s stay polite! But why?” in L’Éléphant n°43, July 2023.
Essay: do you think that marks of sociability such as politeness prevent us from knowing men as they are?
– Subject C. Olympe de Gouges, Declaration of the Rights of Women and Citizens. Text after Marie-Eve Thérenty, “From La Fronde to War” (1897-1918).
Essay: How is writing a weapon in the fight for equality?
In the coming days, the French oral test will consist of a text commentary prepared in 30 minutes for the 535,000 candidates before a 20-minute presentation followed by ten minutes of questions and discussion with the examiner.
The final exams begin on June 18
The final years will begin their tests on Tuesday June 18 with philosophy, before the specialty written tests, from June 19 to 21 and the grand oral between June 24 and July 3.
These specialty tests – the two major subjects chosen by each high school student in their final year and which together account for a third of the results – took place for the first time in March last year, as planned by the baccalaureate reform decided in 2019.
But this schedule had been accused of leading to absenteeism and demotivation among certain students in the last term: it was decided to postpone them until the end of the year. A calendar which should allow “the reconquest of the month of June”, according to Gabriel Attal, then Minister of National Education.
For this edition of the baccalaureate, the youngest applicant – registered as a free candidate in the Strasbourg academy – is 9 years old, an unprecedented precocity in the bases of the Ministry of National Education.
