A revision-week plan for the French baccalauréat

By HSP · Published October 14, 2026 · 10 min read · Exams & Admissions

The French baccalauréat, usually just called the bac, closes lycée. Some of the result comes from class work across première and terminale. Some comes from final written papers and an oral. A useful revision week respects that split: you practise the papers you still have to sit, you keep a short oral habit, and you copy dates only from your lycée or the ministry.

This plan is written first for the voie générale, the general path, where philosophy, two speciality exams, and the grand oral sit together in terminale. The technological and professional paths have their own papers. Keep the week’s shape and swap the middle block for the tasks your regulation names. If you are not following ordinary class assessment, read the rules for your status on the ministry site before you copy a classmate’s timetable.

More exam explainers live on the <a href="/exams/">exam guides</a> page and under the <a href="/blog/topic/exams/">exams topic</a>. For a diploma organised by region rather than one ministry paper, see the <a href="/blog/german-abitur-revision-plan/">German Abitur revision plan</a>.

What you are actually preparing

Two families of assessment sit side by side. Contrôle continu, continuous assessment, uses class results for subjects that do not have a final national paper. Épreuves terminales, the final exams, cover the rest, including work sat early and work sat in the final year.

Ministry pages currently describe continuous assessment as 40 percent of the final result and the final exams as 60 percent on the general path. Check the current Bulletin officiel and education.gouv.fr before you rely on those shares, because weightings can change. This week does not depend on the arithmetic. It depends on knowing which subjects are final papers and which are class averages.

Class still counts

A weekend of philosophy does not repair a year of missing homework in a subject that lives in the average. Keep the short tasks your teachers set. If an in-class test falls in the same week, write it on the map first. The bac week is a container, not a reason to disappear from class.

Make a one-page subject map

Three columns are enough: philosophy, the speciality you are weakest in, and the oral. A fourth line can name the second speciality so it does not vanish. You will not train every subject at full length every week. You will always know which one is waiting.

For each column write the format, the duration printed for your session, the next official date, and the skill that failed last time. If you do not have the duration, write "ask" and leave the number blank. If nobody official has published a date, write "blank". Do not invent one, and do not copy a year from an older sibling whose path was different.

Add one margin line for a subject that is only in the continuous average, such as "history-geography, class test Thursday." That line stops the test from either disappearing or eating the philosophy day. The speciality you dropped after première may already sit in the average. It does not need a final-paper slot unless your school says so.

Give the week a shape you can repeat

Repeat the same shape. Change the question and the speciality topic. Do not redesign the week every Sunday.

Use blocks of about 45 to 50 minutes, then stand up. Two blocks are plenty on a school night. A full philosophy paper, on the day you sit one, replaces those blocks. It does not get stacked on top of them after dinner.

Keep an error log on the back of the map. Three columns: what I wrote, what the textbook or the teacher’s correction says, and what I will do next time. Five lines a week beat a system you abandon.

If you want a quiz from notes you wrote yourself, follow <a href="/blog/how-to-ask-an-ai-for-a-study-summary/">how to ask an AI for a study summary</a>. School rules still apply. A quiz is not a paragraph you hand in. The same idea of a repeatable pace shows up in the <a href="/blog/gaokao-study-rhythm/">gaokao study rhythm</a> and the <a href="/blog/kenya-kcse-revision-routine/">KCSE revision routine</a>: one hard task, one repair, and a stop time.

Philosophy essays: problem, movement, answer

Copy the philosophy duration from the current ministry page for your path, then sit one full paper in the week if you can find a quiet stretch of that length. On other days, practise outlines. An outline shows whether you have a problem or only a topic.

A dissertation hour

Use a question you invent, so you are not memorising a leaked subject. Try, once: "Can a rule be fair if nobody agreed to it?" It is a practice shape, not an official paper.

Spend ten minutes writing the tension. Fairness seems to ask for agreement, yet many rules bind people who never voted, from a fire exit that must stay unlocked to a protection for someone who was not in the room. If you cannot write the tension, you are not ready to introduce the essay.

Sketch three movements. The first shows where the obvious reading breaks. The second uses a concept you have actually studied, or you pick another question. The third answers, and it names the limit of that answer.

Write inside the time you set. The next day, read only the introduction and the last paragraph. They should name the same problem. If the ending never returns to agreement, the essay wandered.

Let the counter show the shape

The <a href="/blog/word-count-and-reading-time/">word count and reading time</a> note is the spoken version of the same check. For a text explanation, mark claim, movement, and limit first, and flag any name that does no work in the argument.

Speciality work: time the real task

Your specialities are the two you kept. The live catalogue is on the ministry site and can change. Train the subject you sit, including a practical or spoken part if the description has one. An essay plan will not train a lab, a language oral, or a performance.

Once in the week, sit a slice that matches a real section’s minutes. Use a task your teacher handed out, or one you build from the chapter list. Write the minutes at the top and stop when they end, even if the last line is unfinished. A paper you finish at midnight with the answers open is not a timed paper.

Record the score the way your teacher scores it. A mark out of 20 can stay out of 20. If you compare a short quiz with a long problem, a percentage can put them on one personal chart. Label the chart "practice only". It does not predict the diploma, and it does not replace the weighting on the ministry page.

Pick three misses. For each, write the wrong step, the corrected step, and a cue you can say next time. "I forgot the unit" is a cue. "I must try harder" is not. Redo those three items on the repair day. Redo the whole paper only if one cause spoiled all of it, such as misreading the verb in the question.

If the speciality is an essay, the introduction and the conclusion must answer the same question. If it is a calculation, the log should show the first wrong line. If it is practical, practise the gestures your teacher listed, in the official time, and note the step you skipped. Keep the second speciality alive with one short block: a single problem, document, or paragraph.

Oral prep without a memorised script

The grand oral asks you to speak about work tied to your specialities and to hold a conversation. Briefings also leave room for a short exchange about what you want to do after school. Confirm the minutes for each part with your teacher. Then time those parts, not a guess from a forum.

Use three cards.

A page that felt short can run long out loud. Cut until the block fits the minutes you were given. Record yourself once, log the moment you leave the question, and delete the file the same day.

Check the official pages before you trust a detail

Three sources outrank this article. The ministry site education.gouv.fr publishes the shape of the bac. The Bulletin officiel carries the texts that weightings and exam rules depend on. Your lycée publishes the convocation, the room, and the local calendar. When a video, a chat, or this page disagrees with those three, follow those three.

Once at the start of the week, check four things on the official page for your path: which exams are still ahead, how long they are, whether a practical part exists, and whether the oral’s minutes match your practice. Then close the browser. Hunting for a newer rumour is not revision.

Weightings can change, and a duration you remember from someone else can belong to a different path. If a percentage in your notes is from last year, write "re-check" beside it. The <a href="/blog/sat-exam-guide/">SAT exam guide</a> is a different test. Borrow its habit of reading the official page. Do not borrow its timing or its scoring.

This week on paper

Times below are suggestions. Shift a block if you have class. Do not add a second full essay the same night.

Monday. Forty-five minutes on the map: philosophy, one speciality, oral. Durations copied or marked "ask". Dates blank unless they are official. Then a 25-minute philosophy outline. Write the tension and name three movements. No full prose.

Tuesday. One timed speciality slice. Stop when the minutes end. Three lines in the error log. If continuous-assessment homework is due, do it first.

Wednesday. Say the oral presentation once. Answer the three questions aloud. Spend five minutes on your plans after school, spoken, not polished into a speech. Note where you drifted.

Thursday. Philosophy for the official duration if you can sit it. If you cannot, sit 90 minutes and write "partial" at the top. Run the word counter. Check the introduction’s share. One line in the log.

Friday. Repair only. Redo the three speciality misses. If Thursday’s opening was a large share of the essay, rewrite it in ten lines that reach the problem faster. One short block on the other speciality.

Saturday. Oral again, standing, timed to the parts your teacher named. Let a partner interrupt, or interrupt yourself with "give the example now."

Sunday. No new topic. Copy any newly official date into the exam calendar. If you are away from your lycée’s time zone, glance at the world clock so Monday matches school. Next week uses the same three columns and a new question.