geoffw Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4688 days ago 1134 posts - 1865 votes Speaks: English*, German, Yiddish Studies: Modern Hebrew, French, Dutch, Italian, Russian
| Message 41 of 329 26 December 2012 at 6:30pm | IP Logged |
Now that I think about it, I actually ended up not doing any Assimil for several weeks after lesson 78 (though I
continued reading and listening to RFI), and then when I came back I started over from the beginning and took
maybe 3-4 weeks to catch back up to where I had been.
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tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4665 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian
| Message 42 of 329 27 December 2012 at 11:08pm | IP Logged |
I also did Assimil Lesson 29 (Active) yesterday, but forgot to mention it. That one went extremely well, to the point that I don't think I had to look at the original French text even once to help me in going from English to French. I will continue to study Lesson 78 today, since I found it especially difficult, but I will be doing Lesson 79 (Passive) and Lesson 30 (Active), too. Now for today's stuff:
Native Sentences 0012-0013 (Day 0010). "Cela m’a un peu choquée, je vous l’avoue. Donc j’avais répondu que j’étais célibataire, mais je me demandais si c’était vraiment légal et comment réagir dans ce cas-là." (source)
And my recording: audio
Other than my usual difficulties of tone and rhythm, nothing leaps out at me as terribly wrong in this one, though a few sounds aren't quite the way I would like them. I'd love criticisms if anyone reading this has some to give. The original was a bit tough for me to understand without the transcript. I've noticed I have trouble when there are a few quick /ə/ vowels separated by single consonants and the speaker seems to run everything together (as in "je me demandais" here). Funnily enough, I pronounced it that way in my recording as well, I guess because that's how I had heard it in the clip.
Assimil Lesson 79 (Passive): This one was much easier than Lesson 78. I don't think any of the vocabulary was new to me, except for the use of "voix" to mean "vote", but that was simple to figure out from the context.
Assimil Lesson 30 (Active): This one wasn't too bad, either, though I blanked on a number of the vocab words relating to furniture. I remembered pretty much all the grammar, so I built the sentences right.
Edited by tastyonions on 27 December 2012 at 11:10pm
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emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5532 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map
| Message 43 of 329 28 December 2012 at 2:26am | IP Logged |
tastyonions wrote:
I also did Assimil Lesson 29 (Active) yesterday, but forgot to mention it. That one went extremely well, to the point that I don't think I had to look at the original French text even once to help me in going from English to French. I will continue to study Lesson 78 today, since I found it especially difficult, but I will be doing Lesson 79 (Passive) and Lesson 30 (Active), too. |
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I remember getting beat up by some of those lessons in the 70s, give or take a bit. It made me feel like I had been too slipshod with the previous lessons, and I was finally paying the price. But given that everybody seems to have problems with the same lesson, maybe it's just Assimil's habit of slipping in a hard lesson to keep us on our toes. :-)
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fezmond Groupie Korea, South Joined 4926 days ago 72 posts - 78 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Korean, French
| Message 44 of 329 28 December 2012 at 6:29am | IP Logged |
tastyonions - what other books/resources do you use for French outside Assimil?
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tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4665 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian
| Message 45 of 329 28 December 2012 at 1:48pm | IP Logged |
fezmond wrote:
tastyonions - what other books/resources do you use for French outside Assimil? |
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As far as learner materials, at the moment, I just use Assimil every day and read this blog. But I watch, listen to, and read all sorts of native media, chiefly articles on news sites, radio on France Inter, and random humorous YouTube videos. And I put new expressions and words into Anki as well.
Edited by tastyonions on 28 December 2012 at 1:50pm
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tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4665 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian
| Message 46 of 329 29 December 2012 at 5:43pm | IP Logged |
I did all of my usual routine yesterday (both Asssimil and the native sentences) but didn't set aside time to write about it. So here it is:
Native Sentences 0014-0015 (Day 11): Alors, vous avez tout à fait raison. Ce n’est pas légal, ce n’est pas ce que préconise la législation.
My recording: audio
Not much to say about this one except that it doesn't sound "right" to me despite nothing really obvious jumping out. Still so much work to do. :-P
I found Assimil Lesson 80 to be tougher than 79, and think I will study it again today. I have listened to 81 already today and taken dictation from it, and am really noticing lately that Assimil is moving toward native speed in these latest lessons. Lesson 31 (active) wasn't very difficult at all. I've been encouraged by the ease with which I've done the most recent active lessons.
Edited by tastyonions on 29 December 2012 at 5:44pm
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tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4665 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian
| Message 47 of 329 29 December 2012 at 5:49pm | IP Logged |
I've been feeling like I should add something on to my usual activities for the upcoming new year. Maybe I'll try to speak spontaneously (!) for two or three minutes and record that and upload it. Though I will probably write down a topic or two beforehand so that I at least won't be at a total loss for words.
Now if I could make that a weekly thing to track my progress for spontaneous speaking, that would be awesome. But I'm not going to count on myself to have the guts to do that. :-)
Edited by tastyonions on 29 December 2012 at 5:50pm
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emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5532 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map
| Message 48 of 329 29 December 2012 at 5:58pm | IP Logged |
tastyonions wrote:
I have listened to 81 already today and taken dictation from it, and am really noticing lately that Assimil is moving toward native speed in these latest lessons. |
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I recall that NFWE speeds up quite a bit towards the end, and that the first 10 lessons of Using French are fairly easy in comparison. But watch out for lessons 11–20 of Using French, which rapidly get harder and more time-consuming. It would be perfectly reasonable to spend two days on each lesson if you're still working on the active wave of NFWE.
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