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I’m riding my bike around France in May | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Travis.H Triglot Groupie United States Joined 4454 days ago 59 posts - 91 votes  Speaks: English*, Japanese, Sign Language Studies: French | Message 25 of 32 10 August 2013 at 11:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've finally completed Assimil!
Today I reached lesson 113 and it felt great to have reached the end. However, even though I've reached the end of the listening section I haven't been as diligent about the active phase which I plan to continue until I get tired of it. I've read that people who complete Assimil end up at about a B1 level. For me this is definitely not the case. I'm sitting on a solid A2 in most every category except writing where I'm pretty sure I'm still A1. While I can listen to the news and get the gist of things, TV shows and a lot of natural speech still blow past me. I've been watching a lot of Norman Fait Des Videos and I can follow pieces of it, depending on the topic. But to claim I have a solid understanding would be a lie. It is however, fun to look back at when I started assimil and thinking about how I couldn't even count to 10 in French and now what I can do in French. I can read and pronounce a good amount of French as well as express myself on very basic topics. I haven't done any writing other than copying texts or what I did during the active phase. In terms of speaking I'm planning on recording myself reading some scripts to document my progress and for others to see how my accent developed after doing assimil. Hopefully I can get some tips on where to improve. More to come soon! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Emily96 Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4426 days ago 270 posts - 342 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Finnish, Latin | Message 26 of 32 11 August 2013 at 5:30am | IP Logged | ||
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Félicitations! Je suis contente de savoir que mes compagnons du TAC étudient encore.
If you'd like to practice writing and need topic ideas, you could try some of the team Romulan challenges =P 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tsopivo Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4469 days ago 258 posts - 411 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Esperanto | Message 27 of 32 14 August 2013 at 11:39pm | IP Logged | ||
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Wow, I think this is great progress in just a few months of learning. My boyfriend has been learning French for a few years now and he still does watch movies or TV shows without subtitles. As for your writing skills, I am sure you are underestimating yourself.
Here is an example of acceptable A2 level posted in the general section of the forum: "Dear My Auntie Joan, Thank you for your geft. It was very fantastic. My birthday was very nice. There were many friends in it. I did some special dance music and cakes. I hope to see soon Much love Younis" 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Travis.H Triglot Groupie United States Joined 4454 days ago 59 posts - 91 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese, Sign Language Studies: French | Message 28 of 32 12 October 2013 at 4:43am | IP Logged | ||
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@Emily: Merci pour le message, Emily! Bonne idée! Je vais essayer d'écrire quelques
phrases. Thank you Tsopivo! That's encouraging. I could write something like that in French at about that level. I'm going to try and write more to help solidify some basic grammatical structures. For the last two months or so I've had the alarm set on my phone to wake me up in the morning by reading off the time, date, temperature and news for the day in a mechanical French voice. I just realized the other day that I understand just about everything. I'm looking for a good TV show I could watch in French with exact subs. I've heard Buffy the Vampire Slayer has exact subs. Are there any other TV shows with exact subs? I've tried Seinfeld, but it's a little over my head. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Travis.H Triglot Groupie United States Joined 4454 days ago 59 posts - 91 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese, Sign Language Studies: French | Message 29 of 32 07 January 2014 at 5:04am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm still here and even though I've been miserable about updating my log, I haven't
slacked in my French studies. After finishing Assimil I've been listening to a lot of French music and for Christmas I got L'etranger in French with the accompanying audio book. It's sort of depressing so far. The first line in the book is: aujourd'hui maman morte. See? Depressing. So here's my analysis of 2013 with French. I didn't get to the level I'd hoped, BUT I did do some French every day and I can tell it paid off. My comphrension is getting much better. I can listen to native materials and pick out the gist, and several longer phrases and utterances. I can also express myself on basic topics and have been more diligent about learning more vocabulary. The grammar doesn't seem to hard so far, but I'm being very careful because I'm paranoid about bad grammar. So if I were to grade my progress in French this year, I would give myself a solid: C+ Not great, but not flunking. Some things to look forward to this year with French. I'm going on a trip to France this year in May and June. I'm riding my bike from Normandy along the coast, cutting across the bottom, and then back up the other side doing a loop and ending in Paris. I've been training for the last month or so, and I have about 5 more months to go. As far as language goes, I've hired a tutor and we'll start sometime this week. I'm really nervous about this because I haven't really gotten to speak to any French people at all yet. I know this will be good for me though because, A.) it will help me break into conversational French; and B.) it will motivate me to study more. In preperation for this, I recorded myself giving a brief self introduction. I wrote down what I wanted to say and then recorded myself saying it. I'm sure my pronunciation is bad, and I'm pretty sure I said some things incorrectly. Anyway, here it is and if you have any constructive criticism on how I can improve my spoken French, I would gladly appreciate it. Until next time. Self Intro Transcript: Bonjour, permettez-moi de me présenter, je suis Travis, j'ai 27 ans et j'habite aux Etats-Unis. J'ai étudié le français par moi-même pendant environ un an …je crois. Pourquoi je veux apprendre le français? Je veux apprendre le français parce que je veux visiter la France, et l'Afrique. J'aime bien Le Corbusier et je veux voir ses bâtiments aussi. Cette anneé en mai, je vais monter mon vélo à travers la France. Je vais commencer en Normandie et rouler sur la côte ouest à Bordeaux. De là, jusqu'à Marseille puis à travers les Alpes, puis terminer à Paris. Je vais monter mon vélo pendant 2 mois. Je veux passer deux mois sans anglais. Merci d'écouter mon introduction. Edited by Travis.H on 07 January 2014 at 5:08am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5205 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 30 of 32 07 January 2014 at 1:09pm | IP Logged | ||
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I had a listen to your recording. Not being a native speaker I can't help a whole lot, but I can say a few things since I'm a bit obsessed with pronunciation and accent these days. Take it with a pinch of salt if you like, since I hardly speak like a Parisian!
Firstly I'm impressed with your prosody and particularly rhythm, it sounds quite natural and not American/Anglophone, and that's the hardest part! Is it something that's come naturally to you, or have you specifically worked on it? That's what I'm mainly trying to improve at the moment and it's not easy. You made some mistakes with individual sounds which are all easy to fix: - "vingt-sept" sounded dodgy to me, normally the "t" in "vingt" is pronounced more lightly, if at all; listen on forvo to see what I mean. - You said "j'habite eux États-Unis" instead of "aux". I'm also fairly sure the liaison between "aux" and "états" is required, although correct me if I'm wrong. - "un an" sounded like "une an", or more like a strange nasalised "une". - Your "je" sometimes sounds like "j'ai" and the "me" in "me présenter" sounded like "mé". - You accidentally pronounced the final "s" in "ses" (I imagine this was just a one-off mistake) and the final "r"s in "commencer" and "rouler", so they sounded more like the passé simple forms "commencèrent" and "roulèrent". - I'd say your /ø/ (the vowel in "veux", "deux", etc.) didn't sound quite right; it's hard to say exactly how but it sounded a bit too much like a "u". This sound should basically be an "é" but with your lips rounded. I don't think your current pronunciation will impede understanding though. - Some of the "p"s at the start of words sound aspirated, although it's quite mild. All these are worth looking at; but like I say I think you're already doing the hardest and most important part, the prosody, pretty well! I'd probably have said "présentation" rather than "introduction", but I'll leave correcting language mistakes to the pros... I liked L'étranger but it's not everyone's thing. I'm currently reading La Peste, which is similarly depressing, about a town that gets infected by the plague and the way the residents are affected by it and handle it. And La Chute is probably my favourite French book, but it's a more challenging read than L'étranger and La Peste which are written in quite a simple and direct style. The bike trip sounds fun! I know a guy who's done similar trips around Normandy, although I don't think he's done one as long as two months. He took a tent with him and camped in forests in between days of cycling. I did some cycling around central Paris last time I was there, which was crazy but fun. Edited by garyb on 07 January 2014 at 1:23pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Mohave Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Mohave1 Joined 4005 days ago 291 posts - 444 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 31 of 32 07 January 2014 at 3:35pm | IP Logged | ||
I had not run across this resource before! Hillarious!! Thanks for sharing! A bike trip in France sounds like quite the adventure! I look forward to following your log this year. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Travis.H Triglot Groupie United States Joined 4454 days ago 59 posts - 91 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese, Sign Language Studies: French | Message 32 of 32 06 March 2014 at 4:27am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for the advice Gary! Going back and listening to my introduction I do see where
those pronunciation mistakes are. Thanks for pointing them out. Mohave, I'm glad you like Norman fait des videos. Another one that I thought was...interesting is Tuto. Lighting fast, I catch about half of what he's saying maybe less. Absolutely insane but I keep watching for some reason. Recently I signed up to meet with a tutor on italki. We have our first meeting next Monday which is exciting. I'm getting tired of having conversations with myself all the time or with unsuspecting animals that are either stuck up, or don't speak French. It'll be nice to talk to another human. I got an app last week that I've become horribly addicted to called Duolingo. It's a simple app that gives you quizzes on different topics. It has you translating from English to French, French to English, speaking and listening / transcribing. I love it because it's harsh. One spelling mistake, one gender mistake and you get the question wrong. In a 15-20 question quiz you're allowed to get 3 questions wrong. This really bugged me at the beginning but it soon became a war between the game and me. After using the app every day for the last two weeks I've since noticed that my French spelling and my attention to detail has improved dramatically. While the content is basic, it has been a fantastic review and I highly recommend it to anyone in the beginner / early intermediate states of language learning. à bientôt! 1 person has voted this message useful |
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