magictom123 Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5592 days ago 272 posts - 365 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian, French
| Message 9 of 22 18 February 2010 at 1:15am | IP Logged |
it's a date then :)
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fizzer Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5544 days ago 17 posts - 25 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, French
| Message 10 of 22 18 February 2010 at 2:33pm | IP Logged |
Thanks for these very interesting posts. I'm considering assembling this course. So I gather so far that there are:
Video
Audio
Text book
2 x study guides
2 x work books
Video and text book go together
Audio and work books go together
Is this correct and complete?
Where do the study guides fit in?
Can I do without any of the components?
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commo Newbie United States Joined 5510 days ago 13 posts - 20 votes Speaks: French
| Message 11 of 22 18 February 2010 at 5:18pm | IP Logged |
"I've just had a thought, you say it took you to b1-b2. Providing assimil does what
it says on the tin (i.e. take a person to b2) would it not be simpler just to use assimil
at 30 mins a day as it suggests than to spend so much time watching videos and doing
exercises."
I've used Assimil courses and I like them. To be frank though, in my opinion, there is absolutely no comparison between FIA and the Assimil French courses. Assimil is good; FIA is great. If one really follows the program (and by that I mean actively mastering every concept and all of the vocabulary as it is presented)every step in FIA is calculated to bring the student to a very solid medium/high intermediate level.
I used to just watch the video once or twice before I moved on to the audio. That was where the heavy lifting was done and I just about wore out (literally) my cassette tapes by repeating and reviewing the lessons over and over again.
I assure you, you will never regret learning French with French in Action. Pierre Capretz is a genius and FIA is his masterpiece.
Edited by commo on 18 February 2010 at 5:19pm
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draoicht Groupie Ireland Joined 6312 days ago 89 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 12 of 22 18 February 2010 at 6:04pm | IP Logged |
fizzer wrote:
Thanks for these very interesting posts. I'm considering assembling this course. So I gather so far that there are:
Video
Audio
Text book
2 x study guides
2 x work books
Video and text book go together
Audio and work books go together
Is this correct and complete?
Where do the study guides fit in?
Can I do without any of the components?
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Yes, that's everything the course contains, although there are 2 editions of the textbook, the first one can be got fairly cheap but the second one has an expanded documents section.
This is how it is recommended you use the course:
1. Watch the video (no books)
2. Listen and participate in Text Work Up/Mise en Oeuvre
3. Go to the textbook and review what you have learned
4. Do the Activities in the workbook with the audio
5. Read the documents section in the textbook
The textbook contains a transcript of the video, some questions based on the Text Work Up and a documents section for reading practice.
They say not to look at the textbook until you have watched the video and worked through the Text Work Up audio.
I think that the studyguides are optional as the course is very straightforward, but I haven’t seen them so I don’t know what they contain.
It’s up to yourself how fast you progress through the course, I like to do the video and Text Work Up on one day and the next day work through the workbook.
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ekendahl Diglot Newbie ekendahl.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5398 days ago 8 posts - 8 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English
| Message 13 of 22 18 February 2010 at 10:40pm | IP Logged |
Cool this is just the information I'm looking for now I just need to find out how to
download the videos so that I can watch them on my iPhone.
I have ordered the books (used) so once they come I think I will start this class
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dleewo Groupie United States Joined 5817 days ago 95 posts - 131 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Mandarin
| Message 14 of 22 18 February 2010 at 11:05pm | IP Logged |
commo wrote:
Yes, after finishing FIA (and really learning everything in it) I was definitely at the intermediate level, probably at about the mid-point between B1 and B2.
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I was doing some research as to how one can speak at a B1/B2 level and came across this website that shows videos of people speaking at a few different levels:
http://www.cambridgeesol.org/what-we-do/research/speaking-pe rformances.html
This helped clarify for me what I can expect and I figured it may be useful to others.
I would be more than happy to get to a B1 level!
Edited by dleewo on 18 February 2010 at 11:05pm
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draoicht Groupie Ireland Joined 6312 days ago 89 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 15 of 22 19 February 2010 at 2:08am | IP Logged |
ekendahl wrote:
Cool this is just the information I'm looking for now I just need to find out how to
download the videos so that I can watch them on my iPhone.
I have ordered the books (used) so once they come I think I will start this class |
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It's explained in this thread how to download the videos Link
I used a download manager called NetTransport and put the urls for the episodes into it.
For episode 1 it's mms://media.scctv.net/annenberg/French_In_Action_01.wmv, episode 2 is mms://media.scctv.net/annenberg/French_In_Action_02.wmv and so on for the rest of the episodes.
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MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5981 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish
| Message 16 of 22 19 February 2010 at 4:33am | IP Logged |
I own the study guides and I think they'd be very useful to have. They have more explicit explanations on pronunciation, explains the grammar of the lessons in English in case you happen to be feeling a bit lost, and explains some of the cultural things that happen in the videos.
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