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Improving my French - TAC2014: Deuxième | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| BonneVivante Pro Member Canada Joined 4856 days ago 33 posts - 59 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French Personal Language Map | Message 1 of 17 23 September 2013 at 5:45am | IP Logged |
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Hello all! I have been using this website as a resource for years, but only recently did I begin actively posting. This is my first language log, and I would like to document my efforts in improving my French.
I am a native English speaker from a primarily English-speaking part of Canada. In my area, French classes began in grade 3 (age 8) and were mandatory up through grade 9 (age 14). Although I did well in class and liked French, I didn't truly learn much. I suppose the teaching methods were flawed, because I don't personally know anyone who gained fluency in French from Canadian public school except those who were enrolled in French immersion programs. We all still remember the theme song to Telefrançais, however! At any rate, I also disliked most of my French teachers, and so as soon as French was no longer mandatory, I stopped taking it. I have been successful at learning other languages since then: I fluently read and write Classical Latin, I'm almost as good with Ancient Greek, and I easily learned enough Italian in just a few months to be able to travel comfortably in Italy and read simple novels. I am also reasonably able to get along in Russian. However, the first three I learned through excellent university instruction, and the last I learned because I am in a relationship with a native Russian speaker. I don't really have experience as a complete solo learner. For a very long time I have intended to go back and finish what I started: to raise my French to fluency (or as close to fluency as possible). I have great respect and appreciation for French culture (in France, in Canada, and elsewhere) and I find the literature and history very fascinating. I also love to travel and have a trip to Belgium coming up in about six months. So I have many good reasons to want to improve my French. What I have lacked in the past is an organized, intentional approach. That is something I am hoping to change. Thankfully, studying it at a young age has given me a good foundation for pronunciation, and I do remember a decent amount of vocabulary. I can read or listen to simple news broadcasts and usually get the gist of the story, if not the details. I have some experience interacting with French speakers, because I have visited France twice and visited Montréal many times, and I have an aunt by marriage who is a bilingual Francophone (although she was raised in rural northern Ontario, and speaks a strange sort of French indeed). However, I tend to get lost unless the French person speaks slowly, and if they use any slang or idioms I am quickly out of my depth. My confidence when speaking is also quite poor. So far over the past month, this is what I have been doing:
As you can see, my approach thus far lacks structure. I feel I'm still in the exploratory stage, trying to select the best methods for me. I just don't want to get stuck in the exploratory stage. I plan to try FSI, although I am worried it will be too rigid and formal for me. I plan to update this log regularly to help me stay on track with my efforts, and to help me analyze what strategies are working. I welcome any suggestions or comments. Edited by BonneVivante on 26 January 2014 at 7:06am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| BonneVivante Pro Member Canada Joined 4856 days ago 33 posts - 59 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 17 23 September 2013 at 10:24pm | IP Logged |
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I listened to about an hour of the FSI audio drills in the car today. While I find the content a bit lifeless, I nevertheless have to admit that I can see why it's such a well regarded program around here. Drilling does work, and when repeating the phrases in the car I noticed myself stumbling over certain sound combinations, so it's clear that the FSI program represents material that I need to work on. I think my pronunciation, automaticity, and fluidity of speech would all improve if I did FSI. The fact that it's free is a nice bonus.
I've resolved to start working my way through FSI starting right from the beginning. I'd like to do a minimum of 30 minutes with FSI per day, which is very achievable with my current schedule. I can do the audio drills in the car while commuting, and review the text in the evening as needed. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Stelle Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada tobefluent.com Joined 4142 days ago 949 posts - 1686 votes Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish Studies: Tagalog | Message 3 of 17 23 September 2013 at 10:47pm | IP Logged |
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Good luck with French!
The core French program in Canada really is broken. It's such a shame. But you'll learn so much faster now, especially since you already know *how* to learn a language. Once you're a bit more comfortable with French, think about getting a language exchange partner to help you with your conversational skills. I just started FSI Spanish a few days ago. I'm not 100% sure if I'm going to keep up with it, but I can definitely see the value. I've been doing it while walking, and I'm surprised by how UNboring it is. I kind of went into it with a bad attitude, but I've really been enjoying my 40 minute FSI walks over the past few days! Amuse-toi! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| BonneVivante Pro Member Canada Joined 4856 days ago 33 posts - 59 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French Personal Language Map | Message 4 of 17 25 September 2013 at 7:10pm | IP Logged |
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Working through the FSI drills while commuting is helpful so far. All of the vocabulary and grammar from the beginning of the course is stuff I already know, so I'm really focusing on pronunciation and thinking in French. I have begun to notice patterns in what combinations of sounds are hard for me to pronounce fluidly, which is great because it helps me target my practice. For example, I stumble when transitioning from a word that ends with a nasal sound to a word that has an 'r' near the beginning, such as en retard. I can pronounce the rolled r just fine when the word is on its own, but when it comes after the 'n' sound it suddenly feels awkward.
[Edited by original poster to add the following comment: I think the problem is that I am over-pronouncing the 'n' at the end of the first word, and if I focus less on it and just try to say it quickly and fluidly, it comes out sounding fine. I just don't yet know how to make this automatic in the middle of a sentence if I don't know it's coming up.] Last night I also started a round of grammar review. A U.S. university in Austin, Texas has all of the materials from their introductory French course posted online for public use (Français Interactif) and their grammar overview (Tex's French Grammar) is a handy starting place for basic review. I know, a Texas university seems like a very strange place to look for French learning materials, but I like that all of their example sentences have embedded audio and they use a fair number of colloquial expressions. Edited by BonneVivante on 25 September 2013 at 7:18pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Cristianoo Triglot Senior Member Brazil https://projetopoligRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4119 days ago 175 posts - 289 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, FrenchB2, English Studies: Russian | Message 5 of 17 26 September 2013 at 3:17am | IP Logged |
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Je vais suivre vos posts. J'étudie le français aussi, mais je ne l'étudie pas seule parce
que je prends des cours à l'Alliance Française. Je ne sais pas si vous connaissez le site BonPatron. (bonpatron.com) c'est bon pour faire de la correction de vos textes. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| BonneVivante Pro Member Canada Joined 4856 days ago 33 posts - 59 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 17 14 January 2014 at 9:05am | IP Logged |
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Apologies for the long gap in posting. Due to some family happenings, I ended up focusing quite intensively on Russian for a while, and French went on the back burner. However, it's time for me to jump right back into French on an intensive basis.
Even in my silence, however, I did not abandon French entirely. The three things I did for French in the past 3 months were: 1) I read the copy of 'Le petit Nicolas' given to me by a friend (very charming children's stories, I highly recommend the book!) 2) I continued doing FSI drills in the car, covering about one unit per month. I am now up to unit 5. I still find FSI very dull, but I grudgingly acknowledge its usefulness. I still haven't decided if I am committed to finishing or not. 3) I continued to listen to the RFI French news broadcasts several times per week. I am now tragically familiar with all the vocabulary needed to understand how many people were killed or wounded in a bombing. My plan for this week is to start watching an hour of French television every day, and find more simple reading material--perhaps some easy novels. I am thinking that perhaps I should join the second French TAC team. I've never done a TAC before, and am a little intimidated, but learning requires risk taking, right? 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| ElComadreja Senior Member Philippines bibletranslatio Joined 7236 days ago 683 posts - 757 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Cebuano, French, Tagalog | Message 7 of 17 14 January 2014 at 9:21am | IP Logged |
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Wow, we have much the same difficulty with language learning (including French) I'll be
watching this to see what you tried :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| BonneVivante Pro Member Canada Joined 4856 days ago 33 posts - 59 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 17 14 January 2014 at 8:09pm | IP Logged |
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I am very happy to say I joined the second French TAC team. It will be fantastic to follow everyone's progress; I'm sure I'll get many good ideas from others.
I am trying to focus right now on improving my understanding of more informal French, and also on vocabulary building. As I mentioned, French television and movies are one of my favourite ways to do this. Today I watched an episode of Engrenages (Spiral is the English title), which is a French crime drama set in Paris that I love watching. Seasons 1-4 are available on Netflix, and I am currently near the beginning of Season 3. It's difficult to watch because the crimes are often very horrific, but the acting is excellent, the stories are engaging, and there is a good combination of informal language (spoken mostly by the police, suspects, and witnesses) and more formal language (spoken by the judges and lawyers in their official meetings or court appearances). There are subtitles. I try very hard to ignore them, but sometimes I feel I need them to understand the story, especially during the cop segments - they use a lot of slang and shout a lot, so it's hard to understand sometimes. The other nice thing about watching the series is that it gives an interesting look at the criminal justice system in France, which is quite different from countries like the UK, the US, Canada, Australia, etc. that are based on a common law system (except for Québec). In France judges and prosecutors have a much more active role than in common law countries. While watching today's episode I noticed a few expressions that stuck in my head for whatever reason, and I thought I would make a list to help me remember, and to share with anyone who's interested: Je m'en occupe - I'll handle it Tout près de - Right next to (speaking of the location of an apartment) Ça marche - It works (talking about an approach to handling a problem). This is an expression I already knew, but I liked hearing it again...it helps keep it in my mind Je demande - I noticed the recurring use of this verb to mean "I want" or "I would like," and it was a good reminder that I must not be influenced by the similarity to the English verb 'to demand' which has a much more confrontational sense 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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