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French vocab lists - noun entries | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| srh9592 Newbie United States Joined 5705 days ago 14 posts - 15 votes Studies: French, Spanish | Message 1 of 9 12 July 2011 at 9:37pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'm starting to study French in preparation for a move to Belgium. When I studied German, I made vocab lists/flashcards with the definite article (der,die,das) vice trying to remember whether a noun is masculine, feminine, or neutral. I planed on using the same method for French nouns, but the use of "l'" before both masculine and feminine nouns starting with a vowel has thrown a curve ball at me. I'm interested in examples on how folks format noun entries in French vocab lists to make learning gender easy.
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| Scratch Groupie United States Joined 5236 days ago 45 posts - 57 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 2 of 9 12 July 2011 at 10:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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You can consider using un and une instead.
par exemple: an eye -- un oeil a school -- une école or make a note of masculine or feminine after the word the eye -- l'oeil (m) the school -- l'école (f) Edited by Scratch on 12 July 2011 at 10:02pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| srh9592 Newbie United States Joined 5705 days ago 14 posts - 15 votes Studies: French, Spanish | Message 3 of 9 12 July 2011 at 10:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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I very much like your first suggestion of using the indefinite article. Your second suggestion is what I'm trying to avoid... memorizing if there is a little (m) or (f) next to the word. Unless someone suggests something I'm more comfortable with (doesn't mean it's better... just better for me), I'll go with your first suggestion. I just received Mastering French in the mail today, and I'm waiting for Pimsleur I to arrive. I start studying tomorrow!
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 meramarina Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5968 days ago 1341 posts - 2303 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: German, Italian, French Personal Language Map | Message 4 of 9 12 July 2011 at 10:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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I do it the second way, with a M or F note next to the word, but I don't make any extra effort to memorize the gender when I'm reviewing words. I use Anki and with enough repetitions of a word I tend to remember it just because I see my note when the card comes up, and if I have any recurring difficulty I put the word on a list of especially tricky ones and then make an effort to specifically learn those. It's not necessarily a better way, but it works for me. Good luck! Edited by meramarina on 12 July 2011 at 10:47pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| psy88 Senior Member United States Joined 5592 days ago 469 posts - 882 votes Studies: Spanish*, Japanese, Latin, French | Message 5 of 9 13 July 2011 at 1:46am | IP Logged | ||
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If you are a visual association learner, you might put the masculine words on a blue index card, the feminine on pink (or the closest to pink you can get) and the neutral on white. This way you can associate the word with the color as a memory aid.
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| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5010 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 6 of 9 13 July 2011 at 12:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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What worked for me, when I had troubles with remembering gender of a particular noun (not only those beginning with a vowel), was remembering it with an adjective. Most naturally you'll just get the feeling for it with reading enough. When you have seen the word in context (I mean with any adjective but the best are adjectives with more visible gender difference, such as beau/belle) enough times, you won't even think of using wrong gender again. Or, if the word is more rare in your reading materials, you can just learn it with an adjective from the beginning.
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| FuroraCeltica Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6866 days ago 1187 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French | Message 7 of 9 13 July 2011 at 10:18pm | IP Logged | ||
I tried that once but it didn't work for me, but I'm sure some learners will like it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6086 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 8 of 9 14 July 2011 at 12:49am | IP Logged | ||
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I go with Scratch's suggestion. To go a step further with what Scratch said about using -un-, -une-
What helps me is to really exagerate saying these articles, "une" and "un" along with the words. If you've dabbled in French phonetics you already know there's a hearable difference. Something else that might help: I started studying nouns by comparing some of them to German. If you study German you could try killing two birds with one stone: try learning words by comparing them to another second language. It helps me to remember the opposites. une alarme (French), ein Alarm (German) une ancre, ein Anker une interview, ein Interview une auto, ein Auto un épisode, ein Episode un opéra, eine Oper un uniforme, eine Uniform (okay, I guess that would be confusing to most people, but I seem to remember opposites better. A word almost takes on a picture in each language. Anyway, it helps me to reinforce the German articles, too.) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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