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As for ryuukohito, French, learns. | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| ryuukohito Bilingual Diglot Groupie Malaysia Joined 6179 days ago 89 posts - 98 votes  Speaks: EnglishC2*, Malay* Studies: French, Japanese | Message 1 of 43 19 January 2008 at 2:43am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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This logbook shall chronicle my forays into the French language.
As of this point, I am a complete beginner with French, and have little, if any, experience with its written, spoken and aural forms. Although, I will not begin intensely studying French any time soon, as at this point becoming acquainted with the Japanese language is of greater priority to me. However, even though I may delay its starting, I must let you know that I am extremely serious about learning the French language. So if you have any constructive criticisms you wish to make, any whatsoever, I urge you to correct me. Any corrections, however brutal they may be, so long as they are constructive, will be sincerely and gratefully accepted. I will chronicle my preparations, thoughts (or comparisons) and any progress that I make here. Edited by ryuukohito on 19 January 2008 at 2:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| ryuukohito Bilingual Diglot Groupie Malaysia Joined 6179 days ago 89 posts - 98 votes Speaks: EnglishC2*, Malay* Studies: French, Japanese | Message 2 of 43 19 January 2008 at 2:57am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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In preparation of my French language studies, this is what I have done:
- Set up my computer keyboard to accommodate the French language, and I learned how to write with it. - I acquired 'French Grammar and Usage' by Roger Hawkins and Richard Towell. - For pronunciation purposes, I have downloaded all *.wav sound files available on the French section of About.com (using Downthemall). I have also begun using Acapela Demo to learn French pronunciation for specific sentences. - I've made bookmarks to all relevant resources on the Internet that I could find through Google. - Sadly, I haven't found many free audiobooks for interesting material that I'm already acquainted with. (This is unlike in Japanese, where it seems that there is an abundance of audiobooks for translated material.) - Made shortcut keys in Firefox to French-English dictionaries (namely WordReference) to facilitate quick access (especially to the Google French-English dictionary, which coupled with Google Translator seems to be a very good checking source.) Some thoughts: I do not consider the French language to be easy, but I do find it to be 'easier', with regards to these reasons: 1. No intimidating wall of kanji to surpass and become acquainted with first before being able to guess at the reading of a sentence! 2. The sentence order feels natural to me, as it is similar to English and my own native language. (Subject-verb-object; also, in the Malay language the adjective follows the noun, which I hear works similarly in French.) 3. I have a fairly large English vocabulary, and many, many words appear familiar to me. (Although, of course, I am wary and careful of the false friends syndrome.) 4. As of this point, I have not yet encountered many homonyms, as is the frequent case in Japanese. Edited by ryuukohito on 20 January 2008 at 2:20am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6413 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 3 of 43 19 January 2008 at 4:58am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Good luck in your studies!
What method are you going to use? Are you just going to dive in, or are you going to follow some course first? If you want to dive in, there are simplified books available here (not sure about Malaysia though) and some also come with recordings. These are very useful because most French literature (especially classics) are written in an archaic kind of past tense, which is both difficult and ridiculous when spoken, so that is probably not the kind of French you should surround yourself with. "French in action" is supposed to feature very modern, colloquial French. If you are looking at free online resources only, that eliminates most modern French. I think the best among the non-copyrighted material would then be either - Molière's comedies, avoiding that archaic past tense because it's mostly dialogue, however the vocabulary isn't particularly easy or - "Le petit prince": the little prince; quite easy in terms of vocabulary and sentence structure but it is mostly written in that archaic past tense I find it easier to first do lessons that teach you the most important French grammar and vocabulary, then it's much easier to learn the rest as you go. There aren't many good free courses online though. Maybe http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/french/lj/ is the best to get you started, or http://laits.utexas.edu/fi/ . Once you have some very basic knowledge of French, you could do http://www.polarfle.com , it's a criminal story where you have to find out who the murderer is and what his motive is, all while reading French and doing exercises. It's available at several levels, so it doesn't matter when you do this actually, the highest level is still challenging for intermediate students of French. Music and podcasts are probably best in order to help you with the French pronunciation. I learn a lot by singing along to French songs, and the French-speaking music industry is quite large. Language-learning podcasts, such as the beginner lessons you can find in the archives of http://www.dailyfrenchpod.com/ , are very convenient if you easily learn by listening. I hope this helps! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Akatsuki Triglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6241 days ago 226 posts - 236 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, French, English Studies: Norwegian | Message 4 of 43 19 January 2008 at 6:21am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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If you like to read there is a book I consider usefull as it's aimed at beginners in preparatory schools and colleges, it consists of small stories. It has about 300 pages (which 200~ are vocabulary) and gives some grammar explanation. The book is called A French Reader by Aldrich & Foster. You can buy the book here for just $11.01 it seems.
Another book you'd might consider is Harry Potter if you like that kind of books. I'm reading Harry Potter à l'école des sorciers while I listen to the audiobook, it's good as you read and listen to the word at the same time. Best luck with your studies. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| ryuukohito Bilingual Diglot Groupie Malaysia Joined 6179 days ago 89 posts - 98 votes Speaks: EnglishC2*, Malay* Studies: French, Japanese | Message 5 of 43 20 January 2008 at 2:18am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Dear Sprachprofi and Akatsuki,
Thank you for your kind words! I shall be sure to use them as motivation. Your guidance is very much appreciated as well. As regards that past tense issue, Sprachprofi, thank you for the notification. I shall be careful about it. Also, I wonder if you could please listen to this short clip of a reading of Le Petit Prince and tell me whether this is bad/good/excellent as a shadowing material? Is this proper French pronunciation? (To the administrator: I am aware of copyright issues, but I humbly ask for leniency, as only 10 seconds of the audio was taken, and even so, only for educational purposes.) Also, the links you have provided are very useful and interesting. Thank you! Akatsuki, I am unable to find any reviews or information on that book, but I will try my best to look around for something similar to it where I am. As per your recommendations on the Harry Potter series, indeed, being a fan of it, I have with me the the entire collection (in French) already, all 7 of them, but I have not and cannot yet use nor read them, for I am very careful in wanting to cultivate only the most proper of French pronunciation, as I hear that French people can be and are quite concerned about that aspect of their language :) (I hope to encounter an audiobook that I may shadow with, soon enough.) Also, I think I have heard from somewhere that the former French president, Jacques René Chirac, speaks beautifully. Is that true? If it is, perhaps I should find his speeches and shadow them? ---------- Today's Preparations: - Downloaded the whole FSI French language series. - Went out and borrowed The Complete Idiot's Guide to French. - Downloaded videos of French interviews and TV shows from Youtube. - Le Petit Prince, an illustrated version, found through Google. Edited by ryuukohito on 20 January 2008 at 2:40am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6413 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 6 of 43 20 January 2008 at 3:32am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I'm glad I could be of help :-)
That recording was done by a native speaker and the pronunciation is excellent. It may be too fast for a beginner though, you could try slowing it down using Audacity; I believe even Windows Media Player has a similar option. You could also practice French pronunciation using the beautiful short film at http://www.dotsub.com/films/lhommequi/index.php . Watch it once with English subtitles to understand the story, after that watch with French subtitles and focus on the pronunciation. Unfortunately the story is also in that archaic past tense, but the images should help you a lot in understanding and the audio is really good, it's an excellent reader and he speaks rather slowly most of the time. Learning IPA may also help you with your French pronunciation. See what I wrote in the IPA thread in the general forum (currently my post is the last post of the thread). Edited by Sprachprofi on 20 January 2008 at 3:34am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6413 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 7 of 43 21 January 2008 at 2:09pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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If you want to learn IPA for French, I just found some of my course materials and I could teach you in a Skype session.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Akatsuki Triglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6241 days ago 226 posts - 236 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, French, English Studies: Norwegian | Message 8 of 43 21 January 2008 at 6:00pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Echoed.
I haven't experienced this yet. Maybe this applies to French people from France? While I was in Belgium people seemed very helpful and friendly everytime I spoke french, and I won't pass for a native.
I think there was someone who said he used the book just to get new vocabulary without, actually, read it. Doing a passage and search for unknown words, tag them and write their meanings. I don't know if this works nor have ever tried it, but you could always try something new. Harry Potter Audiobooks are going to be useful in the future, you could acquire the audibook from the first book, Harry Potter: À l'école des sorciers and using it while you are reading the book. Any help you might need just ask, I'll be glad to help. Good luck and keep us posted. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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