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French in 3 months? | ||
Tags: Time to learn | French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| liam.pike1 Groupie Australia Joined 3549 days ago 84 posts - 122 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto, French | Message 1 of 26 24 October 2014 at 3:46pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Hello,
Let me quickly explain my situation... My fairly long-term pen pal recently announced that she will be coming down to Australia, along with her family (twin sister and parents), this coming February (2015). I told her that if she ever came to Australia then she could stay at my family's place, as we have a large house. I have always wanted to learn French (well, you know what I mean) and now I have the perfect opportunity of being able to actually use a language with native speakers. This is an opportunity which I want to take advantage of. My pen pals parents speak very little English, so I should learn French even if just for this reason. All I have is about three months to learn the language. I am quite new to language learning (Spanish for almost 6 months, Esperanto just started a few weeks ago... by the way, Esperanto actually has improved my language learning ability!). If I were to just go out and buy what I think would be alright, then I would probably purchase the Colloquial French book and/or the Teach Yourself Complete French book (all with CD's, of course). French is such a popular language to learn (to say the least), so I assume that there is a French self-study book which beats the French Colloquial and TY book (among other mainstream brands). With some unusual languages I can imagine that one doesn't really have much of a choice other than CQ or TY: but with French, there would be thousands of great books. MY QUESTION IS: Is there any book which is considered the French self-study book? Any suggestions on which book I may buy? Or, is CQ or TY the way to go? I will have completely finished high school in a few days (2 more exams to go!) and then with all my free time I plan to study French for 2 hours a day. So, around 180 hours of French before my visitors from France arrive. Thank you. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5327 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 26 24 October 2014 at 4:27pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I've never looked at Colloquial French or Teach Yourself, so I don't know how good they are.
Assimil's New French with Ease is excellent, if you like learning from content. If you'd like a quick grammar overview, I like Essential French Grammar. Other good materials that you might not know about include the French in Action video course, and the Grammaire progressive du français grammar workbooks, which are excellent if you're into that sort of thing. For native materials, we have enough recommendations to bury you under a stack of books, comics and DVDs. So you'll need to narrow things down a bit before we can advise you there. :-) Edited by emk on 24 October 2014 at 7:27pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| liam.pike1 Groupie Australia Joined 3549 days ago 84 posts - 122 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto, French | Message 3 of 26 24 October 2014 at 4:45pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Thank you for your great recommendations!
Well, I'll try and narrow down what I'm looking for, although to be honest I'm not 100% sure (obviously, else I wouldn't need to ask haha)... Unfortunately, I'm on a low budget. 18 year old boys aren't known for having much cash to spare, and I'm no different :/ Also, I owe quite a bit of money to my parents haha I am primarily concerned with spoken communication (at least for now), so I understand that a program like Assimil would be perfect for me... Is the free French FSI stuff online any good, anyone? In terms of native stuff, I love philosophy, but unfortunately this subject is hard enough to be able to understand in one's own native language, let alone a foreign one! However, because spoken communication is my priority at the moment, movies and television shows ext. will be of most value for me. Are there any good travel shows or travel documentaries in French? I love watching the French news (I have for ages, despite not knowing any French!), so that's a good start I think. Also, may I ask whether you think it is possible for me to be able to communicate effectively in French after just 90 days (180 hours) of study? Cheers 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6377 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 4 of 26 24 October 2014 at 6:32pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Generally, FSI is considered good but boring. It's a lot of drilling and if you can stand it, it'll get you a solid grammar training.
It's all a matter of degrees. You'll be able to get somewhere in 180 hours, and you'll be able to communicate basic things. You won't be able to say everything you'd like to, but with some Frenglish and gesturing, I'm sure you'll get your point across. Remember that a foreign language is one of few things that's worth knowing badly. A little French can go a long way, and if nothing else, they'll appreciate the effort. Edited by Ari on 24 October 2014 at 6:55pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4239 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 5 of 26 24 October 2014 at 6:35pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Learning any language takes time. The amount depends on your daily exposure and previous experience.
Suppose you know Spanish, Italian would be just around the corner. The same with Norwegian, Swedish & Danish which are closely related. The 2 of you must be sending and receiving correspondences in English for a while so there would be few communication issues with her in English except for other members of her family. When you started being a pen pal with this French lady, you had the same opportunity to start French and exchange letters / E- mails in that language as she would be writing back in English. If you started even 1 year earlier, there would be less stress learning to be fluent. I have a pen pal living in the US. We went to Taiwan for a summer exchange and ended up in an advanced level language class. We have been writing to each other in Chinese for over 20 years. Although he does speak to his parents in Mandarin, he claims his Chinese conversation is weak and prefers to speak English. Otherwise he seems to have no trouble writing in grammatically correct sentences. I can read between 90-95% of the characters in a newspaper without looking up a dictionary. In such a short time, it is unlikely you can reach a very high fluency level to be able to understand everything in a French radio or a TV program. Here are 3 sets of YouTube videos you can check out. #1: this is a set of videos with basic French dialog. SSifTYb&index=6">Learn French #30 dialogues #2: YouLearnFrench series which is a set of online flashcards with a native speaker saying the words & phrases. You get the benefit of learning the words and how to pronounce them. You start with the letters of the alphabet and work your way up. The link: French lesson 1 - Learn French Alphabet - Alphabet Français Alfabeto Cursos Clases de Frances #3: Learn French with Victor. There is a lot of dialog in this series. Learn French with Victor 1-8 (Français pour débutant) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tristano Tetraglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 3842 days ago 905 posts - 1262 votes Speaks: Italian*, Spanish, French, English Studies: Dutch | Message 6 of 26 24 October 2014 at 6:39pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Depends by your definition of "effectively" and your background in language learning. EDIT: oh sorry, you wrote about your background. which level did you achieve in Spanish? (on a side track, I'm curious about the benefits you had from Esperanto in only one week. can you please expand? I'm also interested). Edited by tristano on 24 October 2014 at 6:57pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5327 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 26 24 October 2014 at 6:42pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
FSI French Basic is a well-done set of "drills". A lot of people find it boring, but if you like oral drills, it's a good choice. Budget-wise, you don't need to spend a lot. Assimil's New French with Ease is the most expensive thing I suggested, and it's usually about ~$50 on Amazon. But if you like "absorbing" a language from context with occasional explanations, it's excellent for the price, and lots of people around it have used it with great results. Essential French Grammar is usually about $2 in the US, or you can use the grammar pages on french.about.com, but they're more of a reference than an overview. I think the French in Action videos are available online for free legally.
Definitely go with stuff you enjoy. :-) Documentaries are an excellent choice, because they tend to be even slower and clearer than the news, and the video makes it easier to guess words. You might try out the Carnets de voyage from TV5MONDE, which are available online for free (they also have a section for students of French). The BBC's Planète Terre is absolutely spectacular in French, as well—I prefer the Quebec dub because it contains fewer scientific errors but still uses a standard accent, but the French version is supposedly fine as well. Unfortunately, it's pretty expensive to buy on DVD. If you have access to TF1, France 1, France 2, France 3 or France 5, there are also a ton documentaries on at random hours, including some pretty spectacular travel documentaries that visit different parts of France. Getting these channels outside of France can be a bit tricky—you may need some sort of VPN, and that may cost money. There's one really good travel show that I've forgotten the title of, but maybe I'll remember it later.
180 hours of French is probably enough to reach a level around A2 on the CEFR scale, with a bit of luck. That's generally enough to carry on basic conversations with patient native speakers if you're creative and use some pantomime. To make the best use of your time, you can (1) focus more on conversational skills and less on books, (2) watch easy French TV when you're too tired to study, and (3) install a copy of Anki on a mobile device and use it to review either sentence cards or subs2srs cards when you have 10 free minutes with nothing to do. There's a lot of ways to squeeze a few extra minutes out of a day if you don't need to spend them in front of a textbook. :-) Good luck! It sounds like a fun project. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tristano Tetraglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 3842 days ago 905 posts - 1262 votes Speaks: Italian*, Spanish, French, English Studies: Dutch | Message 8 of 26 24 October 2014 at 7:20pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I found this very useful once you pass the absolute beginner stage:
http://www.dailyfrenchpod.com/ I downloaded everything with iTunes and put the episodes in my cellphone listening to them every time I had a walk or using public transport (so every day). You can avoid spending too much time on grammar like @emk suggests. and you can also listen French music. I find that while I can listen to music all the day I absolutely cannot listen all the day people talking. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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