Posts Tagged ‘french language lessons’

I hate to be the one to tell you this, but learning to speak French isn’t easy – although there are certainly things you can do that can make it easier. If you’re an English speaker (rather than Italian or Spanish for example) you’re starting from a particularly difficult position. Everything about French grammar and phrase construction is different. So let’s look at some French language resources that can make your life a good bit easier.

For a start you’ve got the internet and any number of websites where you can start to learn French for free. A quick browse through a search engine will turn up lots of places offering bits and pieces of free French lessons. OK, it’s probably not going to make you fluent, but you’ll certainly find a few sound clips and French MP3s so you can listen to things like the French alphabet and extracts from the language. Just listening and repeating is a convenient way to start to get the hang of how it feels to speak French yourself.

Some of the better online French language resources also offer short animated films of situations that you might come across on a trip to France. They’re a great introduction to learning about what happens and how to use the language in real French life and they’re entertaining too which always makes learning French easier.

Unfortunately to get any level of fluency you’re almost certainly going to have to pay eventually. Once you put your hand in your pocket a whole new world of resources opens up.

There are French language lessons (although attending regular classes can be a bit awkward if you have time pressures) or one-to-one tutoring (which might be a bit expensive). Either one is still an excellent approach though if you have a native French speaker as a tutor.

Then there are plenty of books of course, and I’m a great fan of a good read, but these days with various DVD and software packages that’s a less popular option.

It’s the software packages I’ve just mentioned which are probably the best French language resource available at the moment and their capabilities are in some cases close to a complete wish list.

You can get modern French learning systems that have interactive lessons with French MP3 sound clips (which you can copy so you’ve got lessons away from your PC), interactive flash cards for learning French verbs, short entertaining video sequences, thousands of pages of transcripts you can read and all with real French people speaking. On top of that you can get some with short try-before-you-buy courses so you can satisfy yourself before parting with your cash and even money-back guarantees.

And all this can be found for about the same as you would pay for one series of classroom lessons. For me, that’s the sort of French language resource I would be looking to take advantage of. It may not be easy to learn a foreign languages but programs like these make it as easy as is possible and fun too. I wish they had been available when I started to learn French!

Author: Dennis Cordy
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Cellphone news

It used to be that you had two choices for learning French – go to a night course or buy very expensive (and quite boring) sets of tapes to Learn French at home. Times change though, and now with the advent of the internet and the home PC you have a huge number of choices for French home study courses.

Now don’t get me wrong – I’ve got nothing against French text books. There are some very good ones about that use modern teaching methods and patterns of learning that your brain naturally adopts. They’re much better than when I was a kid and I’ve bought quite a few.

But they can’t compete with modern CDs and the interactive programs that are available. A book can’t really talk to you. You can’t hear a French accent from a book. A French book can pose some questions, but it can’t actually react to your answers, correct you and then give you the opportunity to revise your newly learned French phrase or move on to a new one.

The interactive French teaching software available today can do exactly that. In fact it can do more. Some of them supply French MP3 files that can not only be played on your PC but can also be transferred to your MP3 player or a CD so you have portable French language lessons as well. Obviously you don’t get the full benefit of interactivity your computer will give you, but you can listen in the car, on the train, jogging, whatever takes your fancy – and you didn’t pay any extra for it, it’s all part of the system.

I am generalizing to an extent, of course. Not all interactive French courses are the same, just like not all French CDs or French books are the same. In general, however, they offer a level of ‘playability’ which is more involving and more entertaining and thus educates more quickly and with more retention than a book ever could. I love to sit down and read a good story with a book in my hands, but if I need to learn something like the French language, give me my PC and a software program any day.

If there’s a downside at all, it’s price. Now it’s not possible for me to check every program to learn French at home but the ones I’ve found that do what I want them to – which is teaching French to a reasonable degree of competence and confidence – are considerably more expensive than a $20 book. Having said that, they’re not what I’d call expensive either, considering what you can get from them.

Rocket French for example has MP3 files and interactive lessons for grammar, words, French verbs (quite a complicated area if you’re an English speaker by birth). It also has hundreds, if not thousands, of text files for further reference and the whole lot comes in at around $100. If I was looking to learn French at home, that’s exactly the sort of thing I’d be investing in.

Author: Dennis Cordy
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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