My current place is being sold, so my cheap ass rent for an entire house? Gone!
Oh well, I have a friend in QC looking to move, and he asked if I’d join him. Prices in MTL are of negligible difference to my city in Ontario, but the area we’d be looking is in the more-french portion of MTL.
So I’ve got maybe 4 months to learn as much french as I can. I have an ok understanding of syntax and can parse the phonemes on the bad end of ok.
I don’t wanna use the Owl app, I don’t think it’s actually that effective a language teacher.
Any advice on how I can shove in as much french as I can to become minimally conversational?
Apps, anki decks, textbooks; anything would be appreciated. ♥
I moved from California to Montreal a few years back to study, and now I’m staying for good. I tried duolingo on and off for far too long, but I found it super uninteresting and hard to remain committed to.
Best strategy I’ve found is called comprehensible input. The idea is to find books or other reading material that you can get the basic gist of when reading, despite not understanding every single word and phrase and grammatical construction. The more you read, the more you’ll find yourself able to understand, which is also very motivsting!
Also, make sure it’s material that actually interests you. The idea is it’s better to read extensively, reading things that actually interest you to some degree and keep you mentally engaged, than to just really intensively study a much smaller amount of (less interesting) material.
This actually mirrors how we acquire languge. The idea is to intuitively understand French by having seen a lot of it rather than to basically memorize French. You ultimately want to be able to glance at a sign, for instance, and just know what it means without having to translate in your head.
Some resources I found useful were these French illustrated books in Dollarama, but even better is a series of books designed to be comprehensible input by Olly Richards. He’s a native English speaker and polyglot who has written a bunch of graded readers that gradually increase in vocabulary and difficulty. He has several books for French, including beginner short stories, intermediate short stories, beginner conversations, intermediate conversations, climate change, WW2, and philosophy. The nice thing is he actually does a good job of making the stories and content interesting to an adult learner, unlike the children’s books at Dollarama.
Even his beginner books might be a little too advanced for your level so far, though, from what you say. If they are, it’d be best to find some material at a lower level that you can understand a little better. After all, if it’s too hard for you, it will make the process much slower and less enjoyable, which will make it much more likely that you quit. You could even simply try googling “french comprehensible input” to try to find material suitable for your level.
One last resource is the government of Quebec offers free in-person courses for immigrants and many French learners. They are part-time, and they offer multiple options for hours per week, so you could pick what works best for you. It would be worth checking to see if you might qualify for those courses once you move here.
Kudos for the great response!
I have been trying to learn French on and off for 7 years now, and I have learnt nothing. I have come to realise exactly what you said here. However, my interest in a particular brand of philosophy is cryptic enough when translated to English, which means I’ll understand absolutely nothing when in its original French.
I will be sitting for classes with a personal tutor when I can (one of my goals for next year) to improve my skills in speaking and perhaps listening, alongside actually working on my French with a fixed curriculum. I still have absolutely no idea how people just learn to speak a language without vocabulary; what do they even say? How would I say “My team obliterated their opponents” when watching a football (soccer) match, when I hardly ever use the word anywhere else?
Would you happen to know any good books on Linux, Networking or Security written in basic French for a neanderthal like myself?
I love a specific type of French music, love reading what little I can in French, and yet, here I am languishing in misery and beating myself up because I just couldn’t pick up the language. I hate it, but that is the truth.
For Canadian French content check out Mauril, it’s a platform by Radio-Canada that has compiled clips of their own content suitable for whatever level you’re at, and asks questions to gauge your comprehension.
Speaking of Radio-Canada you could tune into their radio channel ICI Première, which is available in all areas in Canada. In Toronto it’s 860 AM/90.3 FM.
Another resource I like to recommend for language learning in general is Mango Languages, it’s leagues ahead of Duolingo and has a Canadian French course, though it’s not as extensive as the Metropolitan French one. Plus they are partnered with most (at least North American) public libraries so if you have a library card you can register with that for free forever, normally it’s like $20/month or something.
J’aimerais juste ajouter: c’est apprécié que tu penses à ces choses avant de déménager dans une région francophone. C’est très facile lorsqu’on parle anglais de simplement présumer que tous pourront nous comprendre, et apprendre le français ce n’est pas facile.
Bonne chance avec l’apprentissage et le déménagement!
Best way to do it is to dive right in, alors ça commence maintenant! Si tu veux apprendre à te débrouiller en français parlé, il faut que tu trouves une façon de le parler régulièrement. C’est peut-être le plus difficile, de trouver quelqu’un pour ça, mais ça reste la meilleure façon d’apprendre. Sinon, consomme autant de contenu en français que possible. Écoute les nouvelles à Radio-Canada, regarde des émissions sur tout.tv, etc. Pour commencer, tu peux mettre des sous-titres en anglais, puis quand tu te sens prêt ou prête, mets-les en français. Plus tu vivras la langue, plus tu gagneras en confiance.
This is the best answer.
Also, set your phone and computer OS to French.
I really like “News in Slow French” for listening practice. It’s not free, but very good. For general vocab, I have an app called “Clozemaster” that I enjoy a lot. I also try to cook regularly from French cookery magazines, so that I’m actively using the language. Other than that, maybe see whether there are any local social groups for people who want to improve their French. Something with a specific activity that encourages communication is good, e.g. playing board games.
Oh, and even if you can’t get much communications practice with other people, keep an audio diary. Set a goal to record yourself speaking in French about your day for fifteen minutes every day. On the weekend, sit down and listen to your diary, and correct any mistakes, look up any vocab words you were missing, etc. You need to spend time every day using French so that you develop muscle memory. Correcting your own errors helps you learn, and also lets you see how you’re progressing. If you listen back to your first diary entry in a few months, you’ll be surprised how much you’ve improved.
Okay it with your friend, and ring him every day, but you can only speak to each other in French. Agree that you can ask each other what a word is in French if you’re stuck, but otherwise, you speak French. Obviously emergencies are exempt.
Try Refold. You don’t have to do the paid courses, just join their Discord and look for their recommended lists of things there and on the website to read/shows to easily watch on different streaming services for French. They have different “stages” to go through, and you can pay for coaching, but a good chunk can also be done on your own for free.
And sorry for Reddit links, but more good info and resources: https://www.reddit.com/r/Refold/comments/md9yk9/a_quickstart_guide_for_french_or_how_to_get_to/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Refold/comments/k6cudo/how_to_get_started_with_french_with_refold_a/
