Learn French at Home: Is It Effective?

[wolram]

Are any of the methods used to learn another language at home any good, i never took French at school so i do not have a clue about it, and the worst part is i would need to learn technical terms more than any thing.

 

[BobG]

I don't know about French, but it's usually not too hard to learn how to read and write a foreign language at home. That doesn't help you with the verbal part. The repeated phrases (at a very slow pace) just don't push you to the point where you have to think in the other language.

If you have a TV station in a foreign language, it can help some. It's just hard to stick with it when the announcer is speaking so much faster than you can 'hear'. You probably need a patient friend that speaks the language if you want to get to the point where you can carry on a conversation in a different language.

It can at least get you to the point where you can survive in a foreign country if you can get the person you're speaking with to speak slowly.

 

[JasonRox]

I don't think any of them are good.

Aren't you from England? If so, just go to France.

I'm trying to land a job in Quebec right now to improve my french and also have fun! Of course, not everyone can drop whatever they're doing and go elsewhere. I guess that's the sacrifice you make when you settle down somewhere.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Half my GF's family speaks French, so I would love to learn. But I don't because I would only use it maybe a few times a year, so I'd likely lose anything I learned because I wouldn't be constantly speaking it.

 

[Kurdt]

My friend is a linguist and a fantastic teacher. When he teaches he always speaks in the language being taught for the duration of the lesson and never reverts back to English. He also uses a lot of visual aids and repetition and this forces you to start thinking in that language rather than translating in your head which is frankly useless.

 

[JasonRox]

Half my GF's family speaks French, so I would love to learn. But I don't because I would only use it maybe a few times a year, so I'd likely lose anything I learned because I wouldn't be constantly speaking it.

French speaking skills are good skills to have. If you want to learn other languages, french is good because it uses lots of tongue movements and sounds.

I can pronounce just about anything in Chinese (Mandarin), some better than others. In general, I don't even have an accent when I say it. The girls said the worst my "accent" (quotation because I don't really have one) ever goes is basically a Cantonese person speaking Mandarin. That's really freaking good.

Anyways, my mother tongue is french. The sounds of the Chinese language is so similar to French that it's easy for me to say the words. In fact, I got the Chinese girls to say some things in French, using written Chinese-PinYin (just play around with the letters), and they can say french words better than any Enligsh person I heard. Most English people here take french for like 5-6 years (mandatory) and they all still suck ass in the end compared to the first time a Chinese person attempts.

 

[JasonRox]

He also uses a lot of visual aids and repetition and this forces you to start thinking in that language rather than translating in your head which is frankly useless.

So true.

 

[wolram]

I was quite amazed at how many remember school days French from may be 30yrs ago, okay
they may remember some of it wrongly but they seem to retain the gist of the lingo.
I would need technical French more than anything, i have all ready come across drawings with terms in French that do not translate to English .
How would i find French terms for pneumatic cylinder, servo motor, double acting valve?

 

[lisab]

I didn't have good luck finding a dictionary online, but I did come across this:

http://www.goursau.com/accueil.php?lang=en&titre=Technique

If you have to buy it for your work, your company should reimburse you for it.

 

[wolram]

I didn't have good luck finding a dictionary online, but I did come across this:

http://www.goursau.com/accueil.php?lang=en&titre=Technique

If you have to buy it for your work, your company should reimburse you for it.

You are a star lisab and that book could be worth hundreds of hours head scratching, big thanks.