Online courses from an online or traditional university?

I took French in HS, and I brushed up with "French for Dummies" before my friend and I went to France. That helped, but I already had some knowledge. Still, it was a bit challenging because I was used to Canada where many signs, etc. were bilingual.

Really, the best thing would be total immersion with a trip to France. :)

I wish I could have some total immersion!!!

Thanks for the suggestions! My minor was in Spanish. I studied in Chile and that helped a great deal. I grew up in San Antonio so my ear is very used to the sounds and accents of Spanish. French is so foreign to me. I can't make most of the sounds the French language requires. It will be a challenge!!

If you have an iPhone, iPad, or an Android device, you could try the Duolingo app. It's free, and it was recommended on an educational website I was looking at a month or two ago.

I was using it last month on an iPad to work on my semi-forgotten French from when I was in school, and I felt pretty good about my progress. (Things got busy and I haven't used it lately, but I expect to go back to it once life calms down again.)

They use a game approach for the lessons that's reasonably fun and rewarding, and you can do the lessons in little 5-10-minute chunks of time. I think my biggest frustration was when I had to translate something that was spoken aloud-- sometimes the French plurals and singulars sound identical to me, and it bugged me to be dinged for writing the singular when the speaker was saying the plural. There were also a couple of times when a word would come up as something to translate when I hadn't learned it yet, or when an apostrophe was misused in an English word. Still-- for a free app, I felt that those problems were forgivable. And overall, the app itself was very good and I felt like I was learning things I'd either never known or had somewhat forgotten. It would probably give you a good start on the basics, at least.

app for you iphone ! You won't believe how great it is. You speak the English into it and it says the language you want back to you...or to the person you are speaking to ! Voila you are fluent. It is amazing. Give it a try and see what you think. Start with easy phrases and repeat them and when you meet the "folks" just say into it what you would like to say to them and then hold it up to them and let it do its thing...you can smile and they will know that you are trying and you will be as you will pick it up in no time. c

Does your soon to be husband speak French, if so let him teach you. I married a man from Italy and his parents spoke no English so I was determined to speak Italian. I would write down a sentence or two and have my husband say them in Italian and I would write it phonetically, memorize them and then memorize lists of words. He would speak to me and I would struggle to understand but it sunk in bit by bit and now I can understand completely and speak well enough to converse. I come from a Celtic background so we call ourselves garlic and gaelic lol. The parents are gone now and I miss the lovely sound of Italian. I took 3 years of French and did well in school but now I remember very little. Immerse yourself with them and ask what they are saying. You'll catch on and, if not, I know several people who love the Rosetta system. Two of them bought the system on Ebay as once you learn you don't need it anymore. Good luck.

I took a French class last year that used the Living Language program. It comes with three books and matching CDS to listen to in your car or whenever you like. I think it's a great program -- much better than others I have tried in the past. Good luck!

I took French in high school and recently a class in adult school night. Sometimes I practice by reading here.

PS -- soon rot be in-laws? LOL

Here is a link that might be useful: Le Jardinage en France

I just remembered we also used languageguide.org in the class I took -- it's a pretty helpful website. Offers many different languages.

I haven't taken French since HS, tho my tourist french is pretty serviceable.

I looked at this thread about an hour ago, went right to duolingo and just got back! It was fun!

thanks for the tip

And good luck, AT Killery

Get language tapes like pimsler (check your local library) to listen to when you're doing other things...like painting a room or driving or other boring activities. Of course some of the stuff they teach is stupid, but it's about training your ear to hear the language. Also, find a french foreign film to watch with closed captioning in french....that way you can see the words as they are being spoken in real french...not the more stilted language tape french.

I'm learning Spanish using Duolingo, a free online course, and loving it (my DIL is Spanish and DS is also doing the course). It is SO much fun! Way better than any other course I've tried in the past (I now understand addictions to online games!). If I ever finish I want to do the French course (had one year in h.s. and loved it). I may even do them concurrently. I'm now looking for ways to supplement the course and found "Destinos" (http://learner.org/series/destinos/watch/index.html?ep1) but not sure there's French version. Give Duolingo a try!

Edited to add that I tried one of those translating apps w/my DIL and she had no idea what I was saying so I gave up on it. Don't know if that was a fair assessment though.

This post was edited by funnygirl on Mon, Nov 4, 13 at 10:34

What great advice! Sorry for my typo! haha

I seriously know zero french. I will def try the app and the link. Good idea about the movie. I will have to first learn a little to even to begin to watch a movie that does not have subtitles in English!

I am interested in Rosetta Stone. It is so pricey! Good idea about Ebay.

Unfortunately, my soon to be DH probably does not have the patience for teaching me. It would take a world of patience to teach me! ;)

After we had a French exchange student and traveled to visit her family in Grenoble a few times, my husband decided to learn French (he already spoke Italian). He downloaded free French lessons and listened to those on his commute. He supplemented these with workbooks. He now downloads a French news broadcast every day and listens to that. When he first started, he bought some children's books (in French) and read those until he graduated to adult fiction. He has an atrocious accent, but his comprehension and writing are excellent. Last week he had a teleconference with an economic institute in Paris that was conducted in French--and he managed quite well. He did not want Rosetta Stone because that demanded sitting in front of the computer, which he didn't have time for. Good luck to you!

Ak- first enroll in an adult enrichment or community college program. Secondly join a Francophile meet up group or French language group. These groups often meet for wine happy hour or enjoy a French dinner every few weeks etc. it's essential to begin practicing your language outside of a Rosetta Stone or classroom instruction. I mastered my German by spending Wednesday and Thursdays at different German beer gardens with some other German students. You don't need to get silly drunk but studies show practicing new language skills while drinking in a social setting helps a student improve. students inhibitions are slightly lowered and they stop overthinking pronunciations etc. It helped me tremendously just being atound german. it was about a month before i began participating in the conversations. i would often have to ask someone to repeat themselves while i looked up words or asked for clarification. By the end of german 101 i was speaking at the 202 level. I even took college finance and poli sci courses at the university of heidelberg 1.5 years later. The courses were in german! So I'm a big proponent of the local foreign language clubs. Finally, this will sound absurd, but watch french children's programming online. It helped me tremendously before I spent my junior high school year in Nice.

Oh! Sorry for being rude. I just remembered you said the wedding is a few weeks-- good luck!

The language program developed by the Foreign Service is online for free in a few places. I'd try that, if you can find all the text online too. The lessons are very short. But since you know you cannot learn another language In a few months, I would concentrate on developing a very short vocab--- please, thank you, I don't understand, we are happy you're here, breakfast, lunch, dinner, ,etc. Put each word on a 3x5 card with the word printed in french on one side and English on the other. Underneath the French word put the pronunciation in a phonetic spelling you understand (it doesn't have to be IPA). They will appreciate your effort, and in a pinch you can show them the card. You can use a hole punch at one end of the card and get a ring like the ones in loose leaf notebooks to keep them together. And you can add more cards as you need them. The card system worked pretty well for us. We used them when we lived in New York and sponsored a series of young women from South America for their green cards (with other families in our building we put together a full time job cleaning and child minding). They lived in a convent and had English classes there as well.

How exciting! Tell us about the wedding.

Sounds like a lot of good advice on learning the language. My advice is to take your time and enjoy.

Wow, Duolingo is so much fun. I love that you can record your voice to hear your accent. Je suis une femme.

I didn't know about that feature, Ded! I use my ipad for most things; maybe need to break out the laptop to fully explore the site?

Congratulations Amy! How exciting.
I think I might look into using that app just for the fun of it.

Thanks everyone! I do not need to learn it in a few weeks I just want to be able to speak and understand someday! I have hung out with his fam on many trips and they do speak enough English so I manage.

As for the wedding, we are headed to the Courthouse. Nothing big in terms of a wedding. We both have been married before. We just want simplicity. After we are going downtown (I live in the country in between San Antonio and Austin) to the riverwalk and staying in a nice hotel and having friends and family get together for a fun dinner. We will be eating at a place called Boudro's and my new last name will be Boudreau! Kind of funny!

I was playing with duo lingo last night...great fun!

Thanks so much for the Duolingo tip!!! I have been on it for a couple of hours today! It is a great little program!!!

I wanted to come back and say thank you for the Duolingo tip, too. I love it.

Sovra,

Thank you for Duolingo! My son and daughter started studying French at home last summer. My son was studying just because he likes languages, my daughter was studying because she was switching from Spanish and would have started a year behind.

Anyway, it was fun for practice my high school French with them and I was surprised how much I recalled ( I have used when travelling, too).

All three of us have been on it for a few weeks now and we are all addicted. I love the fact that I can do it on my laptop, ipad, or phone. Thank you!

Yay, and you're welcome! I saw that I was just the first of many to recommend it. I'm hoping to get back to it soon, because I thought it was fun, too. :)