“Oh misery. Maybe I’ll just switch to gardening before Felix makes me feel all shitty inside.” (Oh no you don’t!)
1. “I suck at French.”
Everybody thinks that. Not that you suck at French; I mean all learners think that they themselves suck at French. Take comfort knowing that you’re normal in your suckiness.
Then snap out of it and realise that it’s nonsense! You’ve made a lot of progress since you first began. Remember, there was a time when you couldn’t even count to ten in French.
2. “I’m switching to Dutch. Or gardening.”
Don’t do it. I mean, you can take up Dutch and gardening, but don’t drop French to do it. Even when the going gets tough, stay the course. Don’t get all wishy-washy, switching from French to Dutch to table tennis and back to French for another quick one.
There’s nothing mysterious about learning a language. Be consistent over a long period of time and you’ll get there.
3. “Who do francophones think they are with those silent x’s anyway?”
Fair enough. The letter x is way too cool to be so silent! But don’t let the intricacies of French get you down. You’ll get through the obstacles if you keep at it. With French, good things come to those who are patient.
Photo credit: Geo Martinez
Wow, reading those examples, it is as if you were talking directly to me. Ok, Ok, I’ll get back to learning French.
J’suis avec Nicolaas … je sent comme que t’as écrit cela pour moi! (surtout #1). Je vais rester dans la course!
I’ll say this much. I’ve gotten frustrated many a time since I started 9 months ago. Sometimes it feels like I am making no progress, especially when attempting to speak because I get so self-conscious if I’m pronouncing things correctly and longer paragraphs pose a problem for me because I have to be on the ball 100% of the time in making sure I am making sense.
On the other hand, waking up one day and realising that you can read an article off Lapresse.com without once having to stop to wonder what you are reading, or being able to passively comprehend a sudden temporary shift to French in a favorite Tv show of yours despite not really paying attention, and I suddenly feel like all of that work I put into it every single day is actually propelling me forward.
All of my shortcomings with regards to the language are opportunities to improve and if something poses a challenge to me, then I am happy because it means I have found a new area to improve in. Two things that result in the most progress are speaking for longer periods of time every once in a while (2 hours once a week since not currently living amongst any francophones) and passively or actively listening to French throughout my day.
My problem is not being able to fluently form sentences as I’d like. It feels really slow when I speak because I have to think on the spot, but I can spot on understand the majority of French I hear (minus the slang and expressions I haven’t yet learned). I have a friend who has been learning for a few years longer and experiences the complete opposite problem. He can easily speak and use French really well in any conversation but often has trouble understanding when a native speaks to him or comprehending what he hears on the radio.
I think that listening is a much more challenging skill to acquire, so it sounds like all you need now is to activate through conversation all the French you’ve assimilated.
Yes! That’s my hang-up. I can listen and understand under certain circumstances — like Habs games on RDS. But even that is only about 80% most of the time.
80% is excellent. If you have trouble understanding other kinds of French conversation, don’t avoid them. Start listening to them even if you understand little right now.