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iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2019 1:52 am
by iwanttolearn
Learning French, trying to get to A2 whilst also trying to get to B1 in Spanish

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2019 4:22 am
by Cèid Donn
Welcome to the forum. ¡Te deseo mucho éxito! :) Your profile is really cute, too.

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Tue Feb 19, 2019 6:24 pm
by iwanttolearn
Thank you :)

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Tue Feb 19, 2019 6:47 pm
by Skynet
Welcome to the forum!

What is your strategy? Do you wish to sit the DELF and DELE at the A2 and B1 levels respectively?

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Wed Feb 20, 2019 4:23 pm
by iwanttolearn
Thank you.

I don't know about taking DELF, I'm on the fence about it since I'm learning French for a job. I definitley want to take the DELE for B1, I took it last year for A1 and it went ok. My big issue is conversation, I don't have anyone to really practice with. I'm trying to figure that out.

Right now, for French I'm juggling The Great Courses, Duolingo and Paul Noble. (about 2hrs a day) As soon as I finish Noble, I might go into Pimsleur. Spanish, I'm just practicing on Duolingo and using the stories function on the website (about 30min a day), I don't have as much time to dedicate to it now that I'm actively working on French.

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:24 pm
by iwanttolearn
I had an event to plan and things got away from me but I'm back at it again, thank goodness for Duolingo because it at least helps me get daily practice in.

I was able to get my hands on seasons 1 of Les Revenants and Un Gars, Une Fille. Hopefuly, that'll help.

This week I'm going to try and get 3 lessons from The Great Courses in, that is watching the video, practicing with the audio and doing the grammar excercises.

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Mon Mar 11, 2019 11:04 pm
by iwanttolearn
:lol: i wasn't able to get all 3 lessons of The Great Courses in but I was able to do 2, so yay. Lesson 4 of The Great Courses was difficult, it's like the level of difficulty jumped quite a bit, but I'm up to the challenge.

I'm still struggling with "Il/Elle" est vs "C'est", like I keep messing up.

I figured if I match Duolingo to The Great Courses, it'll help reinforce the lessons I'm learning even though they are two completely different learning methods. Paul Noble is a bit of a pain because I can't sit still doing nothng and when I listen to it while doing things I make mistakes while doing said activities!

Anyway, until I finish The Great Courses, I'm only going to use it , Duo and Paul Noble.

This weekend I had a surprising amount of free time, so I kinda watched (more like skimmed but hey) Les Revenants but was put off by the way the serial killer is handled; then I re-watched (does it count as watching if you spend half the time rolling your eyes?) La Mante which is NOT a good show and I watched (skimmed) all three seasons of Dix Pour Cent. Out of all the three, I think Dix Pour Cent will help me learn French because I can actually watch it over and over again.

Spanish, my poor neglected Spanish- I'm just keeping current with Duolingo, it's looking like I might not get to B1 this year, sigh.

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Mon Mar 11, 2019 11:32 pm
by Cèid Donn
iwanttolearn wrote:I'm still struggling with "Il/Elle" est vs "C'est", like I keep messing up.


C'est normal ! :D

This is something that a lot of native English speakers struggle with--I have and even though I know the rules, I still question and double my choices in some cases because despite knowing the rules, sometimes my intuition likes to think something that's correct isn't and I can get myself confused. :lol: But one thing that will help is to memorize simple, short phrases that fit the different rules and recite them whenever you need to decide between the two. Elle est géniele; c'est une femme géniele; c'est géniel d'être une femme géniele; etc.

This weekend I had a surprising amount of free time, so I kinda watched (more like skimmed but hey) Les Revenants but was put off by the way the serial killer is handled;


I got annoyed with Les Revenants as well. In fact I was annoyed 15 minutes into the first episode. I keep saying I'll finish it from my French Super Challenge, but I just go and find other things to watch. If you didn't like La Mante, don't bother with Glacé (The Frozen Dead), as it's very much in the same vein. If you find Dix pour cent watchable, you might look at Au service de la France as well.

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2019 12:53 am
by iwanttolearn
This is something that a lot of native English speakers struggle with--I have and even though I know the rules, I still question and double my choices in some cases because despite knowing the rules, sometimes my intuition likes to think something that's correct isn't and I can get myself confused. :lol: But one thing that will help is to memorize simple, short phrases that fit the different rules and recite them whenever you need to decide between the two. Elle est géniele; c'est une femme géniele; c'est géniel d'être une femme géniele; etc.


Thanks, I also know the rules but it isn't intuitive yet, hopefully I'll get there.

Au Service de la France is a good mental excercise for learning french, it's not really my cup of tea though. Thanks for the reccomendation :)

Re: iwanttolearn's French and Spanish log(s)

Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2019 1:15 am
by iwanttolearn
This week was better than last week, I managed to get in 4 lessons from The Great Courses, I think my French is getting a teensy weensy bit better but The Great Courses course is challenging for sure. I only managed to listen to one Paul Noble lesson this week, need to work on that. I acquired a book on verbs, French Verb Drills by Roussy and I found my college textbook from 14 years ago :? , I'm going to use that to reinforce what I learn. Spanish verbs took me forever, I'm trying not to make the same mistakes with French. Duolingo stories are a good way for me to practice.

I watched a bit of Au Service de la France, it was what it was.

I've only just started on the Imperative forms and so far, French seems to be easier than Spanish, so yay! Speaking of which, like I know how to tell if a word is masculine or feminine in Spanish, no bloody clue how to in French...am I missing something?

Finally I made a schedule for studying French, hopefully I'll stick to it.
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Per usual, I'm only practicing Spansh on Duolingo :( , however I think it's helping a bit French, so all hope isn't lost.