Re: PM’s French Re-entry into the Matrix - Phase 1: 500 Hours Extensive Reading

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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby PeterMollenburg » Sat Aug 07, 2021 12:21 am

jeffers wrote:I thought about writing something at your last update, because you wrote something about eating better and sleeping less and it seemed that you were surprised it didn't work out.


Hey Jeffers,
No, not that surprised. Frustrated, more so. However, I'm past that now.

jeffers wrote:We often think of sleep as an annoyance that gets in the way but it is one of the most fundamental of human needs for staying alive, as well as being one of the things you need for learning. If you rank our basic needs according to how long you can live without them, the first three would be: air, then water, then sleep. You can't rob Peter to pay Paul. Eating better will probably help you sleep better, but it's not going to make a difference of hours in your sleep requirements.


I completely agree. It's essential. Where I don't agree is on the amount of sleep. I have found that if I follow a diet with cleaner foods, I am not tired and even wake earlier. There is a difference, but it's not as big as I'd like it to be - that is the amount of sleep required if eating a diet with some processed foods and refined sugars compared to a diet free of additives and processed foods. Of course, much of this is subjective and what works for one doesn't work for another. The problem was that while I was eating better and therefore not needing quite as much sleep, I was cutting into my sleep even further. Basically, I might need 8 hours if following a standard diet, 7 to 7.5 hours if eating super clean. I was sleeping between 6 and 7.5... eventually it catches up with you. The key is to listen to your body and not ignore, as you have rightly pointed out, something so essential to survival and optimal function. Additionally, transitioning to such a diet can in fact require the body to have more rest, at least, so it has been said once or twice (I might have been one of those people, but it was before I was a person, when I was a turtle).



jeffers wrote:Sleep is one of those things that is barely understood and yet loads of people talk like experts. So I was skeptical when the top of my Kwiziq dashboad said something like: get plenty of sleep because sleep is when your brain lays down memory (or something). However, I found an article from Harvard Medical School which says:
Sleep, learning, and memory are complex phenomena that are not entirely understood. However, animal and human studies suggest that the quantity and quality of sleep have a profound impact on learning and memory. Research suggests that sleep helps learning and memory in two distinct ways. First, a sleep-deprived person cannot focus attention optimally and therefore cannot learn efficiently. Second, sleep itself has a role in the consolidation of memory, which is essential for learning new information.

https://healthysleep.med.harvard.edu/healthy/matters/benefits-of-sleep/learning-memory
One of the key points in the article is that a good night sleep doesn't only help us focus better on our learning (which I think most of us know), but is also essential for memory consolidation.


Thanks for sharing. This is a good reminder.

jeffers wrote:In addition, I wonder if you should keep your focus on the small goals for the time being.


Sounds reasonable.

jeffers wrote:Your post of 11 June shows a clear plan of what to study but also vaguely mentions "C-level exams" and then your most recent post unambiguously mentions C2. It seems to me at some point in June the spectre of C2, the realization that C2 is a monumental undertaking, got to you and you decided to go from reasonably fanatical study (over two hours per day in June), which you could just about manage, to the unfeasible.


I think you're taking a little too much creative liberty here, Jeffers. I appreciate your assessment and desire to help, and you have some good suggestions, but not all is what you think. I'm very keen to study like crazy, to pursue C2, however as iguanamon has often pointed out, life happens. As I said in an earlier post, there are outside elements here that I don't wish to discuss that are influencing my progress. To some extent I let them be problems, but on the other hand some things need to be dealt with otherwise luxuries like learning languages suddenly disappear if I don't focus on things that matter, that ensure I have an income, a roof over my head etc. I'd prefer some of my personal life remain out of my log. That's not to say something drastic is going on and I'm about to lose everything or go through a divorce. No, that's not the case, but the challenges of reaching C2 within the language learning sphere itself (materials, motivation, chosen focus) is not the main issue here, as I have those ingredients, but things are going on around me that are influencing the ability to sit down and study with C2 as the target and to stay the course.


jeffers wrote:It shouldn't be a surprise that it didn't go as well as you had hoped. Remember when you had a list of courses and you could strike them through as you finished them? Perhaps you would enjoy making a list of the current resources you are working on so that you could cross them off one by one. (Maybe you already have, I only recently got back into the forum).


From my recent experience, my materials, routine and method of approach are great. I'm happy with it. The problem is, I am struggling to find the time, due to outside pressures. Hence why I attempted to drop some sleep. That didn't go so well, as we know. For the moment I need to go into maintenance mode while I deal with some other things for a while. It is my desire to pass C2 some day, and to go on a full very lengthy mission to achieve that. For the moment I have to bide my time until I can potentially see an opportunity to attack this once again.

jeffers wrote:Regarding your pattern of "Mission, quit mission, mission, quit mission..." etc, that's actually pretty reasonable and normal.


Agreed. I think it's useful to be humble and this was my attempt at being humble with a bit of humour. I wasn't beating myself up altogether.

jeffers wrote:I can't remember who it was, but someone on these forums (leosmith I believe) described language learning like a bow wave on a boat. As a boat goes faster a bow wave can build up in front which slows the boat down, so the boat needs to slow down to allow the wave to reduce to allow the boat to proceed. In terms of boating, it's a bit rubbish (instead of slowing down you build a boat with a better bow). But in terms of learning the idea is that you study hard for a period and then take a break. This would be quite a shift in your methodology, but maybe you would benefit from alternate weeks in your study plan: a study week and a native content week. So, for all of your sit-down study time for one week you focus on grammar and vocuabulary (your coursebooks), as well as your creative writing. This is about the "formal study time", so you could use native materials when you are listening on your commute or reading to your children. On the alternate week you would spend your study time reading Bien Dire and watching Buffy (ugh). One result is that the time wouldn't seem so short. In addition, theoretically the week off grammar and vocab would give your brain time to bed down what you learned the week before. Finally, I think at the end of each week you would be looking forward to the next week's activities. It's just a suggestion, and not one that I'm following for my study, but it seems to me it could be a suitable fit for the way you work given the pattern you describe. Basically, turn what you may have previously considered a weakness into a virtue.


There are some good suggestions here for reflection. Thank you, Jeffers. Still, I think I have some pretty good strategies now and a good mix of content in diverse settings. I do use native children's books with my kids. I do listen to native podcasts on commutes. My contact with French is more adaptable to various settings than it ever has been. I've had no choice. I've had less time and just as much drive to want to succeed, so I've had to get creative. However, even doing all that there have still been more constraints. From here on I will do what I can day in day out and consider when my next mission shall begin. If that never arrives, then I'll chip away and maybe some day pass C2, eventually. Thanks again, Jeffers.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby PeterMollenburg » Sun Aug 08, 2021 3:21 am

A few musings... just because I can...

Australian language data

Us Australians are to take part in the national census in the coming days. While I don't appreciate gathering of personal data, I certainly see some positive aspects of this. One of course is around languages.

In 2016 the most widely spoken language in Australia at home (all these statistics are for languages spoken at home) after English was Mandarin. In 2001 there were (I'll round up/down to nearest thousand) 139,000 Mandarin speakers. Ten years later in 2011 there were 336,000 and for the first time it became the number one language after English for overall number of speakers in the country. In 2016 Mandarin climbed to 596,000 - over half a million, or 2.5% of the Australian population. Pretty significant. This is a good enough reason to learn some Mandarin. Will I? Who knows, but it's definitely not in my top five currently. Asian languages haven't interested me that much in my life, and truth be told, almost not at all. However lately I think I've become a little more open to the idea.

My kids have been watching some Japanese films (not in Japanese), and I've always steered away from Asian cinema. It's never interested me. These films were very creative and they certainly impressed me. My eldest asked for Japanese subtitles to look at the writing and then filled a couple of pages copying the characters. Interesting... If the interest continues I could find myself exploring a little Japanese at some point with the kids. Japanese didn't make the top 10 with 56,000 speakers.

From 2016:
Italian (1.2% of Australian population = 271,000 dropped from 375,000 in 1996),
Greek (1.0% = 237,000 dropped from 269,000 in 1996) and
Spanish (0.6% = 140,000 rose from 117,000 in 2011 - couldn't find older data.. edit: up from 94,000 in 1996)
These are the top European languages at fifth, sixth, and ninth places respectively.

Were I to choose (an)other European language(s) to learn, it would be wise to pick from these three above. Especially given how the world has changed under Covid. Spanish perhaps would be the wisest choice, given it is actually on my top 5 list for several reasons and is rising in numbers. This might however depend on how quick I were to choose another language (Italian next year might be okay but in ten years might be a little bit of a lost cause were I basing it on the above numbers and associated patterns). Again it will be interesting to see the numbers from 2021 once they're in and published.

I have some Dutch background. The Dutch speakers are also declining rapidly in numbers, since with the older European immigrants their languages are disappearing as they pass away as many (the Dutch are particularly known for this) don't carry on the language with their children. Other European languages are going the same way.

Some more numbers from 2016:
Arabic: 322,000 (2nd after Mandarin, also increasing significantly)
Cantonese: 281,000 (3rd, increasing)
Vietnamese: 277,000 (4th, increasing noticeably)

Korean: 108,000
German: 79,000 (decreasing slowly)
French: 70,000 (increase of 13,000 in 5 years, yay! - not so bad afterall, where are you all?!) (41,000 in 1996)
Macedonian: 66,000
Croatian: 57,000
Serbian: 54,000
Russian: 50,000
Portuguese: 49,000 (25,000 in 1996)
Polish: 48,000
Afrikaans: 44,000
Dutch: 33,000 (noticeably decreasing) (42,000 in 1996)
Norwegian: 2,906 (slightly increasing) (1331 in 1996)

Sources:
Australia Language spoken at home
Ethnolink
ABC News
Australian Bureau of Statistics


Learn Japanese? Nah

Learn Mandarin? Nah

Learn Arabic? Maybe

Learn Vietnamese? Maybe

Spanish? Yes!

Italian or Greek? Hmmmm

Continue with serious French? Yes

Continue with Dutch? Yes (but serious study mode to be delayed for some time)

Norwegian? Yes (but serious study mode to be delayed for some time)

European languages are generally on the decline in Australia. Asian languages and Arabic are rising rapidly.

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Plans (some more musings, nothing serious)

Perhaps I could study only intensive content (courses, language mags) until May 2022, and then I could go native all the way and win the next SC, get a solid gold trophy and an Olympic gold medal... wait? How do I get the Olympic gold medal?

I need to learn how to do life and get my language study done too - Yes, I find stolen moments rather well, but I need to get out in my kayak and jump on the bike. No good being an unhealthy moron with a brain only good for languages. I need to become a Ninja of life (Japanese? Nah).

Throw a cat in your kayak, move to Quebec, release the cat (after you've taught it French), accuse everyone in Quebec of not speaking French correctly, get kicked out of Quebec, move to Ontario, tell everyone there they're not speaking French correctly, like they do in Quebec, get welcomed back to Quebec, eat a chocolate mud cake. See what I mean?

In sifting through some of my resources, I'm tempted to learn the French regional languages - Breton, Basque, Corsican, Alsatian, Occitan etc. That's as far as it goes.

With all these languages I need to get on with my task at hand - French C2 (someday - better sooner than later).
Okay, my numbers for August are looking a bit sad, time to go on another mission - a mission that allows time for everything else.

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Edited once to add some more statistics above that hadn't found earlier
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby DaveAgain » Sun Aug 08, 2021 10:33 am

ABC have an interesting article showing which languages are taught in the school systems of the different federal states: Which languages should Australian children be learning to get ahead?

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Re: Japanese TV/Culture, there were two Japanese series that were quite popular in the UK (dubbed into English), both based on Chinese books: The Water Margin and Monkey.

European languages are generally on the decline in Australia. Asian languages and Arabic are rising rapidly.

That's only true until it isn't. If there are political/economic problems in Europe, they'll be another wave of european immigrants arriving in Australia. Most likely joining existing family/community populations.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby Cavesa » Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:19 pm

PeterMollenburg wrote:A few musings... just because I can...


Cool data, thanks!

If you want to go after a minority language in your region, it makes perfect sense in healthcare. But yes, take into account the things like "the Dutch don't carry the langauge to the younger generations" or "this minority tends to be more bilingual than that one". And btw, perhaps a sign language would make sense too, have those been included in the census? How many homes are English and Sign Language bilingual?

However, I'm still waiting for you to join the French C2 club!!! I'm cheering like crazy, waving the "PM is the best" banner just behind the finish line, my imaginary banner holding arms are hurting like hell already! Have some pity and pass the C2 already! :-D :-D :-D I'm pretty sure you're much closer to it than you think!

DaveAgain wrote:ABC have an interesting article showing which languages are taught in the school systems of the different federal states: Which languages should Australian children be learning to get ahead?

-----------
Re: Japanese TV/Culture, there were two Japanese series that were quite popular in the UK (dubbed into English), both based on Chinese books: The Water Margin and Monkey.

European languages are generally on the decline in Australia. Asian languages and Arabic are rising rapidly.

That's only true until it isn't. If there are political/economic problems in Europe, they'll be another wave of european immigrants arriving in Australia. Most likely joining existing family/community populations.


Hmm, perhaps a better question might be "what language should they be learning to keep up?" Especially if some of the minorities on the rise are not linguistically meek and assimilating (like the european ones), but rather intend to fully profit from bilingualism.

Not sure what sources you're basing your assessment of Europe on, but this is not likely to happen. Europe may be portrayed in various colours in various kinds of media, but it stays one of the best regions to live in, and there are no huge reasons for mass emigration outside of it (but there are tons of reasons for inner migration of course). On the other end of this equation is Australia, with very strict immigration rules. I know, because I've checked. Even I wouldn't qualify now (and I have an MD degree, solid language skills etc), I would qualify only in five or more years after the medical residency, but I won't have any reason to migrate by then. The conditions are similarly strict in other fields too.

The only europeans Australia wants are those, who don't have anything to gain by moving to another continent.

They are so desirable that they can get anything they want at home or in another country within the EU. So no, no new important waves of Dutch, Italian, Czech, or Hungarian natives are likely to arrive. There will be a few individuals, who want Australia above any other country for some reason (such as a genuine love of the australian culture, or a burning desire to be as far from home as possible, which are both totally valid reasons but not massively prevalent in the population), there will be the typical study/work/travel youth coming for a year or two, and that's it.

So, looking at the non european languages makes sense for so many reasons imho!
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby DaveAgain » Mon Aug 09, 2021 3:00 pm

Cavesa wrote:Not sure what sources you're basing your assessment of Europe on, but this is not likely to happen.
Europe has had political and economic crises in the past, and will have them in the future too. It's just the dates that are unknown.

EDIT
However, as French and Spanish are world rather than regional languages, their possible sources of migrants stretch far beyond Europe.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby Le Baron » Mon Aug 09, 2021 4:08 pm

The growth of Chinese alone (all varieties) outstrips any other non-English language in Australia. There is only one European language with any foothold and that's Italian. But overwhelmingly people speak English. Any immigrants going to Oz will be learning and using English for the most part.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby Cavesa » Mon Aug 09, 2021 8:30 pm

DaveAgain wrote:
Cavesa wrote:Not sure what sources you're basing your assessment of Europe on, but this is not likely to happen.
Europe has had political and economic crises in the past, and will have them in the future too. It's just the dates that are unknown.

EDIT
However, as French and Spanish are world rather than regional languages, their possible sources of migrants stretch far beyond Europe.


What I meant was not any doubt of a crisis being possible. I totally agree with you.

But rather my doubts of a crisis that would lead Europeans to massively migrate to Australia. There would need to be a really huge crisis to drive that many people to such an extremely difficult solution, Australia is not a country calling for 99,9% of Europeans. And I doubt such a crisis, that would hit whole Europe, wouldn't hit the rest of the world too anyways.

And the europeans are far too eager to just ditch everything for English, I agree with Le Baron. I have my doubts even about the Italians in this area. Some other minorities will be probably more bilingual.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby PeterMollenburg » Wed Aug 11, 2021 4:50 am

DaveAgain wrote:ABC have an interesting article showing which languages are taught in the school systems of the different federal states: Which languages should Australian children be learning to get ahead?


Interesting. Yes, it seems that the school systems lag when it comes to responding to changing demographics in terms of languages spoken at home in Australia, and lag with regards to trade languages too. Still, while I hated French at high school, I'm glad to see it's still going strong, relevant or not, but that's entirely biased and likely to have negative impacts - forcing a language on children that can't see the logical reason for learning it is not a great approach.

New Caledonia is one of our closest neighbours, one could even go as far as saying that Australia shares a border with France, albeit an overseas territory. Well, who cares about that, it's at least a French speaking location, but GDP, trade and tourism levels between Australia and NC are not high enough to justify French being taught in our schools on widescale. Despite French being a long way from relevant for most people within Australia, it remains relevant internationally.

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DaveAgain wrote:Re: Japanese TV/Culture, there were two Japanese series that were quite popular in the UK (dubbed into English), both based on Chinese books: The Water Margin and Monkey.


Ah!!! Monkey! (aka 'Monkey Magic'). Yes, this was popular indeed when I was a kid here in Australia. I saw segments of it here and there, but had little continuity to grasp the overall attraction and themes. Basically I knew of it, but didn't watch it. Still, I remember it. The other series I've not heard of. The Japanese films we are going for nowadays are on Netflix are very handy (as for many other films/series) given we can watch them in several languages.

DaveAgain wrote:
PeterMollenburg wrote:European languages are generally on the decline in Australia. Asian languages and Arabic are rising rapidly.

That's only true until it isn't. If there are political/economic problems in Europe, they'll be another wave of european immigrants arriving in Australia. Most likely joining existing family/community populations.


Yes, agreed. In fact this was happening on a smaller scale with the Greek community ~15 years back at a guess when their country was facing extensive economic hardship (mind you, it still is).

From your Wikipedia linked article on "Monkey":
The Water Margin wrote:The Water Margin is known for its sometimes obscure, but memorable philosophical quotes, such as "Do not despise the snake for having no horns, for who is to say it will not become a dragon?"


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Cavesa wrote:
PeterMollenburg wrote:A few musings... just because I can...


Cool data, thanks!


You're welcome. The first link I provided even allows you to see the data on regions, towns etc. Pretty handy stuff. I used it when we were looking to move to get an idea of the linguistic landscape. It was unfortunately a little disappointing, however.

Cavesa wrote:If you want to go after a minority language in your region, it makes perfect sense in healthcare. But yes, take into account the things like "the Dutch don't carry the langauge to the younger generations" or "this minority tends to be more bilingual than that one". And btw, perhaps a sign language would make sense too, have those been included in the census? How many homes are English and Sign Language bilingual?


Your logic is impeccable. However, I definitely won't do the logical thing. I'll continue to study languages that intrigue me and that capture my imagination and interest more than others, and these are more than likely going to continue to be Western European languages - some global, some minority languages in Europe. We'll see. Thus, me and a useful language in healthcare is not likely to happen unless we move someday to Europe and that is looking less and less likely the more time passes.

I know this might potentially sound bad, but I'm just absolutely not interested in sign languages.

Cavesa wrote:On the other end of this equation is Australia, with very strict immigration rules. I know, because I've checked. Even I wouldn't qualify now (and I have an MD degree, solid language skills etc), I would qualify only in five or more years after the medical residency, but I won't have any reason to migrate by then. The conditions are similarly strict in other fields too.


I knew it was tough, but didn't think it was quite that tough.

Cavesa wrote:The only europeans Australia wants are those, who don't have anything to gain by moving to another continent.

They are so desirable that they can get anything they want at home or in another country within the EU. So no, no new important waves of Dutch, Italian, Czech, or Hungarian natives are likely to arrive. There will be a few individuals, who want Australia above any other country for some reason (such as a genuine love of the australian culture, or a burning desire to be as far from home as possible, which are both totally valid reasons but not massively prevalent in the population), there will be the typical study/work/travel youth coming for a year or two, and that's it.

So, looking at the non european languages makes sense for so many reasons imho!


Yes indeed. Asian languages and Arabic make sense. Arabic is a chance for me, but not if I take 20 years to learn a handful of European languages, and that's not exaggerating. Still, that's just me, I guess.

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Le Baron wrote:The growth of Chinese alone (all varieties) outstrips any other non-English language in Australia. There is only one European language with any foothold and that's Italian. But overwhelmingly people speak English. Any immigrants going to Oz will be learning and using English for the most part.


Yep. Too bad, I'm not that interested in Mandarin nor Cantonese. I'm very curious to where the European languages stand with this census we are completing. Fingers crossed French is still on the rise, and Spanish too. Maybe there's been a wave of half a million Dutch speakers and I hadn't noticed? :lol:

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DaveAgain wrote:
Cavesa wrote:Not sure what sources you're basing your assessment of Europe on, but this is not likely to happen.
Europe has had political and economic crises in the past, and will have them in the future too. It's just the dates that are unknown.

EDIT
However, as French and Spanish are world rather than regional languages, their possible sources of migrants stretch far beyond Europe.


Very valid points.

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Cavesa wrote:
DaveAgain wrote:
Cavesa wrote:Not sure what sources you're basing your assessment of Europe on, but this is not likely to happen.
Europe has had political and economic crises in the past, and will have them in the future too. It's just the dates that are unknown.

EDIT
However, as French and Spanish are world rather than regional languages, their possible sources of migrants stretch far beyond Europe.


What I meant was not any doubt of a crisis being possible. I totally agree with you.

But rather my doubts of a crisis that would lead Europeans to massively migrate to Australia. There would need to be a really huge crisis to drive that many people to such an extremely difficult solution, Australia is not a country calling for 99,9% of Europeans. And I doubt such a crisis, that would hit whole Europe, wouldn't hit the rest of the world too anyways.

And the europeans are far too eager to just ditch everything for English, I agree with Le Baron. I have my doubts even about the Italians in this area. Some other minorities will be probably more bilingual.


Equally valid.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby DaveAgain » Wed Aug 11, 2021 5:20 am

PeterMollenburg wrote:
DaveAgain wrote:ABC have an interesting article showing which languages are taught in the school systems of the different federal states: Which languages should Australian children be learning to get ahead?


Interesting. Yes, it seems that the school systems lag when it comes to responding to changing demographics in terms of languages spoken at home in Australia, and lag with regards to trade languages too. Still, while I hated French at high school, I'm glad to see it's still going strong, relevant or not, but that's entirely biased and likely to have negative impacts - forcing a language on children that can't see the logical reason for learning it is not a great approach.

New Caledonia is one of our closest neighbours, one could even go as far as saying that Australia shares a border with France, albeit an overseas territory. Well, who cares about that, it's at least a French speaking location, but GDP, trade and tourism levels between Australia and NC are not high enough to justify French being taught in our schools on widescale. Despite French being a long way from relevant for most people within Australia, it remains relevant internationally.
There's been a good deal of geo-political debate in the UK, and France, since Brexit. Mr Macron made a speech recently-ish pointing out that France (due to a number of island territories) is a one of the largest Pacific powers. France and the UK have both been trying to increase their political/military involvement with Australia and the "quad".

French's influence on English also makes it among the easier choices for an anglophone student to learn, another argument in favour when choosing which languages to include in the curriculum.

That said the prominance of both Japanese and Indonesian in the various states education systems is nice to see.
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Re: PM’s French Adventures in the Matrix

Postby PeterMollenburg » Wed Aug 11, 2021 6:07 am

Cavesa wrote:However, I'm still waiting for you to join the French C2 club!!! I'm cheering like crazy, waving the "PM is the best" banner just behind the finish line, my imaginary banner holding arms are hurting like hell already! Have some pity and pass the C2 already! :-D :-D :-D I'm pretty sure you're much closer to it than you think!


I possibly am closer than I realise, but insanity has crept back in...

I've decided to go back to the drawing board, so to speak. Not because I've got problems that need to be solved by my proposed solutions (see below), but just because I've got unfinished business, I'd like to have another crack at. I swore black and blue to never do this. I'm gonna do it. So I'm human, I'm definitely a hypocrite so I want to, so I will.

A while back (a few years?) I had what I called "PM's Big Five". Well I'm resurrecting that. This time it's

PM's Insane Six

1 French in Action (previously up to Leçon 19)

2 Cours de Langue et de Civilisation Françaises I-IV (a.k.a. Le Mauger Bleu)

3 Foreign Service Institue: French Basic (previously completed a handful or so of units)

4 Assimil:
French without Toil
New French with Ease (completed previously, to review)
French (new Assimil course)
Using French (completed previously, to review)
Business French

5 CLE:
La grammaire en dialogues (débutant)
La grammaire en dialogues (intermédiaire)
La grammaire en dialogues (avancé)
Vocabulaire progressif du français (débutant)
Vocabulaire progressif du français (intermédiaire)
Vocabulaire progressif du français (avancé)
Vocabulaire progressif du français (perfectionnement)
Grammaire progressive du français (intermédiaire)
Grammaire progressive du français (avancé)
Grammaire progressive du français (perfectionnement)

6 Les autres:
Hugo French in 3 Months (speedy review)
Colloquial French (speedy review)
Fluenz French 5
Hugo Advanced French
Colloquial French 2
The Ultimate French Review and Practise
The Ultimate French Verb Review and Practise
...and some others that I am unlikely to get to, and don't particularly care...

Disclaimer:
I'm likely to give up after two weeks and see the folly of my ways. I'll return again in another year and give up again after three weeks. At age 81 I will complete this and wonder why the hell I bothered, realising for a serving-sized portion of my brain, I was actually insane.
8 x


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