The French C1/C2 Group

An area with study groups for various languages. Group members help each other, share resources and experience. Study groups are permanent but the members rotate and change.
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Ani
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Re: The French C1 Group

Postby Ani » Wed Jun 28, 2017 4:07 am

lavengro wrote:
Ani wrote:I saw this thread at 3 pages and I thought I must have missed weeks of discussion.. But nope!

I have a cold and I'm sitting around feeling sorry for myself :roll: so I won't write a long intro right now, but absolutely count me in. I don't know if I can actually sit an exam due to where I live, but I am considering flying out next November to sit the C2 (in NYC, making the assumption they will have one around then).

I believe C2 testing goes on in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories at the Centre Delf-Dalf des Territoires du Nord-Ouest . I don't know where you are in Alaska, but Yellowknife will undoubtedly be closer geographically for you than New York, though not necessarily easier for you to get to. Actually, prolly a lot harder to get to.

Yellowknife does have the advantage of being way less distracting than New York would be (quite a few less museums or interesting attractions, for example, unless you are easily distracted by snow), and the considerable advantage for you of not requiring a de-thaw decompression period before taking the test after arriving from Alaska.

lavengro
(been there; ignore the above advice; go to NYC)


That's good to know but anything in the NW Territories is probably an 18h drive minimum, and in November it would be virtually impassible for my vehicle and possibly even require snow camping (or at least being prepared for the possibility). Not ideal with 5 kids in tow :) I'm from the NY area so I'll just stay with family. I go back there at least once a year anyway so I'd just need to time my visit strategically and make sure I am past the jet lag phase, which makes ordinary talking impossible, let alone passing an advanced French exam :)


(And you are talking to a girl who moved to Alaska on purpose.. OF COURSE I can be distracted by snow.. And the northern lights, and the mountains.. )
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smallwhite
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby smallwhite » Wed Jun 28, 2017 5:42 am


Cavesa's is a success story so you want the full list:

Bookworm's adventures in the exile 20 Jul 2015
Cavesa's 2016 log 06 Ene 2016
France 10 Sep 2016
the Diaries of a Caffeinated Squirrel 02 Ene 2017
Con calma, a new and better log for 2017 30 May 2017

(I couldn't be bothered to search HTLAL).
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PeterMollenburg
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby PeterMollenburg » Wed Jun 28, 2017 5:50 am

smallwhite wrote:

Cavesa's is a success story so you want the full list:

Bookworm's adventures in the exile 20 Jul 2015
Cavesa's 2016 log 06 Ene 2016
France 10 Sep 2016
the Diaries of a Caffeinated Squirrel 02 Ene 2017
Con calma, a new and better log for 2017 30 May 2017

(I couldn't be bothered to search HTLAL).


Thanks smallwhite, I was meaning to find her log on France. Now I can add them all. Btw you're an honorary member now smallwhite ;)
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby Ani » Wed Jun 28, 2017 7:08 am

PeterMollenburg wrote:
Well, reading, would you believe, I know I know, it's shocking, IS included in my rotation now. And i'm doing only one lonely course, but believe me there's plenty more on that list, and since i've kept my routine to a 4 hour rotation, in theory I'll be doing that course most days of the week. I would love to be working on 5 courses, sorry 255 courses, at a time, but I simply cannot. Where reading gives me much needed extensive language exposure, courses it seems give you much needed intensive focus. So if I hear you've cut your list below 231 courses I'll have to get out that stick i've been beating Dutch into submission with and.. .umm... wave it around to see how it... umm... glides through the air? :?


Oh I know it is in your rotation. But ... if we are competing in hours, your courses/intensive against my extensive materials, then I need to get in nearly 2h day intensive to keep up with you right? And you probably need to do all 4 hours EVERY day to keep up with me ;) , so it forces more cycles out of you. See?

Your schedule does sound very reasonable though so don't let me rock the boat on what is working :)

I've actually decided to do only one course at a time. I am going to work through the grammar book smallwhite recommended me (because the GPdF avancé and perfectionnement sitting on my night stand needs a little more dust), then the Phonétique progressive du français intermédiaire, then the two conjugasion books, and finally switching back to GPdF before the exam, or at whatever point x-weeks before the exam that I decide to switch over to specific exam prep. I did look through the big red Delf/Dalf C1-C2 book and it doesn't look terribly intimidating at all so I plan to work on skills more holistically (albeit intensively) until I know I can sit an exam.

Oh and my French background that I didn't type out earlier --
I wanted to learn French when I was 7 or 8 and my mom found me a casette tape with a little booklet. I listened to that tape until it wore out but could barely make heads or tails of it. It covered formal greetings and ordering food at a restaurant. I can't still remember hours trying to say très heureux, which I could only render as "Tri-zew-ur" :) After that I went to boarding school for highschool and one of my good friends was a French expat. Her family rescued me from school many weekends and introduced me to the French expat community in NJ. They were all awesome, welcoming people and I loved listening to the completely French dinner conversations. With a background of Italian, I could pick up a fair amount by the time we graduated highschool, but I was too shy to really dig in and learn to speak while I had the chance. I spent most of my 20's regretting that. About 5 years ago, I decided I couldn't regret it forever and in frustration googled "How to learn a language" ... and guess which site came up? :) Lil' ol' me had nothing to contribute to HTAL but I read a lot and studied on an off. It wasn't until about 2 year ago that I really hit my stride and have been studying and using French daily since then.

I really don't know what my level is right now. I do know my language is really unbalanced. I am hoping that if I fill gaps, I will quickly gain ground against the CEFR scale. I can now read as quickly and easily in English as French, although I will sometimes come across a novel that suddenly has 2-3 unknown words per page and that really shakes my confidence. My listening comprehension is decent. FSI is painfully slow where as Kaamelott feels very comfortable (although I definitely miss some jokes). Since writing on an exam has to be done with an actual pen, I'm pretty much doomed. I can't spell to save my life on paper. That applies in English too so I am not sure how I am going to fix it. Lots of work and I'll just have to do the best I can I guess. My biggest issue in speaking is needing to drill conjugations for verbs that I don't hear spoken often enough.

So yeah :)
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blaurebell
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby blaurebell » Wed Jun 28, 2017 9:49 am

You guys are definitely filling up my Amazon wish list fast with all your courses! I should have known with PM starting this madness :lol: That phonétique progressive course looks great! I feel like doing it *right now*. But then, right now I have no mind-space for courses at all, I'm just in read-all-the-books mode!

Ani wrote:I can now read as quickly and easily in English as French, although I will sometimes come across a novel that suddenly has 2-3 unknown words per page and that really shakes my confidence.


Tell me about it, there is just such a huge difference between writing styles sometimes. The Guillaume Musso audiobook I listened to the other day was super easy (apart from the funny English pronunciation), whereas Irène Némirovsky throws some pretty strange vocabulary around in most of her books.
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby aravinda » Wed Jun 28, 2017 9:57 am

Thank you, PeterMollenburg for creating this thread, and others for their input.
Here is the link to CIEP DALF page (as I didn't see it in this thread. Sorry if I have missed it):
http://www.ciep.fr/en/dalf

Bon courage à tous!

EDITED: for typos and to add the link to CIEP DALF page.
EDITED: to remove all the rambling.
Last edited by aravinda on Mon Jan 15, 2018 6:25 am, edited 4 times in total.
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DaveBee
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby DaveBee » Wed Jun 28, 2017 10:11 am

PeterMollenburg wrote:
smallwhite wrote:

Cavesa's is a success story so you want the full list:

Bookworm's adventures in the exile 20 Jul 2015
Cavesa's 2016 log 06 Ene 2016
France 10 Sep 2016
the Diaries of a Caffeinated Squirrel 02 Ene 2017
Con calma, a new and better log for 2017 30 May 2017

(I couldn't be bothered to search HTLAL).


Thanks smallwhite, I was meaning to find her log on France. Now I can add them all. Btw you're an honorary member now smallwhite ;)
One surprise hiding in Cavesa's old log, is a link to a 2014/5 super challenge website, that includes no-superchallenges-for-me-I-prefer-courses P Mollenberg!
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tomgosse
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby tomgosse » Wed Jun 28, 2017 11:09 am

aravinda wrote:Thank you, PeterMollenburg for creating this thread, and others for their input. This is exactly the hard kick I needed to get back to my French. This means my other projects (German and English) going into a low profile or hibernation but that’s ok. You don’t need to read all this, just add me PM! I need to join Les voyageurs too (Thanks, tomgosse)


Please send me the link to your log and I will add you to Les Voyageurs. :D

Bon courage,
Tom
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PeterMollenburg
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby PeterMollenburg » Wed Jun 28, 2017 12:04 pm

DaveBee wrote:
PeterMollenburg wrote:
smallwhite wrote:

Cavesa's is a success story so you want the full list:

Bookworm's adventures in the exile 20 Jul 2015
Cavesa's 2016 log 06 Ene 2016
France 10 Sep 2016
the Diaries of a Caffeinated Squirrel 02 Ene 2017
Con calma, a new and better log for 2017 30 May 2017

(I couldn't be bothered to search HTLAL).


Thanks smallwhite, I was meaning to find her log on France. Now I can add them all. Btw you're an honorary member now smallwhite ;)
One surprise hiding in Cavesa's old log, is a link to a 2014/5 super challenge website, that includes no-superchallenges-for-me-I-prefer-courses P Mollenberg!


Umm clearly that is a different Peter Mollenburg. If you look closely the letter 'o' is a slightly different shape ;) Surprised you missed it! Yep, prefer is the word. I've definitely had a sprinkling of reading and done a good deal of watching outside of my 'desk study time'. I've perhaps been a little more balanced than some people think (or what i've led them to think ;) ), but really, compared to voracious literature lovers and avid readers, I've done jack s*^t, but I have done some. I do intend to balance that out much more on the push to C1/C2. In fact it almost astounds me when I read such comments:

blaurebell wrote:
Ani wrote:I can now read as quickly and easily in English as French, although I will sometimes come across a novel that suddenly has 2-3 unknown words per page and that really shakes my confidence.


Tell me about it, there is just such a huge difference between writing styles sometimes. The Guillaume Musso audiobook I listened to the other day was super easy (apart from the funny English pronunciation), whereas Irène Némirovsky throws some pretty strange vocabulary around in most of her books.


Clearly there's a lot of ground to be made up by me, if I'm to feel at home with such comments. And if I do, I will have greatly surpassed my abilities in English, as I all I read is the odd non-fiction book, generally speaking. Having said that, of course I do read quite a bit online in French when surfing the net, or reading transcripts of RFI Journal en français facile. Again non-fiction is calling me, as I feel the truth is so much stranger than fiction, and rather fanciful in many ways, and I see fiction as largely distraction, much like the media in general nowadays. Still, I can't really say that non-fiction is rather fanciful when I've barely read a fiction book in my life even in English. I still love a shiny glossy course but I am sorely missing reading and I can feel it- I need to consume volumes and believe me there are indeed a lot of books out there I really want to read almost desperately, so it won't be a pain whatsoever.

Waffling over... DaveBee can you provide a link to your log please?
--------------------------------------------------------------

On another note, thanks everyone who has explained their French journey and plans so far. Some very interesting and varied backgrounds out there! And to risk breaking the record, best of luck everyone! I'm targeting July 1st, as is schlaraffenland to begin this mad mission. I won't be stopping until I reach my goals, but i'm likely to take an over-perfectionist scenic route. It's not a race, but believe me, i'll be working hard. I hope you will be too! :)
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Cavesa
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Re: The French C1/C2 Group

Postby Cavesa » Wed Jun 28, 2017 3:59 pm

Ouch! I should feel flattered (and I probably do), but I feel a sudden urge to go back in all my previous logs and censure lots of stuff out :-D In some ways, my logs are a warning "don't do this". It really feels weird, but thanks :-)
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