Learning a second language, French.

[habernac]

another good tip for learning French, find a soap opera type program on a french station. They always seem to talk more slowly on those shows.

In my years of following hockey, it's very difficult to learn anything short of hockey phrases watching games on RDS (or CBC french in the past) because they talk too darn fast.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Buzzard

So...all who can speak French or Spanish or both, how did you learn it, school?

I'm fluent in French and I learned by taking full french immersion in school up to grade 12 starting in elementary.

Its handy, especially when going to Europe, people from almost any western European country can get their message across in one of French or English.

[Ashartus]

There are some good French courses offered by Alliance Francais in Calgary (and other cities) - they also have French social events to practice your French.

[Cactus Jack]

Another great way - date a foreigner. I speak Spanish so it was dirt easy to learn but I learned Portuguese so quickly dating the future Mrs. Cactus Jack who is Brazilian.

My family is from South America so I learned Spanish here in Calgary before English. And for the record, Spanish and French are close but not as close as Spanish and Italian, which is not nearly as close as Portuguese and Spanish. Those last 2 are identical, nearly.

[GreenLantern]

Has anyone ever tried these Demystified books? They try to simplify a lot of concepts, one of which is languages.

http://www.amazon.ca/French-Demystif...8762824&sr=8-1

It seems so far from googling that Pilsner (I can't look at that word without saying Pilsner, sorry im from SK) and Rosetta are the two best on the net. Both with their positives and negatives. I think that Rosetta would be better for me because I am more a visual concept kind of guy, I like to see it where as many people would rather think it.

If you ask me a question my eye queue will always go to the visual area.

[Sidney Crosby's Hat]

Originally Posted by Cactus Jack

Another great way - date a foreigner. I speak Spanish so it was dirt easy to learn but I learned Portuguese so quickly dating the future Mrs. Cactus Jack who is Brazilian.

My family is from South America so I learned Spanish here in Calgary before English. And for the record, Spanish and French are close but not as close as Spanish and Italian, which is not nearly as close as Portuguese and Spanish. Those last 2 are identical, nearly.

What would you say is closer? Portuguese and Spanish or Catalan and Spanish?

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Sidney Crosby's Hat

What would you say is closer? Portuguese and Spanish or Catalan and Spanish?

I'm no expert, but I'd say Portuguese. My Spanish aint bad, but when I was in Europe I was hanging around with a group of Catalonians and I couldnt make out a damned thing.

[Teh_Bandwagoner]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern

I have heard a rumour that it is easier to learn French, THEN Spanish, rather than trying to learn Spanish with zero french.

Is that true? Does that even make sense? When I was in Mexico some of the more educated locals at the resort told me that.. apparently the two languages are very similar?

I would say this is true. Both are Romantic languages, and are very very similar. With French, you have to be very particular with your masculine/feminine nouns, and the grammar rules are pretty strict, especially with verb conjugations.

In Spanish, it's less important because most times you can omit the pronoun, which often means you can ignore the gender of the word. And the verb conjugations are slightly simpler.

A bit OT, but Japanese is supposed to be one of the easiest languages to learn. The gender of a word means little, and there are only two tenses: past and present. I tried learning a bit for fun a while back, and yeah, it wasn't too bad.

[Torture]

Originally Posted by Locke

I'm fluent in French and I learned by taking full french immersion in school up to grade 12 starting in elementary.

Its handy, especially when going to Europe, people from almost any western European country can get their message across in one of French or English.

I remember when my school went to Italy this guy I knew talked to everybody in (broken) French before even trying English. Because "It's a European language".

So's English you nitwit.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by Torture

I remember when my school went to Italy this guy I knew talked to everybody in (broken) French before even trying English. Because "It's a European language".

So's English you nitwit.

There is a debate about whether Britain is part of Europe.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_Great_B...part_of_Europe

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/featur...in-over-the-EU

An overwhelming 99 per cent of our readers felt cheat­­ed by the Prime Minister when he tamely surrendered ­sovereignty to Europe this week, our exclusive poll reveals.

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/20...20_313709.html

Young people from tiny Luxembourg were most likely to embrace a sense of "European-ness," with an average of 78 per cent of respondents from 1996-2004 saying they identified themselves as totally or at least partially European, the study said.

Italians were next with 72 per cent, followed by the French, 68 per cent; the Spaniards, 64 per cent.

Those who identified themselves as least European were the Portuguese at 50 per cent; the Greeks, 46 per cent; and lastly the famously Euroskeptic Britons, with 40 per cent.

[Hack&Lube]

French words are easy because many are so similar to english. What messes me up is grammer and sentence structure and reading is okay but understanding what someone else says is difficult.

I spent a July in Montreal learning French at the University of Montreal from scratch as part of a paid program by the Quebec government (even gave us room and board in residence and a couple hundred bucks for food) but sadly, since it was Montreal, I drifted to speaking English all the time and partying. I did pick up a lot of basic concepts.

[Sidney Crosby's Hat]

Originally Posted by troutman

There is a debate about whether Britain is part of Europe.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_Great_B...part_of_Europe

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/featur...in-over-the-EU

Well, there's only seven continents and they have to be part of one of them! And if Iceland is part of Europe, well then so are you, U.K.

[Nage Waza]

Before you even start, learn about conjugation and how it works. French conjugates their verbs so I found it easier to learn once I grasped the rules.

[amorak]

I attended full french immersion from ECS through Grade 12 and besides a summer job as a Customs Officer, it opened precisely zero doors for me in Western Canada

With that said, I think learning a second language (at least as a child) really helps a brain develop learning skills that help through your entire life.

Also, knowing French is a bonus if you're going traveling, obviously.

If you're looking to learn it as an Adult there's probably a reason (job, travel, l'amour) then I would look at what you need it for - if you need conversational french, maybe a course where you can practice it works best. If you just need reading and writing for some gov't job, then maybe Rossetta would be good, but I don't know for sure, just a hunch from learning it...

All I know is you need to use it or lose it... Or else you'll end up in Paris, in a cafe, trying to remember what a lemon is again mid-sentence while ordering and call it a "lee-mon" instead of citron

[Shazam]

Korean is the easiest language to learn to read, by far. For you roundeyes it's pretty hard to speak, but really, you only need to know the swear words.

[DropIt]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern

I have heard a rumour that it is easier to learn French, THEN Spanish, rather than trying to learn Spanish with zero french.

Is that true? Does that even make sense? When I was in Mexico some of the more educated locals at the resort told me that.. apparently the two languages are very similar?

Definately true. I was told the same thing in one of my french classes, and then found myself being able to understand very basic levels of Spanish, and even other languages too.
A lot of words are very similar, and once you learn the possesives (I, you, we, they, etc.) Then you will find everything to start to slowly piece itself together.

[Suzles]

My English nieces moved at age 14 to Portugal - with English and some school level French and Latin. They (at 18 now) are fluent in Portuguese and even learnt French and Spanish from Portuguese. One of the girls is going on to medical school in Portugal with the hopes of becoming a neurologist (again all in Portuguese). Blows my mind in all that they have achieved but it shows that, probably, immersion in a language helps

[3 Justin 3]

I am taking German classes next year in University so I can finally learn it (I should have taken it in highschool, ugh..) and I am quite glad to be doing a course.

I tried Rosetta Stone but I thought it was dumb, I learned what some objects were, like cats and planes, but I didn't understand the grammar at all.

Pimsleur is quite good, I downloaded all 3 parts for German and I find it very useful. I only listened to the first 2 (out of 90), but I can still remember most of what they tought and that was 2 years ago.

I'd recommend a class if your unmotivated like myself, or Pimsleur if you're motivated.

[JerzeeGirl]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern

I have heard a rumour that it is easier to learn French, THEN Spanish, rather than trying to learn Spanish with zero french.

Is that true? Does that even make sense? When I was in Mexico some of the more educated locals at the resort told me that.. apparently the two languages are very similar?

I started on French first and picked it up quickly enough that when I did start taking Spanish it was mainly thru self-study as what I needed to learn was mainly vocab and the relevant grammar differences.

Because French, Spanish & Italian are all derived from Latin, their grammars are quite similar so taking either one should make learning the second a lot easier. The real challenge I found was in not mixing up the vocab when talking one language....I found that I often spoke French/Spanish for a while.

About getting some French conversation - check out the UofC French dept, once upon a time they had a free conversation club but I'm not sure if it's still around.

[FlamesAddiction]

A technique that worked for me is to just do a little at a time every day. Don't try to learn the bare minimum of many things, but master little by little. Also read explanations for why things are the way they are when it comes to grammar. Don't just learn vocubulary and memorization.