.

By far and away, the michel thomas auido recordings are the best way to start learning a new language. His method shifts the responsibility away from the student to learn on to the instructor to teach. He changes the way you think about language from dictionary rote to functional structure. He builds the house, then you furnish it with more vocabulary later.

Right at the start of the french course, for example, he points out you already know thousands of french words if you can speak english because there are so many loan words. The difference is just in the pronounciation.

Argh i cant do it justice here. It just works and it sticks in your mind.
 
You seem the type that would get on well with knuckling down and learning a language. The first hurdle is getting the basics in the present tense. Once you've got that down, it's time to slam some vocabulary! The only way to do it is to just.... crunch.

You can get by in a language in a day, converse after 2 weeks... years to master.

Quite liked the Michael Thomas myself... for Spanish. Although the male student is a right tardlette :p
 
Kreeeee said:
-A Swiss lady friend .... to practice with
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Ahh, I see, well the number one thing you need is motivation - seems you have that sorted so good luck ;)

Can be interesting to download a french book and just going through it, translating as you go, until you are able to read it out loud with a passable accent. Forvo.com may help with learning how to say some words.

Can do same with videos (stepping through translating as you go until you understand all of it) but not as easy with some sources - transcripts help, also things like dvd are horrible for this, youtube is better. Music videos normally have accurate lyrics available (I hate subtitles that don't match the words said!).

Yabla is a good site for video, makes it easy for you, but not free. If motivation is at all a problem I'd recommend a tutor - it forces you to keep your hand in even if you're too busy to give it the time you'd like.
 
i have a couple on my phone. the apps are made by BYKI and have a lot of languages to chose from. i have German, Cantonese and Russian. they cost money but only £15 i think. not as expensive as other systems. they have full voice and you can slow them down to hear it better and how it is said.

they are very good and worth a shot. im not disciplined though so only know bits and bats in each one.
 
Immersion and living in the country is the best way to learn.

However, things like Rosetta stone are okay as an introduction but without formal tuition and 2-way conversation it can be quite limiting.

Do you have any night classes you can do?
 
BunnyKillBot said:
By far and away, the michel thomas auido recordings are the best way to start learning a new language. His method shifts the responsibility away from the student to learn on to the instructor to teach. He changes the way you think about language from dictionary rote to functional structure. He builds the house, then you furnish it with more vocabulary later.

Right at the start of the french course, for example, he points out you already know thousands of french words if you can speak english because there are so many loan words. The difference is just in the pronounciation.

Argh i cant do it justice here. It just works and it sticks in your mind.
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+1
 
This is useful for me actually as it looks like I'll need to learn decent French within ~6 months, fluency within a year. I'm currently running through Rosetta Stone (only because it's available through work) but I'm not convinced that its phrase/picture based teaching is working for me.

Might try the Michael French cd's, the only problem is all these different systems are so expensive.

Other than that I'll check out duolingo as it looks good, but yeah I need some immersion, and fast :p.
Kreeeee said:
I suppose the end goal is to become fluent though, as I may end up moving to Switzerland!
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Only way you'll become fluent is by moving there which is the problem I face, a sort of catch 22. Hey ho, looking forward to the challenge :).
 
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Whilst my French is good (I am fluent after all!), I wouldn't feel confident enough in teaching someone a language with all the grammatical aspects - however if any of you want to spend an hour doing conversational practice, I'm happy to do so.
 
Bonjour

Aprendí español básico con la piedra del rosseta, pero la mejor manera es hablar con los altavoces españoles, pues usted aprenderá mucho más rápidamente.
 
Freefaller said:
Whilst my French is good (I am fluent after all!), I wouldn't feel confident enough in teaching someone a language with all the grammatical aspects - however if any of you want to spend an hour doing conversational practice, I'm happy to do so.
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Might take you up on that when I'm a bit more confident.
 
Rotty said:
worst chat up line ever :p
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It worked on you. ;)

eatcustard said:
Bonjour

Aprendí español básico con la piedra del rosseta, pero la mejor manera es hablar con los altavoces españoles, pues usted aprenderá mucho más rápidamente.
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Lo siento amigo, pero eso es español, no francés!

platypus said:
Might take you up on that when I'm a bit more confident.
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Genuine offer - a pint and an hours of speaking in French will be good. We could pick topics (news, sports whatever) and discuss it.
 
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