<p>^Arabic is good to know going to Paris. Maybe you should just stick to what you already know and improve it.</p>
<p>^lol, swimcatsmom, picturing myself bopping around and making buck-teeth noises with my hands in claws to evoke the image of a rat :).</p>
<p>I knew someone who traveled in China with very little Chinese. She said she went around with a little notebook and drew pictures of what she wanted. I had to do that when my cleaning woman put my dustpan somewhere. She didn’t know the English word and I didn’t know the Spanish one, but the picture was as they way worth 1000 words!</p>
<p>My son is spending this term in Irbid in Jordan on the theory that it’s off the tourist trail and fewer people will want to speak English. He also has taken a language pledge and memorized the sentence saying that he has sworn not to speak any English for the length of the program. He says sometimes people speak to him in English, but he always answers in Arabic. Luckily he’s exempt from the pledge when talking to us!</p>
<p>Thanks to a recommendation, I started the michel thomas method with a podcast last night. Very easy and fun. Who knows how much I’m learning but it’s audio only, no homework, so it’s a good place to start.</p>
<p>I’ll be reviewing all the other methods recommended to see what else to use as the podcasts only will not be enough. The only thing I"m not open to is taking a class at my junior college. I have terrible memories of high school French. My teacher was wonderful but I was a terrible student and I have so much language anxiety because of it. So, I want to try things I can do at home. </p>
<p>Merci for all the suggestions! C’est tres bon!</p>
<p>If you had high school French you can probably get away without doing a class. </p>
<p>Bonne chance dans vos </p>
<p>PIMSLEUR. If too expensive or not available, then anything carried by Barnes & Noble should suffice (Rosetta Stone or Berlitz).</p>
<p>High school classes are fine, but the CDs/DVDs reinforce/teach speaking & listening skills.</p>
<p>Merci, mathmom!</p>
<p>Sadly, my French was weak 25+ years ago when I was in high school. I remember some curse words, I can ask how to get to the library (Ou est la biblioteque?) and that’s about it. Perhaps some of it will come back to me? One can hope!</p>
<p>Live Mocha won’t play because my version of Adobe is so old and my dumb old computer won’t update it to the newer version of Adobe.</p>
<p>The BBC link is telling me that videos are permitted in my area. Perhaps you have to be in the UK? </p>
<p>I’ve got to update this old beast of a computer some day!</p>
<p>My son is in high school and loves all things french. He spends hours on you tube watching movies (a lot of disney, lol). It has really helped. </p>
<p>Also, as a cheat, I have seen a commercial for some smart phone lately that has an app that takes what you say in your language and translates it aloud to your preferred language.</p>
<p>One such app is VOCRE.</p>
<p><a href=“Translator+ Free my voice now on the App Store”>Translator+ Free my voice now on the App Store;
<p>It is a nice conversation piece and could be helpful in a caf</p>
<p>Tunnelbear lets you watch BBC television videos. Not sure about the language lessons - I used to be able to watch those over here. It is free for the first so many gigs a month (it was enough for me to watch the BBC Olympic closing ceremonies live), plus you can double the free amount by “tweeting” something each month.</p>
<p>If you could speak it in high school, it may come back to you, especially the grammar and sentence structure. Vocab will probably be an issue. I was fluent in Spanish when I graduated high school and have occasion to go to Spanish speaking countries 1-2x/year. After a few days, I can get the basic idea of what people are saying and work up the nerve to ask questions in Spanish. </p>
<p>That said, I work for a Dutch company and took 10 weeks of lessons a few years ago. I was able to read emails fairly well immediately after the class, however I never could understand the spoke word, even in class. It is such a harsh sounding language and I never had exposure to German, so I was hopeless, plus all my colleagues speak perfect English, there was never an opportuntity to practice. </p>
<p>Bottom line - if you had the ear a while back, it should come back to you, however I subscribe to the ‘you can’t teach an old dog new tricks’.</p>
<p>Be sure to check your local library before you spend money! They may have online options–from my library networks I can access for free: Mango (see findmango.com for the closest library), Tell Me More, Powerspeak Languages and the more complete courses from Livemocha. (Rosetta Stone doesn’t sell to libraries anymore, so that can be hard to find.) </p>
<p>My library also has CDs and playaways to check out, including Pimsleur, Behind the Wheel, and Michel Thomas. There are a few downloadable options from the library in OverDrive, plus books, of course.</p>
<p>My father was raised in Dutch, but he struggled when we traveled though Deutschland where German is spoken. Hardly the same language, although both are hard to learn.</p>
<p>I second the notion of a community college or night-school class, if that’s possible. Otherwise, a tutor or a group of people trying to learn French. But whatever you do, you have to force yourself to try to produce French, either written or spoken. It’s like math-- you don’t learn it if you don’t do it.</p>
<p>Go with Pimsleur. It is the absolute best for building automatic response and oral skills</p>
<p>Your public library may have materials for children as well as adults. That can be fun too. Look for the BBC children’s language course “Muzzy”. There is a new online edition that you might have access to.</p>
<p>Depends on what kind of French you want to learn!</p>
<p>If you’d like to learn some basic vocabulary and touristy phrases then any intro book will do. Look into the Living Language series, e.g. [Ultimate</a> French Beginner-Intermediate (Coursebook) (Ultimate Beginner-Intermediate): Living Language: 9781400009633: Amazon.com: Books](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-French-Beginner-Intermediate-Coursebook/dp/1400009634]Ultimate”>http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-French-Beginner-Intermediate-Coursebook/dp/1400009634)</p>
<p>Personally I like the manuals published by Routledge (disclaimer: haven’t tried the French ones): [French</a> - Routledge Language Learning](<a href=“http://www.routledge.com/languages/french/]French”>http://www.routledge.com/languages/french/)</p>
<p>Edit: The colloquial series rather than the textbooks. They also sell frequency dictionaries, which are an interesting idea (words are listed in order of occurrence after a statistical study of lots of texts) but they are a very artificial way of learning new vocabulary. I own of a few for different languages but never used them.</p>
<p>You will want to get lots of practice listening, so whatever audio/video materials you have may help. Someone mentioned the Pimsleur method. The idea is interesting - it’s audio only and has a heavy focus on pronunciation and building up words syllable by syllable. I find it helpful, but <em>only</em> if used with a traditional textbook, otherwise you’ll simply be mimicking sounds (possibly incorrectly) and you won’t be able to read anything (written French is not particularly phonetic unfortunately), not to mention you will have a very poor understanding of grammar.</p>
<p>My opinion is that you cannot get away from some formal grammar, but there are excellent resources, here’s a great one from UT Austin (Tex’s French Grammar):</p>
<p>[overview:</a> about this site: overview](<a href=“http://www.laits.utexas.edu/tex/gr/overview.html]overview:”>overview: about this site: overview)</p>
<p>If you do get very serious about this hobby check out what the people on this forum have to say: [French</a> Language Profile](<a href=“http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/e/languages/french/index.html]French”>French Language Profile)</p>
<p>Bonne chance! :)</p>
<p>Pugmadkate - how’s the French going? I have Pimsleur disks in the car, a textbook, the French in Action videos, and a couple of sites. I’ve been trying to get in 30 minutes a day, even if it’s just what I can do in the car. </p>
<p>Je comprends un peu le francais! (pas tres bien :))</p>
<p>Tres bien mes amies</p>