<p>I’d never thought of turning on French subtitles for a French film. I’ll have to see if that’s an option. My French is rusty enough, I miss a lot and being able to see the words would be a big help. I could use them for some British shows too, especially when I’m tired!</p>
<p>Congrats Sylvan, sounds like you are really making progress.</p>
<p>Especially since a lot of French in (especially contemporary) films is incredibly quick and full of slang, seeing the words just reinforces the understanding.</p>
<p>I’ve also done something similar to what NJTheatreMOM suggests and watched old episodes of, for example, Friends, which I know like the back of my hand, but with the French audio dubbing instead of the English.</p>
<p>I don’t know if there are any French language TV shows available that people can watch in the US? Shows with a simple sit-com type format would be helpful. Even French children’s shows might work. </p>
<p>Sometimes I try to follow a bit of the Spanish language TV stations, because I know some Spanish too. The easiest thing to understand is the news. The patterns of speech in news coverage are similar to one another in any language…and the images help explain the story.</p>
<p>Once I was in an Eastern European country where I knew nothing but a handful of phrases and maybe a few hundred words of vocabulary. I stumbled upon some cartoons for very young children on TV and was able to understand more than I expected to. People were laughing at me because I wanted to linger and watch the silly things. </p>
<p>An Asian immigrant of my acquaintance who knew no English at all when he came to the US as an adult taught himself primarily through watching the old TV show “Three’s Company.” He liked the characters and the humor, and slowly learned a lot by watching reruns over and over. One day, he visited a barber and pointed to his hair and said, “Cut it like Jack Tripper!”</p>
<p>Perhaps it’s because we have a very cosmopolitan, multilingual population, but here in South Florida one of our local educational television stations runs “Le Journal” in French (no subtitles) nightly, and then broadcasts both “Maigret” and “Spiral” (with English subtitles) during the week as part of the MHz network’s International Mysteries series. MHz has affiliates in NYC, DC, LA, San Francisco, New Orleans, and Chicago as well as a number of other markets.</p>
<p>When we lived in Germany we used to watch Miami Vice. The guy they had dubbing for Don Jonson was so much better than the real Don Jonson!</p>
<p>Having been a student for most of my adult life, I’m being reminded again as to why - there is something innately exciting about learning something new - I feel every day like my brain is changing, being added to, modified, revised. How great is that? I have been working hard to get in 20-30 minutes a day with the French. Not easy with work and all, but hanging in there!</p>
<p>Thank you guys for being my lifelines!</p>
<p>Je vais diner ce soir et boire un peu de vin - c’est vendredi!</p>
<p>I am going to Paris with my mom, sister, and a friend of my mom’s who is a retired French teacher! We are going for 10 days in September. I want to try to work on my French. I had four years in high school and one year in college, but I don’t remember too much. I could read that sentence, Sylvan!</p>
<p>(DMCV) Dieu Merci, C’est Vendredi = TGIF in French :)</p>
<p>My D in AP French watches Petit Nicolas on youtube</p>
<p>Today’s question is about words with silent endings that are heard with words starting with vowels, etc. This does not seem to be a die-hard rule. For example, I would say “pas (pah) demain” and “pas (paws) aujourd’hui”, but Pimsleur puts “pas onze” as “(pah) onze” and “Je dois (duah) onze euro.”. </p>
<p>Is there something I’m missing about the rules here, or are they just not uniformly applied?</p>
<p>DMCV!</p>