Hi
benzboksas,
Many thanks for useful information. Could you please clarify if you had known another romance language (such as Italian and Spanish)? because, as you know, in that case learning process becomes much easier and faster. Unfortunately, I know nothing about French (even a word).
I'd also be grateful if you share your learning method with me?
Thank you.
Unfortunately I don't know another romance language but nevertheless knowing English also gives a considerable boost. I assume that if you participate in Express Entry you already have solid English knowledge or maybe it is even your mother tongue. So do not underestimates yourself by saying that you know nothing about French. In fact you already know a lot and with just some basic grammar studies you could quickly pass through the A1 and A2 levels at least on reading skills. One thing for sure, you will find it very easy to understand French grammar terms as they look and sound so similar to their English counterparts.
Personally, I haven't used some really special language learning method. I just try to do different activities and try to look at the learning process from various angles. It is this mosaic pattern that also helped me to prepare for English (another foreign language) exam and max out the points for it.
Here are some tips that worked for me:
I find no better way to master the pronunciation and to some extent the oral comprehension than just simply mimicking it. I bet you would really feel comfortable to do that only where and when no one is listening to you as this is quite embarrassing. Since I have a plan for fast mobile Internet I load one of the many youtube videos, e.g.
, while drive alone in car. I'm not looking at the screen but listening and repeating everything as it flows. Even if all I hear is just blah-blah-blah I still can mimic intonation and rhythm of it. At the beginning I would still recommend to watch the video first and read the text, translate what you don't know.
As for the learning of words it is related to the nature of the brain. I'm no scientist but I know that it likes steadiness and repetition. Just as it is better to go to sleep at the same time it is also good to find some patterns for language learning. Everyday no matter what in the morning when I get up I learn at least several new words. And the second thing is to put some extra effort. If I learn a word I try to also pronounce it, write it down and to mark it in the dictionary with a color marker. It is no good to read the dictionary from page A to Z, I'd rather open only the entry of a word which I need to know at the moment. For example, lets say I think about some term in my own native language and try to translate it in the new language and I fail. I just need to feel the slight pain of this failure to actually force my brain to value it more after I actually read the word in the dictionary.
I hope these tips will also help you.