My teacher is French, about 10 years younger than me, and really nice, very friendly. I explained to her at the end of the session that my 'in' direction is working pretty well, it's just that I've had no conversation practice in 20 years. Actually, I've *never* had decent conversation practice, ever, because my school French teacher was mindbogglingly merde. She seems happy not to throw me out.
It's a bit like my experience of Russian Basic last year. I joined three weeks late when a place became available after someone dropped out. I was way, way behind at the start, but managed to pull through to be fine toward the end. I hope I can pull off the same trick again -- I am, if anything, even further behind this time. Other people seem to be able to chatter away in French without any trouble, and even though I can understand them fine, I am not practiced enough to be able to find the words myself. French is definitely much easier than Russian for an English speaker, however, and I do seem to be learning fast. But then, I hope I can learn fast enough not to be chucked out.
The other problem is that there seems to be a mandatory listening comprehension test at the end of term that we're supposed to turn up for on pain of death, but it clashes with me visiting NASA and the US airforce space research group, so I'm not going to be there. I'm also going to miss the second lesson, but since my excuse is that I'm going to Paris anyway to give a lecture at ENS, she let me off! I am lecturing in English, of course, but maybe one day I'll be able to manage French. We shall see.
no subject
It's a bit like my experience of Russian Basic last year. I joined three weeks late when a place became available after someone dropped out. I was way, way behind at the start, but managed to pull through to be fine toward the end. I hope I can pull off the same trick again -- I am, if anything, even further behind this time. Other people seem to be able to chatter away in French without any trouble, and even though I can understand them fine, I am not practiced enough to be able to find the words myself. French is definitely much easier than Russian for an English speaker, however, and I do seem to be learning fast. But then, I hope I can learn fast enough not to be chucked out.
The other problem is that there seems to be a mandatory listening comprehension test at the end of term that we're supposed to turn up for on pain of death, but it clashes with me visiting NASA and the US airforce space research group, so I'm not going to be there. I'm also going to miss the second lesson, but since my excuse is that I'm going to Paris anyway to give a lecture at ENS, she let me off! I am lecturing in English, of course, but maybe one day I'll be able to manage French. We shall see.