So you want to learn French. That’s great.
Maybe it’s been a life-long dream and you are ready to put in the work it needs. Maybe it’s a new project, and you want to make sure you do it the right way. Or maybe it’s a necessity: for a diploma, a job or for family reasons.
In any case, here is how to learn French according to a French teacher.
Author : Marie Drouvin
Salut! Je suis Marie and I'm on a mission to make learning French simple. You can find me on Youtube, or here, on this blog. And if you want to know more about how to learn French, take a look at my book.
If you’d rather listen, you can watch this video. There are more details in the article.
Tips won't teach you how to learn French
I’ve been teaching French for 5 years, but not in class. My specialty is self-learning strategies, and conversation – for adult learners.
Which means I’ve been working directly with people like you, who are learning French on their own.
And aren’t children.
I know the kind of advise you have been given as child when you were learning French, and all the new kind of advise you have come across since.
That means YOU have seen a lot of different tips on how to learn French.
Some very good, some very bad. But you don’t really know that.
You know what I’m talking about when I say it can be confusing.
Because from one article to the next, you read contradictory advises. And you don’t know who to believe anymore.
We need to get rid of this confusion. And it’s very easy because: Your confusion comes from a misunderstanding.
‘Tips’ that you have been reading, won’t teach you how to learn French. Tips are here to optimise, or speed your learning.
But what makes a true good strategy is principles.
When you follow a few core principles, you can be assured to progress no matter what. And you can follow all the tips you want, if you’re not applying some principles with it – you’re screwed.
So let me make it clear that what I’m about to share with you, isn’t ‘tips’. It’s principles.
They might not be sexy. They might not be revolutionary. They definitely aren’t new.
But they work.
As long as we understand each others on this part, you can keep reading.
I’m going to share with you two kinds of principles in this article:
- The principles of language learning
- The principles of French learning
How to learn French? Follow the principles of language learning
Learning French, isn’t that different, than to learn Spanish, or Greek, or English, or Mandarin.
At the end of the day, it’s still a language.
And effective language learning respects a few principles.
4 pillars of language learning
In language acquisition theory, the perfect learner is working on 4 different parts:
- Reading
- Listening
- Writing
- Speaking
I like to represent them like this:
Each leg of the table is balancing your French. And if you lack serious skills in one compared to the other, your French table will be unbalanced.
Ideally, you do a little bit of them all in your learning.
But we don’t live in an ideal world, and in reality – it will be unbalanced!
You might have a natural ability to speak, or read – but the rest if more difficult. That’s fine.
You should capitalize on that – without forgetting to work on your other skills.
What does that mean?
That means doing a lot of what you love, and a little bit of what you don’t love.
Practice more than you learn French
When we imagine how to learn French, the first picture that comes to mind is usually a very serious kind of person.
Maybe she is wearing glasses and is looking into a big book. Or she’s checking some words in a dictionary.
And because of this image, we have the impression that it’s what we are supposed to be doing. So we bury ourselves into books, we buy heavy dictionaries, and we STUDY.
But studying, or learning isn’t the biggest part of language learning.
The biggest part and where you should put 80% of your efforts is on PRACTICE.
Because learning a language isn’t like learning facts. It’s more like learning how to play an instrument.
There is almost a physicality to it. It’s not conceptual. It’s practical.
And so, it should be learned mostly, with practice.
Each word that you learn, you’ll need to repeat it over and over again, to use it, to recognize it again and again – to be able to master it completely.
So that it becomes a reflex. When you see the word or hear it; you pain a mental picture of what it means.
Just like hearing a certain note in a song should tell you where to place the bow of your cello, or which key to press on your piano.
Make mistakes
This one might be the hardest.
I know that when I speak with students that don’t do well – it’s usually because they aren’t willing to make mistakes.
They want it to be perfect.
Or not to appear ridiculous, or like a baby.
But if you stop at this, and you’re not stepping out of your comfort zone, you’ll keep being blocked and not capable of speaking French.
And you’ll start doing the squirrel method: endlessly storing information in your brain, without ever using them.
Making mistakes is very important, not only because it means you are actually using the French you are learning – but also because it shows you what you haven’t fully understood yet.
How many times did you think you knew something, only to realize you really didn’t?
I even got this tip from a fellow French teacher – she was keeping a mistake journal during her learning.
She would write down all the mistakes she was making.
And that showed her where she needed to improve.
Genius right?
How to learn FRENCH? Follow the principles of French learning
Now, French is French. It’s not Spanish, Mandarin, or Greek.
So what about specific principles of French learning? What should you do specifically to learn FRENCH?
You don't need to learn all the grammar
French is very heavy in grammar exceptions.
Usually, the rule itself is easy to understand, but it’s when you need to use it in real life that you realize there are many many exceptions to it.
For this reason, you shouldn’t try to learn it all.
What your goal with French grammar should be is: getting a taste of how it work, and the most important rules.
Did you know that with a couple hundred words in English or in French, you can express yourself in 80% of situations?
Well, it’s exactly the same with grammar.
Really only a few grammar rules are going to be useful, especially at first.
Things like general sentence structure, how to ask questions, and a couple of tenses.
French pronunciation & enunciation should be a priority
Much more important than 90% of the grammar rules? Pronunciation.
I like to say:
“No need for perfect grammar if your pronunciation sucks”
You can quote me on that aha
But really, if French people don’t understand you, then you can put the adjective wherever you want, they still won’t.
Pronunciation is important, and so it enunciation.
Enunciation is the way you are going to make the words go together in a sentence. In French, if you raise your voice too much, we will think you’re asking a question.
It makes communication difficult.
Work on those two like it is music, and you’ll find that it greatly improves your French.
