This came at a great time for me. So much to take in however most of what you both mention I am doing. I took French one year in school, was so excited about it but the way we were being taught killed my joy, and I could not do well. Started off with an A gradually to a D...terrible. I've never lost my love for language. I lived in Europe nearly ten years, Japan for four, I've just decided that it's time to do this. I began with children's videos on you tube. I signed up for weekly meetups, first one is coming up. I've had no real direction, this has helped immensely. I look at now as a journey, who knows how long. I love the idea of posting names of things on everything..that is a must do. You both are so wonderful. Thank you mostly for giving me hope. I've had words in my head for many languages forever..It is my desire to learn them. I'm a musician and travel, I always cram to learn but then am afraid to use it...crazy. Thank you, Merci, Dankeschön, Grazie, Arigatogozaimashita,
Wow. You are so right Kirsten. One has to go out and practise, practise and practise. No point watching the news when you can’t string a simple sentence. Merci beaucoup
Merci beaucoup. Je trouve cette vidéo extrêmement utile. J'écoute, je lis, j'écris, je parle français presque tous les jours, mais je me sens que je n'améliore pas. Je me sens que j'ai atteint un plateau et que je suis coincé. Je n'ai pas encore mesuré mon progrès du tout. Je n'avais pas encore défini des démarches concrètes ce dont j'ai besoin pour atteindre mes objectifs en français. En fait, j'ai décidé d'acheter le livre de Kerstin "Fluency Made Achievable". Ensuite, je ferai la planification nécessaire pour améliorer mon niveau de français.
Thank you very much Geraldine. I have been teaching myself French for a few years and the reason why I am kinda stuck at intermediate level is that many times I get too busy I keep it aside and I lack practice so my written French is good but the spoken form is very bad. Now, when it comes to learning techniques, I think different people learn differently. For instance, for me, I learn faster when I first learn the rules in the traditional setting of sitting down, studying and doing as many exercises as possible about the topic. Then, I can find resources for applying what I learnt. That way, I move on very fast because I have the foundation, the background information such that I can identify the grammar elements I studied in the conversation. Donc je dirais, à chacun son goût!😆
Thanks Geraldine for sharing this learning goals setting system with her. I have El learned a lot of French culture, and French language in your Chanel. You are a great teacher !! 😍 merci beaucoup!!
What surprised me, living in Brussels, 'vous' is used less often. When going to the market, I am always refered to as 'tu'. I thought of it as rude. I asked someone about it, and they said that it is to be friendly. I knew a French guy for 10 years before using 'tu'.
Geraldine, thank you so much for this podcast. So inspiring. I loved the take away that the brain learns when you are having fun. You do not necessarily learn by sitting down and studying from a book. I also learned that there are rules for figuring out what words are masculine and which are feminine. I will definitely look into that.
I wonder if you two realize you aren't always vocalizing the most important points of your examples? I love you both by the way. You're both extremely lovable. I believe the one thing you ladies both imbue is genuine passion for language learning. Watching you guys together or apart is infectious. Together you two exude a synergy that's greater than the sum of your personalities. You should get together more often. I have learned that the real dichotomy in learning manifests apart from the everyday unemotional antiseptic functions of the brain - that which in essence monitors and directs our somatic processes - bodily monitoring, endocrine driven systems and organ control, subconscious muscular-skeletal motor control/instruction, feedback and response, thus ultimately maintaining our homeostasis, our status quo. That in essence being the brain's primary goal, and triage its go-to 5 alarm, life and death, emergency 911 state. We have no direct, conscious participatory role in our homeostasis other than the times we recognize we are wet and freezing and standing naked outside in the wintertime. It may or may not have been our choice to be there. We may have put ourselves in harm's way on purpose. This is us as we see ourselves in our other brain state, our state of mind. We have two brain states - the somatic which can extend down to the most basic cellular, chemical, hormonal and electrical stages, and the emotional psychological quasi-dream state, which is us as a whole person, in other words our Gestalt. This other is our conceptualization of our whole being as a complete organism engaging externally with other organisms. We call this our mind, and these other processes we call our emotions. The brain operates independently of the mind to do only what is best for our survival. It's probably exactly why we have no direct control over our somatic processes. The brain can call for a hundred simultaneous actions and reactions. The mind can only think about one thing at a time. That's a very good thing because some of our emotional responses can be incredibly stupid and not in our best interests. I tend to think of memory and learning on the emotional side. I cannot think of any somatic processes I learned. They were innate and passed down to us in our RNA & DNA. Still with me? Let's go visit one of the people I have met in my lifetime. I used to have breakfast at a local diner several days a week back when I was single and on the go.. One of the waitresses was an emigrant, a Russian woman. She'd been working there for years and spoke excellent English. One day I asked her how she had mastered English as a second language (ESL). Did she study ESL before she emigrated? I did not expect the answer I got. She said when she first came to America she could not speak a word. What motivated her to make the move? I thought it would be for political or religious reasons because she was exceptionally well-spoken and sounded far too educated to just be a waitress working in a diner. She said love. She had met an American man and they immediately bonded and shortly thereafter married before they could even hold a conversation with each other.. They fell madly in love but neither could speak the other's language? Yes. But they learned quickly? No. She said they couldn't hold any meaningful talks for over a year. I asked if they were still married? She said, oh yes. Ten years now. They were still very much in love. I asked what she did for work in the Soviet Union. She said she had been a doctor. I asked if she missed her vocation. She said the govt will not recognize her credentials, but it was irrelevant. She'd never been happier working as a waitress. How did she get past the language barrier? It was very hard but she found a method where it became easy, by singing American songs and learning the emotional connections inherent with English words. At that point she could think in English instead of following the arduous path of memory, recall, translation to Russian, understanding the meaning of the word and associate meanings and relationships in the phrasing and sentences. The sum of the whole. It's the Gestalt if you will.
Ok. As a learning goal you have reminded me. I have bought a French LP with all the lyrics by Serge lama whose songs resonated with me on first playing. I shall dust it down and give it a go. As a goal I should report back in 4 weeks...! But ah, the mind and society. If only we could make compassion central to our lives..merci Don
My approach to learning from popular French TV shows, movies and literature is to listen, read the subtitles or text in French, and not stop just because I don't understand something. I try to let the scene's or the reader's tone tell me what's going on. I don't know if this is correct, but it's how I do it and it's much less tedious than stopping every couple of minutes to look up a word or phrase.
Merci pour le show, I tend to learn French by reading books and take notes of words I dont know. I very good at that, well practiced. But now a goal is the other 3, listening and speaking and writing. I have the series of four by M. Mauger, from 1958. Have heard of it?
Merci Géraldine pour cette vidéo. J'ai un ami congolais mais il a dit moi que "tap moi cinq" ça veut dire "High 5" en anglais. What do you think about it ??
In Canada, if you speak French (or English and are posted in a French speaking region ), and work for the federal government you are given a bonus that is worth a few thousand dollars . There are practical benefits to becoming bilingual 🌼
My francophone friends say they never learned words as little children without the definite article that indicated the correct gender So they did not learn chaise, they learned la chaise. That helps me.
How would you improve your own system to learn French?
Did you recommend Duo Lingo? I love this video!
This came at a great time for me. So much to take in however most of what you both mention I am doing. I took French one year in school, was so excited about it but the way we were being taught killed my joy, and I could not do well. Started off with an A gradually to a D...terrible. I've never lost my love for language. I lived in Europe nearly ten years, Japan for four, I've just decided that it's time to do this. I began with children's videos on you tube. I signed up for weekly meetups, first one is coming up.
I've had no real direction, this has helped immensely.
I look at now as a journey, who knows how long. I love the idea of posting names of things on everything..that is a must do.
You both are so wonderful. Thank you mostly for giving me hope. I've had words in my head for many languages forever..It is my desire to learn them. I'm a musician and travel, I always cram to learn but then am afraid to use it...crazy.
Thank you, Merci, Dankeschön, Grazie, Arigatogozaimashita,
Wow. You are so right Kirsten. One has to go out and practise, practise and practise. No point watching the news when you can’t string a simple sentence. Merci beaucoup
Kerstin’s English accent is VERY good !!
But the German accent is still substantial.
Actually she sounds slightly Australian to me with an occasionally almost Dutch accent rather than German
This video inspired me to write out my long-term goals for learning French, including the goals I've already met.
Merci beaucoup. Je trouve cette vidéo extrêmement utile. J'écoute, je lis, j'écris, je parle français presque tous les jours, mais je me sens que je n'améliore pas. Je me sens que j'ai atteint un plateau et que je suis coincé. Je n'ai pas encore mesuré mon progrès du tout. Je n'avais pas encore défini des démarches concrètes ce dont j'ai besoin pour atteindre mes objectifs en français. En fait, j'ai décidé d'acheter le livre de Kerstin "Fluency Made Achievable". Ensuite, je ferai la planification nécessaire pour améliorer mon niveau de français.
Thank you very much Geraldine. I have been teaching myself French for a few years and the reason why I am kinda stuck at intermediate level is that many times I get too busy I keep it aside and I lack practice so my written French is good but the spoken form is very bad. Now, when it comes to learning techniques, I think different people learn differently. For instance, for me, I learn faster when I first learn the rules in the traditional setting of sitting down, studying and doing as many exercises as possible about the topic. Then, I can find resources for applying what I learnt. That way, I move on very fast because I have the foundation, the background information such that I can identify the grammar elements I studied in the conversation. Donc je dirais, à chacun son goût!😆
J'adore The Fluent Show. C'est mon podcast préféré. Vous êtes tous les deux si inspirants. Merci mille !
Thanks Geraldine for sharing this learning goals setting system with her. I have El learned a lot of French culture, and French language in your Chanel. You are a great teacher !! 😍 merci beaucoup!!
Merci beaucoup Géraldine et Kirsten. Je suis vraiment inspiré 😘
What surprised me, living in Brussels, 'vous' is used less often. When going to the market, I am always refered to as 'tu'. I thought of it as rude. I asked someone about it, and they said that it is to be friendly. I knew a French guy for 10 years before using 'tu'.
Well spotted! Yes, the level of familiarity depends on regions, and obviously countries. Belgians are known for being super friendly.
Yes, we are; )) Je suis devenu belge.
Geraldine, thank you so much for this podcast. So inspiring. I loved the take away that the brain learns when you are having fun. You do not necessarily learn by sitting down and studying from a book. I also learned that there are rules for figuring out what words are masculine and which are feminine. I will definitely look into that.
Bonjour, cette semain on est en Salon de Provence, c'est belle, et demain on aller a Marseillette. On est en France pour un anne....c'est genial!
I wonder if you two realize you aren't always vocalizing the most important points of your examples? I love you both by the way. You're both extremely lovable. I believe the one thing you ladies both imbue is genuine passion for language learning. Watching you guys together or apart is infectious. Together you two exude a synergy that's greater than the sum of your personalities. You should get together more often.
I have learned that the real dichotomy in learning manifests apart from the everyday unemotional antiseptic functions of the brain - that which in essence monitors and directs our somatic processes - bodily monitoring, endocrine driven systems and organ control, subconscious muscular-skeletal motor control/instruction, feedback and response, thus ultimately maintaining our homeostasis, our status quo. That in essence being the brain's primary goal, and triage its go-to 5 alarm, life and death, emergency 911 state. We have no direct, conscious participatory role in our homeostasis other than the times we recognize we are wet and freezing and standing naked outside in the wintertime. It may or may not have been our choice to be there. We may have put ourselves in harm's way on purpose. This is us as we see ourselves in our other brain state, our state of mind.
We have two brain states - the somatic which can extend down to the most basic cellular, chemical, hormonal and electrical stages, and the emotional psychological quasi-dream state, which is us as a whole person, in other words our Gestalt. This other is our conceptualization of our whole being as a complete organism engaging externally with other organisms. We call this our mind, and these other processes we call our emotions.
The brain operates independently of the mind to do only what is best for our survival. It's probably exactly why we have no direct control over our somatic processes. The brain can call for a hundred simultaneous actions and reactions. The mind can only think about one thing at a time. That's a very good thing because some of our emotional responses can be incredibly stupid and not in our best interests. I tend to think of memory and learning on the emotional side. I cannot think of any somatic processes I learned. They were innate and passed down to us in our RNA & DNA.
Still with me? Let's go visit one of the people I have met in my lifetime.
I used to have breakfast at a local diner several days a week back when I was single and on the go.. One of the waitresses was an emigrant, a Russian woman. She'd been working there for years and spoke excellent English. One day I asked her how she had mastered English as a second language (ESL). Did she study ESL before she emigrated? I did not expect the answer I got.
She said when she first came to America she could not speak a word. What motivated her to make the move? I thought it would be for political or religious reasons because she was exceptionally well-spoken and sounded far too educated to just be a waitress working in a diner. She said love. She had met an American man and they immediately bonded and shortly thereafter married before they could even hold a conversation with each other..
They fell madly in love but neither could speak the other's language? Yes. But they learned quickly? No.
She said they couldn't hold any meaningful talks for over a year. I asked if they were still married? She said, oh yes. Ten years now. They were still very much in love. I asked what she did for work in the Soviet Union. She said she had been a doctor. I asked if she missed her vocation. She said the govt will not recognize her credentials, but it was irrelevant. She'd never been happier working as a waitress.
How did she get past the language barrier? It was very hard but she found a method where it became easy, by singing American songs and learning the emotional connections inherent with English words. At that point she could think in English instead of following the arduous path of memory, recall, translation to Russian, understanding the meaning of the word and associate meanings and relationships in the phrasing and sentences.
The sum of the whole. It's the Gestalt if you will.
Ok. As a learning goal you have reminded me. I have bought a French LP with all the lyrics by Serge lama whose songs resonated with me on first playing. I shall dust it down and give it a go. As a goal I should report back in 4 weeks...!
But ah, the mind and society. If only we could make compassion central to our lives..merci Don
Très bon Kerstin et Géraldine. Merci beaucoup.
My approach to learning from popular French TV shows, movies and literature is to listen, read the subtitles or text in French, and not stop just because I don't understand something. I try to let the scene's or the reader's tone tell me what's going on. I don't know if this is correct, but it's how I do it and it's much less tedious than stopping every couple of minutes to look up a word or phrase.
Thank you so much for this. I want to RElearn French and RElearn Italian. Now I'll see whether I really want to learn Dutch.
this is really cool! kerstin's podcast is really interesting and it was super nice to see you talking. :)
Thank you for your video!
Merci beaucoup a vous deux. Je recois de nouvelles idees!
Hi! I'm new here and enjoying the way you talk.
I think you're very much alike that actress Anne Hathaway!
Merci pour le show,
I tend to learn French by reading books and take notes of words I dont know. I very good at that, well practiced. But now a goal is the other 3, listening and speaking and writing. I have the series of four by M. Mauger, from 1958. Have heard of it?
Merci Géraldine pour cette vidéo. J'ai un ami congolais mais il a dit moi que "tap moi cinq" ça veut dire "High 5" en anglais. What do you think about it ??
In Canada, if you speak French (or English and are posted in a French speaking region ), and work for the federal government you are given a bonus that is worth a few thousand dollars . There are practical benefits to becoming bilingual 🌼
How do you learn a language in between a job?
I have used my language knowledge to songs with the language du jour.
I loved the interview. How (if it is still possible) could I take advantage of the $10 offer to learn French?
My francophone friends say they never learned words as little children without the definite article that indicated the correct gender So they did not learn chaise, they learned la chaise. That helps me.
Are you fluent in German? I'm 22 and have been speaking English all my life. Maybe I'm not as fluent as I thought I was.