Hi Elyse,
I am curenntly in the middle of my Trial HSC Exams and the French countiners exam is fast approaching. 1. How did you study all/most of the tenses? Such as the stems, endings etc. 2. How did you memorise all the regular verbs? and 3. Is exposure the only way im really going to be fluent in French? Lastly, love all the tips for the French HSC speaking exam. I am for sure going to take them on-board!
Merci beaucoup,
Elias
Bonjour Elias!
For the tenses, I did a lot of boring worksheets where I was just writing out the words in the different tenses over and over...but then I began putting it into oral circulation and thinking to myself "How would I say that in French?" Tenses are just something you need to know unfortunately, but they do come with practice. Exposure to them really helps you to memorise the patterns so you don't have to think about calculating a word in a new tense, it just becomes natural. Regular verbs...well the conjugations came somewhat easily after I became quick at being able to do this in my head instead of needing to write things down. It was never instantaneous for me, even when I was at my peak, I still would have a 0.5 second delay. I've just started studying French at TAFE again, starting right from the beginning so I can learn it all again, and I'm finding it's coming back to me quicker this time - but I still notice myself pausing ever so briefly to make sure the conjugation is right. But actually in terms of memorising the verb: sometimes they get mixed up! It's really about using the words back to yourself. If they aren't cognates, I never managed to find a trick for them!
But when I'd study, I'd group certain verbs together. So I'd make a study point of looking at "my day at the shops" and I'd look at verbs for walk, buy, look, drive, carry, eat. And by studying the verbs in association groups they were easier to commit to memory.
As for fluency...c'est difficile. I'm hoping to become fluent by the end of next year...or at least fluent "enough"
I learned Italian last semester, and I realised part of the reason I learned it so slowly at first is because I wasn't really engaging with the language beyond what I needed to, and then I started to do everyday narrations in my head with Italian. I still remember the very first sentence I put together..."Sono felice" (I am happy). I was about to blurt out "I'm so happy!" to the person I was walking through Venice with, and then I thought "Do I know how to say that in Italian?" It became a habit, from then on, to consider situations in advance and think "Do I know the vocabulary for this?" and I'd say something in English, and then think "do I know how to say that in Italian?" and I'd begin the sentence, and once I got to a word I couldn't work out, or find a substitute for, I'd pull out my phone and jump onto word reference immediately to see what they had to say, and I'd add it to my vocab. By the end, I had Italian friends I could speak to - which is a huge bonus. But now it's time for French, and I'm doing the same thing again, trying to consider "How would I say this in French?" all the time. So it's exposure, but in an internal way - you don't rely on anyone but you for that exposure, you can make it happen anywhere, anytime!