Learning French as an Absolute Beginner

I have a history of giving up learning a new language after watching 20 random youtube videos on it and mindlessly duolingoing it for a few hours.

I took the beginner Danish class at Fudan, but I didn't spend much effort outside of the classroom to learn it, and I could barely remember more than 10 words / phrases (including people's names). It was frustrating.

I really like the sound of dansk, they say it's like having a hot potato in your throat when you speak, but it reminds me of the country and the people, and how awesome it is. actually, i find scandinavian languages kinda sexy, esp. svenska / dansk.

I watched every single Danish TV series I could find on Netflix. Still, I barely understood anything they say besides hej, ja, nej, det er godt & hvad laver du. No, I've not forgotten the beloved København and the aarhus island

And spanish... it's such a widely spoken and popular choice of language to learn. Only 5 vowels, but I still couldn't do the r sound. That's one of the reason I gave up.

Why Learning French?

• french speakers generally do not speak good english, and my observations, they still do not try to speak english even in english speaking countries (not canada).
• i gradually grew to appreciate the sound of it
• some of my friends learned it, and i want to at least speak a little bit of it too
• very useful in quebec?
• not too easy or challenging, not too useful but can be a lot of fun

I was also inspired by my super polyglot friend V.

Goals

I wanted to register for FLF (Foreign Language - French) 101 course at NCSU, but have conflict schedules.

Reached out to the professor with a cold email and she gave me a really long reply, sending me resources, encouraging me to learn on my own and do the 102 course when I'm ready. (Thank you!)

So that's what I'm trying to do. Self-learn enough in a week before semester begins to be ready for 102.

To do that I have to be more efficient and avoid my mistakes when learning dansk or spanish.

Comprehensible Input

According to a linguistist, comprehensible input is the only way human acquire new languages.

I agree with that, because that's how I learned English many years ago. I just listened to a lot of podcasts and watched tons of movies and TV shows. I love how simple and low-effort the apporach is

So the first step is to find comprehensible input resources for absolute beginners like me. Fortunately, some awesome human beings have already created such content and some redditors have curated them for me:

https://www.google.com/search?q=comprehensible+input+french

The one I'm using it the YT channel below, the youtuber explains everything visually and with body languages, so your brain can fill the gap and get a fairly good understanding of what he's saying.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXweyiR2fMMf-ZrjCNNKWoeq8L6tlSFUV - A1 level - beginner

https://www.aliceayel.com/resources/il-y-a-baby-stage-video-1/ - i really like her baby stage videos

Pronunciations

alexa's: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLV1-QgpUU7N15x-ehJgw2t7MPdcHCySo2

IPA

https://IPAChart.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-fMDMKJAxs

Vocab

I think at such early stage, vocabulary should get more attention than grammar or very accurate pronunciation.

I use Memrise to learn new words, it has visual explaination for words and multiple recordings for each word / phrase.

Progress

• 12/31: learned ~15 words/phrases and learned to type most of them from memory. have a basic understanding of the IPA vowel layout.
• 1/2: Keep doing memrise, start watching Alexa's pronunciation videos

Tips

The R

nothing compares to the danish R!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrjMJ_PAlB8

• rouge red
• orange orange
• arrivera will arrive
• rhododendron rhododendron
• réparera
• will repair

Keyboard

• Accent aïgue (é): Press Option + E.
• Accent grave (à, è, ù): Press Option + ` followed by the letter.
• Accent circonflèxe (â, ê, î, ô, û): Press Option + I followed by the letter.
• Trëma (ë, ï, ü): Press Option+u followed by the letter.
• Cédille (ç): Press Option + C.
• OE: Opt + Q