Studying languages

Spank

Languages are not my thing, deffo Irish and French are my two weakest subjects. Doing higher Irish and Ordinary French. Anyway, what's the best way to study languages, do you think? I'm finding it hard to actually sit down with pages of writing and try to memorise it. Or do I have a choice lol?

tolosenc

Irish, I'm fluent, so it's just a matter of knowing the poems and stories and stair. Can't help you there, just learn everything you can about them.

French, I buy a copy of "Le Monde" once a week and read it(dictionary in hand). I feel it gives me an idea how French should look and sound.

Those and past papers.

md99

obl wrote:

French, I buy a copy of "Le Monde" once a week and read it(dictionary in hand).

Where do you get it?

Selphie

They sell it in Easons in Cork :P:P
We get Francais Plus, which I also find handy. It's not too taxing to translate either, and there's topical stuff, for example articles on fashion, Bebo, etc... You can get your teacher to order that for you. Past papers aswell though, yep.
I don't know much about ordinary French, but maybe learn off phrases to do with postcards, "Here I am in .... the weather is good/bad/indifferent etc...."

For Irish, I do exactly what you don't want to do. Pages of stuff to learn off! That's what helps me anyways!

is_that_so

Here are a few podcast links I came across.

http://www.learnoutloud.com/Podcast-Directory/Languages/French/Learn-French-with-Daily-Podcasts/22845#
http://www.rte.ie/rnag/gaeilgenahardteiste.html

That French one has grammar podcasts as well.
Mostly though it's grind as posted, head in the book and learn it.
Do 40 minutes , then break then another 40 minutes.

tolosenc

Well, my local shop stocks it, though there are an awful lot of French people living locally

originalcupcake

dont do irish so unfortunatly cant help ya out there...

but french, i worked thru all the comprehensions in the exam papers, and looked up the words i wasnt familiar with, wrote them down and learned them. i go back over them about once a week. i found that the same vocab keeps coming up. i got the idea from a guy who got an A1 in french so it must work!!

for the long answers id say learn off a few sentences that can be manipulated into any answer, as if u write an essay thats not relevant, ul get docked marks..

Selphie

For French also, it may be handy to learn off some proverbs/handy sayings. If you have Bac Francais 1 or 2, there's a list at the back. Apparently if you incorporate these into your answer it makes you cool!

lilmizzme

Im the same, I find just keeping it basic, using simple,clear French throughout a written section works well, then just throw in a few complicated, pre-learnt phrases to make it look good....:)

JBoyle4eva

I do go onto fr.wikipedia.org a lot. There's loads of articles relating to all sorts of things, just like the English version of wikipedia (

interpolian

I'm not the best at languagues myself doing both ordinary, i find for irish going through the exam papers and answering each question on pro's and filioct good (even though its a pain)then handing them up get them corrected and keep your answers clipped to the top of the exam paper to refer back to constantly going back and reading over them and eventually it sticks,
im afraid im a lost cause in french i dont know where to start myself i just tried to do well in the oral (which went ok) to relieve a bit of pressure off the written exam.

Spank

Thanks for the advice. The podcasts are good, listening to a language helps me more than reading it really. I'm just going to learn off french letters and notes and hope for the best, along with knowing all the irish pros and poems & essay phrases