Notes from Meeting 4

Thursday afternoon, we read a poem by a Moroccan poet, translated into French from the Arabic.

For next time:

• Look for imperfect & passe compose exercise clarifying use.
• Practice with pronouns (placement; direct/indirect)

Notes from Meeting 3 on 6/25/08

Notes:

• We discussed the difference between savoir and connaitre.
• We talked about the verb savoir and its idiosyncracies in French. (conjugations!)
  
• We read over, discussed, and practiced some idiomatic expressions using savoir.
• We talked about goals for the lessons, including ideas for vocabulary themes.
• We talked about online resources, including this blog, our private Ctools site, and others.
  

Goals:

• Be more comfortable speaking with vocabulary she knows.
• Move passive vocabulary to active.
• Build more solid grammar knowledge to enhance speaking fluency

Topics for future lessons:

• s'interesser; conjugations of reflexive verbs
• imperfect

Ideas for future lessons:
Working in computer lab?

Ideas for future home study:
Online activities.

Teaching suggestions:
More real-time correction in conversation.

Themes de Vocabulaire

• la politique
• le travail (ingénierie)
• les etudes
• la cuisine
• la conversation polie
• le voyage
• les voitures
• l'energie

(de notre rendezvous 6/25/08)

Bienvenue!

Voila! Nous avons un blog.

Recently my friend approached me about doing private intermediate-level French lessons together, after she realized that the community college course in intermediate French she'd been planning to take would have meant studying in a class with beginning and intermediate students, with very limited contact for the intermediate students.

I'm not a native speaker, and I'm a bit rusty in my own French since I've been focused on Hungarian for the past ten years, but I studied the French language for many years from elementary school through college. My student and I are getting together more or less weekly for conversational lessons. This is a blog for our classes, to discuss goals and progress. I initially made it a private blog for the two of us, but as I added more and more free online language learning resources today, I realized it might be of interest to a self-directed learner. If you wind up here and have suggestions or ideas, or you find this useful, it would be great to hear from you.

Notes from Meeting 2

Vocabulary

• s'inquiéter Verb, pronominal to worry, fret (Infml); s'~ de qch to worry about sth; s'~ pour qn to worry about sb; t'inquiète pas! (Infml), t'inquiète! (Slang) don't worry! (neutral), don't fret! (Infml), no sweat! (Slang)

• aider Verb, to help; to ~ sb do sth aider qn faire qch

Est-ce que je peux t'aider avec quelquechose? (Can I help you with something?)

3. help Verb, transitive

(at meal) to ~ oneself se servir (to, en); yourself to vegetables sers-toi de (or) en légumes

• distingué Adjective distinguished, elegant, refined; veuillez agréer l'expression de mes sentiments ~s yours faithfully

• soigner Verb, transitive (of doctor) to treat, (of nurse) look after, nurse; to look after a plant, dog, groom a horse, take care over work

• mourir - to die
• nettoyer - to clean
  

Notes for future lessons:

• Review me/te/le/la, etc.
• metal, shape, coal