French Twixmas Intensive!

Language learning has many facets: speaking and listening are often paired (oral/aural) and reading and writing are another pair.  Another way of looking at is “active” (speaking and writing) v “passive” (listening and reading).

We feel the key skills to master (being of most interest to the majority of our learners) are speaking and listening, so that you can communicate when travelling.  Listening is probably the harder of these, as you may make yourself understood but understanding what comes back can be demanding, as how people phrase responses is unpredictable!  You are ideally looking for a so-called “sympathetic interlocutor”, ie someone who understands they need to slow down, while still speaking normally, but you can’t really screen people you happen to meet!  Our teachers are sympathetic interlocutions – they will speak at an appropriate pace and “grade” their language in relation to the level.  This is why it’s a good idea to take courses with us in the “shallow end” before you throw yourself into deep water!

Reading of all sorts is great for input but relatively “easy”, as its not in real time.  Writing is a very special skill – not everyone can write well in their first language; mastering this in another language, with aspects such as register/tone and punctuation conventions, is tough!

Our advice: focus on speaking and listening and build up your vocab, which is key to fluency.  Grammatical accuracy is important too, if you want to come over as an educated person.  You can buy grammar exercise books and study this aspect in your own time.