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French textbooks/resources?


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My dd began learning French in late grade school, but only very simple vocabulary workbooks, vocabulary cards, post-it notes that you stick on things in your house that show the French translation, and lots and lots of songs that teach days of the week, numbers, etc.    (YEARS later when she was taking a French exam, she said all those songs came back to her and helped her so much!)

That's really all we did till high school, and then she took French classes online.  She took it through IQ Academy, which back in the day (10 years ago?) was offered in our state.  It was actually pretty impressive how much she could do online with a teacher.  It had far more practice and opportunities than I ever would have imagined possible for online language learning.  She put more effort into that than any of her other classes.

Is there an online class your dd could take eventually?  My dd did that for three years in high school.

She also read French translations of books she had already read in English, like Alice in Wonderland and Harry Potter.  (We were able to find them at local universities.)  That doesn't mean she understood every word at all, but she knew the story-line so was able to follow.  She listened to French streaming radio.  She got together with the one person in our town who was French about every other week and had lunch with her while conversing in French.

She graduated early from high school and attended a semester long French immersion course in France.  That was very difficult for her and she felt she only really understand a small part, but boy, did it push her!  And, it allowed her to test out of French level grammar courses in college and go directly into literature and writing.  Also in college, she did a semester abroad in Dakar, Senegal, where all of her classes were in French.  

In other words, she mostly took advantage of what was available, stretched herself a lot and always felt like it was much harder than what she was capable of doing.  🙂  But, she's fluent now, so I guess it went along okay!

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We're using Global Goose this year, which uses a lot of resources (Duolingo, quizlet, quizzes, Easy French Reader and school textbook.

We used online live tutors for a while. We used Breaking the French Barrier and some books from France in the past. We started using Seneca for Biology Subject Test prep, and they have free French on their British side: https://app.senecalearning.com/courses?price=Free I'm not sure what levels are which, but it looks like a good spine for things like J-rap mentions above.

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You could start pronunciation with a syllabary.  This links to some free and cheap ones.

https://infogalactic.com/info/Syllabic_phonics

I got a free PDF copy by clicking years ago, using my knowledge of Spanish and clicking a lot of things.

http://www.lalibrairiedesecoles.com/produit/manuel-de-lecture/

Edited by ElizabethB
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I'm using C'est à Toi because three levels (including TMs, workbooks, & some audio) were gifted me. I've seen Bien Dit! textbooks recommended & French In Action.

If you get a textbook, make sure you get  a corresponding workbook and audio files (sometimes available online), if possible. Sometime during French 2, I start having my kid do an hour a week talk with a native speaker via italki.

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20 minutes ago, RootAnn said:

I'm using C'est à Toi because three levels (including TMs, workbooks, & some audio) were gifted me. I've seen Bien Dit! textbooks recommended & French In Action.

If you get a textbook, make sure you get  a corresponding workbook and audio files (sometimes available online), if possible. Sometime during French 2, I start having my kid do an hour a week talk with a native speaker via italki.

Thank you for the recommendations!

The talking part I can do myself, I learned the language while living in France as a kid and have kept it up fairly well. 

I'm not up to providing an immersion environment at home though, and need a structured program to help me teach in a non-immersion manner.

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I was never fluent -- just took up to French 5 (wasn't labeled AP back then) in high school & went to France once as an adult. I have the first two years of textbooks that I used in school but no additional materials (audio/TM). I bought a bunch of stuff to cobble together a program but found that using the stuff that was given me was best (for me). 

I also have Easy French Step by Step, French Now! Level 1, and Getting Started with French. My DD liked GSWF the best. I didn't care for the order things were presented in Easy French or French Now. (But if you want either/both, let me know!)

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If you’re looking for textbooks I really liked Galore Park’s French for common entrance. Used to be called So you really want to learn French or something like that. The audio files came in an email link but the book had to ship from the UK and I had to wait a bit for it. I got them for my elem daughter, but just passed them on to my middle school niece. 

Edited by madteaparty
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My younger daughter is taking Spanish 3 with Leven this year.  She’ll continue with him, but also wants to add French next year.  So we’re using Getting Started with French this semester, and we’ll officially start French 1 in the fall, with me as co-student.  (I took French in high school, but most of it is long gone.)

Because we’ve used Vistas (Sr. Gamache) and Descubre (Sr. Leven) texts for Spanish, we’re super comfortable using Vista Higher Learning’s materials.  Since I found a couple copies cheap on Amazon with unused codes, we’ll use Espaces 3rd edition + workbook + Supersite (online component including audio & vídeo content).  I doubt I’ll be able to get instructor access because the rep assigned to my geographic area says that’s no longer allowed, but that’s okay, we’ll just use the auto-graded online exercises. (Espaces is the same as textbooks D’Accord 1 + 2.  D’Accord is packaged for high schools, while Espaces is the same curriculum packaged for colleges.  An Espaces online code is good for 3 years, and completion of the entire text would be a solid French 1-3 sequence.  An ambitious student could complete it in 2 years.  That is my daughter’s current plan, but we’ll see.  This is a grammar- and vocab-heavy curriculum, which some students hate, but my kids have done well with that approach for Spanish.)

I don’t speak French, so we’ll add weekly conversation sessions, probably with a LiveLingua tutor, but if we don’t find a good fit there we’ll look on iTalki.  I’ll probably also purchase access to CMU’s inexpensive courses to use as a secondary resource (https://oli.cmu.edu/courses/elementary-french-i-independent-paid/).  And I’ll likely add French in Action videos at some point, but I understand that many students enjoy it more if they already have a foundation in the language.

Edited by jplain
Oops, originally included wrong link for CMU OLI.
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