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Becoming Bilingual?!

Lucky, I didn't need to learn any French in school.  But my college would of accepted me into advanced French because I already knew a second language... that being COBOL. 
 
LittleHockeyFan said:
I thought all Canadian hockey fans were already bilingual? Either English or French, plus a phenomenal fluency in profanity?
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I've got English, Jiberish, and conversational Jibber Jabber.   
 
Madferret said:
Sarge said:
I've got English, Jiberish, and conversational Jibber Jabber. 
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Got a silver spoon, on a chain
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"I've got a grand piano to prop up my mortal remains...."

We were having this exact 'debate' at work the other day. The debate was about how do people who come to this country, get free English languages through my taxes, but if I want to learn French, I have to pay? I mean, God love the people who want to learn English, so it's not a shot at them. Just seems to be a bit backwards. I guess I am naive to believe that since we live in a bilingual country by law, I should have all the resources available to me to get French books/courses for free. Heck, maybe I have it wrong, and it is free, but I haven't found them yet.

But good Luck Rick.. I always regret not going past Grade 12 with it. And like you, I have lost it. Lost out on jobs I could have had had I spoken the French language. *shrugs*
 
I found Rosetta Stone wasn't nearly as helpful as simply speaking with people in French. Not sure if it's available where you live, but in some towns there are French speaking people that want to practice English so you can meet a couple times a week and just talk about whatever. You practice French, they practice English.

Maybe there's an online version.
 
BMan said:
Madferret said:
Sarge said:
I've got English, Jiberish, and conversational Jibber Jabber. 
Click to expand...

Got a silver spoon, on a chain
Click to expand...

"I've got a grand piano to prop up my mortal remains...."

We were having this exact 'debate' at work the other day. The debate was about how do people who come to this country, get free English languages through my taxes, but if I want to learn French, I have to pay? I mean, God love the people who want to learn English, so it's not a shot at them. Just seems to be a bit backwards. I guess I am naive to believe that since we live in a bilingual country by law, I should have all the resources available to me to get French books/courses for free. Heck, maybe I have it wrong, and it is free, but I haven't found them yet.

But good Luck Rick.. I always regret not going past Grade 12 with it. And like you, I have lost it. Lost out on jobs I could have had had I spoken the French language. *shrugs*
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The presumption is that you had the opportunity to learn French in school.

Anyone who took French in school knows how laughable that presumption is.....
 
I know the french classes I took in high school were a total farce. I took it in my first year at university and was completely lost. I never took another class after that. Two of my cousins in St. John's went to a french immersion program in their schools and are so much better off by it.
 
riff raff said:
The presumption is that you had the opportunity to learn French in school.

Anyone who took French in school knows how laughable that presumption is.....
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I thought the french classes I took in school were actually quite good. I went to a school with both full english and french-immersion streams and was in the english stream. I'm definitely not fluent like some of my friends who took french immersion by I understand many words and the syntax.

maybe I was just lucky and had good teachers.
 
Bullfrog said:
riff raff said:
The presumption is that you had the opportunity to learn French in school.

Anyone who took French in school knows how laughable that presumption is.....
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I thought the french classes I took in school were actually quite good. I went to a school with both full english and french-immersion streams and was in the english stream. I'm definitely not fluent like some of my friends who took french immersion by I understand many words and the syntax.

maybe I was just lucky and had good teachers.
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Put it this way, one year the French teacher at my high school went on leave at the Christmas break. His replacement was another teacher on staff who barely comprehended the language.
 
Lets start with the basics: "crisse de calice de tabarnac!"  or "Mon dieu tabarnac de calice!"  :-X

Best to save those for if the job interview goes south and you need to make a last ditch effort to show you know some French!  ;D

Kidding aside I'm pretty sure a few of the local high schools (thinking John F. Ross and Centennial)  offer language classes at night as well as Connestoga  College (both Kitchener and Guelph locations) so there should be plenty of options for you Rick.
 
seahawk said:
Put it this way, one year the French teacher at my high school went on leave at the Christmas break. His replacement was another teacher on staff who barely comprehended the language.
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ahh, you got the ol' "teacher isn't available let's use the gym teacher" treatment. We actually had a language expert that could speak all of the romantic languages plus a few others (in high school, that is.)
 
Bullfrog said:
seahawk said:
Put it this way, one year the French teacher at my high school went on leave at the Christmas break. His replacement was another teacher on staff who barely comprehended the language.
Click to expand...

ahh, you got the ol' "teacher isn't available let's use the gym teacher" treatment. We actually had a language expert that could speak all of the romantic languages plus a few others (in high school, that is.)
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Close enough. Then again it was a Grade 7-12 high school of 350 students. We'd be lucky if there was anybody on the supply list who studied French.
 
Bullfrog where did you grow up?
I'm fortunate that I grew up in Orleans - it's about 60/40 English to French, and it's literally across the river from Quebec. So learning french wasn't even really an option for me - I was always able to practice my french in day to day life. You guys are telling me you've never experienced the joys of french girls?
 
I grew up in Northwestern Ontario, a very unilingual place. Knowing French here is unimportant except for some very small communities.

If anything, it's better to know Finnish or Italian.
 
I bought the full Rosetta Stone - french - today off Kijiji.  I paid $40.  It was 6 CDs, burned.  I had tried D/L'ing it but with no luck.  $40 for the full program? Didn't mind paying that at all.  Merci!
 
Hey Rick, best of luck with the learning. I'm trying to learn french myself as well. I'm using a program by Rocket Languages. I see you've already found a good deal on Rosetta, so it's not as important to you, but anybody else looking at a program should check Rocket out as it is MUCH cheaper than Rosetta if you have to buy it new. The quality is very good, the lower price is due to it being a downloadable program (which you can then burn onto CD's) as opposed to Rosetta mailing you physical documents.

As for going to local colleges, I live in London and have taken a course at UWO and was slightly disappointed with it. It's not that it wasn't helpful, but not really worth the price paid, unless you have no other options for personal interaction with french speaking people.
 
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