How good is your French?

[Squirrel]

There's a very good interview with Johnny Depp (yum!) on the DVD of 'Arizona Dream.' The French director conducts the interview entirely in French, he can understand her apart from one or two odd words, but his replies are completely in English. Johnny said something funny once about living in France. He said at first he couldn't understand anything and it was refreshing to just be able to sit there and no have to speak!

[Scarlett]

[quote user="Russethouse"]

 

a member of the western group of Goths who sacked Rome and created a kingdom in present-day Spain and southern France

 

[/quote]

Does that mean they wore black eyeliner and spikey black hair?

I got a grade 1 French O level and did about 3/4 of the A level course but then boys and booze prevented me from continuing with the course - it was at evening class at the time.  I then spent about 20 years having holidays in France but when I moved here I realised I actually knew b****r all that was actually useful!!!  My latin (for which I got 20% in the only exam I ever took) is quite useful for working out what english words you haven't come across before mean.  And my german O level leaves me able to say haben sie hunger, haben sie durst, wie geht es ihnen, ich wohne in der nehe von Cherbourg and that's about it.[:P]

[JohnM]

I think you would have had an "A" in your O level. It was use less able folk that could get 1 2 3 4 or unclassified at CSE! (I got 3 in French

[Mistral]

I remember coming to live in france for 6 months when I was 18, straight after studying it at A level. I didn't understand a word for 2 weeks! After, I got used to it and found I could understand more and more and communicate better and better. I went on to study it at university, but I can't say whether it was the studying or the frequent trips to France that helped me improve (probably the latter when I think of the pittiful state of my German) Living here and only ever speaking French outside of the classroom (and I don't think "where is Julie's hat? it's on the floor." really counts as English) has done the rest.

I can also remember the hours spent learning the subjunctive and the past historic. Since leaving uni, I don't think I've ever written a single past historic, although I come across them in reading. And I seem to use the same subjunctives all the time. Maybe it would have been better to have only learnt être, faire, venir and aller to start with.

[Squirrel]

[quote user="JohnM"]I think you would have had an "A" in your O level. It was use less able folk that could get 1 2 3 4 or unclassified at CSE! (I got 3 in French[/quote]

 

Correct. If you did CSE and got a grade 1 that would be equal to a C grade pass at O level.

[Will]

I actually felt my French was pretty reasonable in a previous incarnation, when working regularly in the south, but living on the Normandy/Brittany/Pays de Loire borders I know how crap it really is. Although the poor souls (sorry, charming ladies) who have tried teaching me the language while I have been living here have been very encouraging, and manage to understand me pretty well, holding anything like a conversation with the locals is a real uphill struggle. It makes me feel like the Indian woman with Marjorie Dawes in Little Britain's Fat Fighters [:)]

I suppose it all comes down to regional variations.

[Teamedup]

But but, I think that the indian lady in Little Britains english is good. Have I been away too long?

[Miki]

[quote user="Teamedup"]But but, I think that the indian lady in Little

Britains english is good. Have I been away too long?[/quote]

Sorry, what's that again ?

[hastobe]

[quote user="JohnM"]I think you would have had an "A" in your O level.

It was use less able folk that could get 1 2 3 4 or unclassified at

CSE! (I got 3 in French[/quote]

I think it depends when you took your O levels - they used to be graded

1 to (I think) 7 before they had grades A to C.  (Showing my age

now [:)] )

Hastobe

[KathyC]

I think it depends which exam board you took as well. Some used letters, some used numbers. What does depend on when you sat them is how many pass grades there were. When I took them, A,B,C,D,E and O (!) were pass grades, and I do mean proper pass grades, none of this "nobody fails this exam even if they get a G malarkey" that we've had more recently!

[Scarlett]

[quote user="hastobe"][quote user="JohnM"]I think you would have had an "A" in your O level. It was use less able folk that could get 1 2 3 4 or unclassified at CSE! (I got 3 in French[/quote]

I think it depends when you took your O levels - they used to be graded 1 to (I think) 7 before they had grades A to C.  (Showing my age now [:)] )

Hastobe
[/quote]

That's right Hastobe, when I took my O levels it was 1-6 as passes and 7 a fail.  The year after I took mine they changed to 1-2=A, 3-4=B, 5-6=C, all the rest FAIL but still people used to proudly state they had 10 O levels and then include the 6 that they had got grade D or E For!!!  Don't know if it depended on the board but I did Cambridge board.  I'll let you into a secret, my German was actually only a CSE but it was a grade 1 so I always say I've got the O level.  BUT I took the O level as well and got a grade 7 - dooooh!

Love

Scarlett

[Just Katie]

Scarlett, did you take them both on the same day?

[Missy]

and recently had just over a year of private French lessons at home with my hubby, an American who had had lessons at Boston's French Institute as an adult.

Could you rephrase that !!... [Www]

Come to think of it, French is about the only thing I can still remember

Waoowee! Some lesson that was....[;-)] [:D]

[Scarlett]

[quote user="KatieKopyKat"]Scarlett, did you take them both on the same day?[/quote]

Couldn't have done that Katie, it would have been brain overload![+o(]

[keith.P]

Sounds like a coach company from the 70`s or was that windsorian !!!!!!!!!

Keith.p