How I Learned French in One Year

Re:How I Learned French in One Year by tokenadult on Saturday June 13, 2009 @04:33PM (#656454)

learn pronunciation first, and learn the script of the new language immediately

Correct, and correct. All native speakers of any language are habituated to produce the sounds and perceive the phonemes of their own language, and NOT to produce the sounds or perceive the phonemes of any other language. Acquiring an understandable accent generally takes good training at the beginning.

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Re:How I Learned French in One Year by tungstenfurnace on Saturday June 13, 2009 @10:09PM (#656719)

OK, so what's the optimum strategy?

How about starting with a CD and book of nursery rhymes and then listening whilst following the text.

Then eventually ditching the CD and reading/singing the rhymes from the book out loud.

Then (having read the translations) doing the same whilst visualising the content.

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Re:How I Learned French in One Year by tokenadult on Sunday June 14, 2009 @12:33PM (#657238)

what's the optimum strategy?

For an adult learner, CONSCIOUS awareness of the different phoneme system of the target language is almost surely necessary. For some language combinations, dictionaries with International Phonetic Alphabet pronunciation keys can help a good deal. Better quality language textbooks have a beginning section detailing differences in the sound system from the learner's native language to the target language.

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