French Language Novels
Posted by admin on March 8, 2010french language novels
The Importance of Cultivating Good Language Skills
In a few short years, the students of today are going to be entering a work atmosphere that will be more competitive and demanding than it is right now. Many of these students will study hard and get really good marks but they may still suffer in one regard. Many of them have really poor language skills. If anyone has any doubts about this then a quick look at some of the social networking sites will confirm the fact. The situation causes a breakdown in communications and the worst case scenario is that students/people with poor language skills may not get the clients or customers they hope for as their poor language turns people off.
What is really needed is an immediate improvement in the language skills that students leave schools/colleges with. The sad part is that the new trend of making short forms for anything and everything is not helping the situation at all. What needs to be remembered is that if you go to someone ans say, “Good evening, myself (your name),” then you are loosing out because companies, clients and sometimes even future employers are influenced the most by the first impression you make on them. Were you to make statements like these then you have already killed 20% of the chance you had of success.
The bright side to this unfortunate situation is that all is not lost. If you wish to then you can improve you language skills really fast. When I started learning French I was also given a few pointer on how to improve my skills with French on my own and I would like to share those pointers with you.
Take an interest: Most of the times learning suffers because the student is not willing or considers it an irritation to study language but my friend, without a language you can not communicate effectively. This is not the stone age and you can not say all you need to with just pictures and gestures. So the smart thing to do would be to take an active interest in the language. Learn a bit about about the language and the people who speak it. This background research will help you understand the language better.
Dictionaries: These will be your best friend while you try to learn a language. If you wish to then, for your ease, you can keep a dictionary that has translations from the language you speak to the one you are learning. In most cases these dictionaries also contain a few pages about the grammar of the language and can prove to be very useful when you need to take a quick look at the grammar.
Read: Once you have learnt the basics of a language and developed some rudimentary skill with it, you already know enough to venture out on your own so what you need to do is get some reading material. The best thing to start with are graphic novels, or comics, because the text accompanied by the pictures will help you understand the situation and what is being said. Once you are proficient in the basics and have learnt more of the language you can graduate to novels. Keep the dictionary next to you and refer to it every time you come across a word you don’t understand. A good thing to start with are the classics.
Speak: Just being able to read a language is not enough to gain proficiency in it. You must also know its verbal form. In some cases the way sentences are written is different from the way they are spoken. To become proficient in the verbal form of the language the best thing to do is to speak to someone who knows the language well. Once you have found such a person try your level best to restrict your conversation to the use of the language you are learning.
Watch/listen: Another way you can improve your language skills is to watch movies or listen to songs made in that language. The interactive nature of these two will again help you understand the subtleties of the language. However in this regard it would be advisable to seek guidance from a teacher or someone who knows the language well while choosing the movie or the song as not all movies and songs are conducive to learning.
Analyze: This was a technique that we were taught when we were in school. When you come across a word that you don’t understand then before you lunge for the dictionary try to discover the meaning of the word based on the way it has been used and once you have decided on a meaning then compare it to the meaning given in the dictionary to see if you were right or wrong. This will develop analytical skills and enhance your understanding of the language. Every time you get a right answer it will also work to boost your confidence in your ability to learn.
Slang: As I mentioned earlier, social networking today has sparked a trend that tends to abbreviate and twist a language into new forms. An example of this is English. Instead of asking, “Where are you?” people ask, “whr r u?”. Another example is the creation of short forms like ‘dis’ for ‘this’ and ‘da’ ‘the’. There are also words like ‘thankx’ for ‘thanks’, ‘gr8′ for ‘great’, ‘cld’ for ‘could’ and ‘wld’ for ‘would’. I don’t need to stress on how important it is for you avoid using these tempting forms of the language. Stick to the correct forms when you are learning.
Another thing I had noticed, when i was in school, was that when it came to English, many of the students would score better marks than me. I was perplexed because their English was poor compared to what I spoke and wrote and yet they did well. The reason was that in most cases they used to mug up the grammar and not really understand it. When it came to answering like a robot, however when asked about why a statement was grammatically incorrect, the only answers was utter silence. I would suggest that you avoid this and pay equal amounts of attention to both, knowing and understanding the grammar.
If you are to gain any level of proficiency in any language then these are the things that you need to keep in mind. Remember that learning a new language is not an impossible task. It is, in fact, easy and can be a lot of fun.
About the Author
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The Outsiders – The Complete Novel (Two-Disc Special Edition) $4.60 Two opposing gangs, the Greasers and the Socs, battle each other over their turf and their girlfriends.Item Type: DVD MovieItem Rating: PG13Street Date: 09/20/05Wide Screen: yesDirector Cut: noSpecial Edition: yesLanguage: ENGLISHForeign Film: noSubtitles: noDubbed: noFull Frame: noRe-Release: noPackaging: Sleeve… |
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Misery [Blu-ray/DVD] $12.65 Studio: Tcfhe/mgm Release Date: 09/15/2009 Run time: 214 minutes Rating: R… |
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Lord of the Flies $6.89 Harry Hook’s adaptation is not as faithful to the William Golding novel as you’d wish (they excised the Lord of the Flies dialogue with Simon!) and because of it, the movie is less allegorical and less resonant. A group of young men from a military academy are stranded on an island. The group quickly becomes fractious with a passive section led by Ralph, trying to get rescued, and a hunter faction… |
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The Kindly Ones: A Novel $9.81 Named one of the “100 Best Books of the Decade” by The Times of London “Oh my human brothers, let me tell you how it happened.” A former Nazi officer, Dr. Maximilien Aue has reinvented himself, many years after the war, as a middle-class family man and factory owner in France. An intellectual steeped in philosophy, literature, and classical music, he is also a cold-blooded assassin and the … |
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Have Mercy on Us All: A Novel (Chief Inspector Adamsberg Mysteries) $8.78 In a small Parisian square, the ancient tradition of the town crier continues into modern times. The self-appointed crier, Joss Le Guern, reads out the daily news, snippets of gossip, and lately, ominous messages — placed in his handmade wooden message box by an anonymous source — that warn of an imminent onset of the bubonic plague.Concerned, Le Guern brings the puzzling notes to the bumbling b… |
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The Rabbi’s Cat $10.97 The preeminent work by one of Franceâs most celebrated young comics artists, The Rabbiâs Cat tells the wholly unique story of a rabbi, his daughter, and their talking catâa philosopher brimming with scathing humor and surprising tenderness. In Algeria in the 1930s, a cat belonging to a widowed rabbi and his beautiful daughter, Zlabya, eats the family parrot and gains the ability to … |