I have found that to build a good speaking level, the first step is to read out loud, after having heard the French pronounced correctly by a native. The next step is to form small sentences about your daily life and passions. And third step is to speak with another person who speaks French. Moving up in the these stages allowed me to build my level with confidence - by the time I was speaking with French people, my level was already Intermediate so I had strong confidence in each conversation, as opposed to being scared to speak. Hope that helps some of you! Thanks, Rory :)
One of the things I like best about your videos is that you’re a non-native speaker & therefore understand the issues we English speakers encounter in learning French.
It’s true. While I’m an early A1 and can’t judge for certain, knowing that your first language was probably English and that you speak so well is encouraging. It underscores the point that we can also attain an excellent French accent with effort.
Your videos are essential, and excellent. My French is OK, but the nuances and tips that I learn from them (and the 'shorts') have been, and are invaluable. And fun too! Merci braucoup!
The point you make about training muscles at 13:30 is important. People often imagine language learning as simply a knowledge building process. For speaking it’s much more akin to learning a sport. As a retired teacher of English, I tried to impress this same point on my students. Learn how to make the sound correctly, then repeat repeat repeat until you don’t have to think about it to make the sounds correctly.
This was very helpful. I’ve been married to a French guy for many years, so I can pronounce most things correctly when I’m speaking slowly, but at a dinner table, I’m afraid I sound very American. Your last example is the most difficult for me. Don’t get me started on écureuil. 😩
You can do it slowly. That's more than doing being able to do it at all. The next stage is doing it in real time at real step. Go gradually and appreciate each step of progress. Not all the rungs of the ladder are equally spaced. :)
In French like in most languages with rounded front vowels, the type of lip rounding of font and back vowels tend to be different: back vowels tend to have protuded rounding and front vowels tend to have compressed rounding. But that difference in type of rounding between /u/ and /y/ is secondary and not even mandatory. The primary difference is that /u/ is produced in the back of the mouth and /y/ is pronounced in the front of the mouth. Effectively, /y/ is an /i/ plus lip rounding. Focusing on the the type of lip rounding to differentiate minimal pairs like "doux" and "du" is IMHO bad advice. It is much more important to concentrate on the position of the tongue. Rounding is the primary factor in distinguishing minimal pairs like "dix" and "du".
Native French speaker here. If I may, you've got one thing wrong : the 'eu' in 'feuille' is not the 'eu' of 'feu', 'peut', ' or 'deux', but the 'eu' of 'peur', 'beurre', 'boeuf' or 'oeil' (not exactly the same actually but close enough to make no real difference). In IPA, the former would written be /ø/ and the latter /œ/. At least that is the case in standard French, many regions would be closer to realizing /œ/ as /ɜ/, a sound which is rarely ever seen in English so it's no big surprise if you find it quite difficult to reproduce.
1). Personne. Open the mouth for the r, like in pear, and sound the double nn as in Son. 2). I. Can either be “e” or “un”. Interessante is sounded liked unterressante. Immersive is sounded like emersif In, Inn, Im, Imm, if followed by a vowel then sound like an “e”. If followed by a consonant then sound like an “un”. Important - is un por tan 3). Dans l’hopital. No liaison 4). Beaucoup. ou bou-cou. dessus v dessous. Sound the ou like in soup for dessous, and like a u or ew for dessus 5). Fueille. Don’t say foy. Instead feu+i+yuh Accueille. A + que + yir
I'm French. I have no idea why RU-vid recommended this video to me, but that was fun. I thought I might comment on your own pronunciation. 1) "Regarde" wasn't correctly pronounced, either. You said it ʁeɡa:ʁd instead of ʁəɡaʁd. For those who don't read the phonetic alphabet, you pronounced the first "e" as if it was "régarde". You also spent slightly too long on the "a" (but that one could be done by a native speaker to add emphasis on the word). 3) The pitfall with the liaison can be avoided entirely on this one because you would say "je le vois bien à l'hôpital" instead of "dans l'hôpital" anyway. 5) I can't quite put my finger on exactly why, but the "s'il" in "s'il te plaît" doesn't sound quite right. It's definitely subtle. Maybe you're going down instead of going up, or maybe there's a hint of an "a" sound. I don't know. Throughout the video, your French "ʁ" aren't very consistent. Some of them are perfect, others... well, I wouldn't go so far as to say they're incorrect, but they'd definitely out you as a non-native speaker :)
Haha. I confuse French people. Sometimes they think I'm one of them, at other times they spot me right out of the gate. At other times, I get "Vous êtes suisse, ou canadien"?
Regarding the "s'il", it's really quite simple actually. The English way of realizing the voiceless alveolar fricative /s/ is mostly alveolar while the French leans more towards a dental.
