How do I incorporate more French in daily life?

In addition to the lessons I am doing, I watch the occasional movie & children show. I have the Rocket French app in my android phone that I can listen to when I have opportunity. How do I incorporate and SPEAK more French in my daily life while I am at work for example? I feel like it's all stuck in my head and the only opportunity that I speak is when I'm doing the lessonsI would love to hear some creative ideas.

Here are some of the things I do: -Set my homepage to French news. I have mine set to <a href="http://www.lefigaro.fr">Le Figaro</a>, but there are others. On Le Figaro, listen to "L'actualité en vidéos". They're short but you get the flow of the language even when you can't follow it completely. Sit through the "pubs" (publicités=commercials), browse through the diapos (diaporama=photo gallery). As a bonus, you become au courant on French culture and current events...like the return of Sarkozy. :) -Listen to French music. I listen to it almost exclusively now, including when I run (I set up an all French music playlist), but of course, you can mix it up. You start memorizing phrases, and a lot of idioms come up again and again. Look up the lyrics ("les paroles"), and start singing along! -Since you have a smartphone, I also use the lesinrock app. It has a selection (but whole) articles on French culture, including pop culture. -If you use social media, follow French personalities. I follow all the French singers and bands I like on Facebook and one artist even writes occasional poetry on her Tumblr page. -Email French friends in half French/half English. As a cinephile, I have a few international friends, so instead of conversing in English, we do moitie/moitie. -French tutoring. I have French tutoring with native French speakers four times a week. For me, this was key to overcoming the anxiety in speaking French in "public". You get used to making many mistakes, so it's no longer a big deal. :) -Subscribe to language and culture tips sites like <a href="http://www.francaisfacile.com/">Françaisfacile.com</a> or <a href="http://www.commeunefrancaise.com/">Comme une française</a> for tips on how everyday French is actually used/spoken. I also enrolled in her 4-week course, but that's entirely up to you. -Read French books (aloud), even if they're for kids. I'm reading all the <u>Le Petit Nicolas</u> series and also the fables of La Fontaine (the chapters are short, so even if the language is too advanced for you, it's still only a few pages at most to digest). Plus, with La Fontaine, you'll know all the bedtime stories that every French kid knows by heart, like <u>Le Corbeau et le Renard</u> or <u>La Cigale et la Fourmi </u>.

I love all your suggestions! They are all excellent! I've made Le Figaro my main page. I am in the process of selecting a French radio station of music I like. I'm considering a French tutor too. Thank you for your awesome response! Very helpful.

I seem to be around the same point as you french connection. I have recently found the podcast by 'learn french with alexa' she does a weekly topic then asks questions about it to help with comprehension. I don't understand most of it but I find I am picking up more and more with repeat listening. I also really like telefrancais which is on YouTube. It's a 70's show for kids but at a level I can mostly comprehend (and you get used to how silly it is).

Telefrancais is fairly easy to understand and would be good for many who are relatively new to RF. The program is Canadian and is aimed at French immersion students who have been in the program for about two years, starting in Grade 1. It's entirely in French but there's enough context to help make the dialogue understandable.

I also forgot to mention the app book box french which has children's stories read to you. I have also found that very useful.

Instead of Foxtel, I have Canalsat Australie french cable TV. French television where you can watch 40 french channels. Call: 1800 245 465 Mon - Sat 7.30am - 6.00am Sunday 8.00am - 12.00am. canalsat-australie.com You can watch movies, music and news whenever you wish. Found this information via alliance français.

I also found that many of our favorite movies/DVDs at home have French as an optional language. Since we don't have TV, we watch our movies A LOT, so I know most of the dialogue by heart. Switching to listening to my favorite movies in French (with English subtitles) has been really helpful and fun for me. Don't do it with French vocal AND French subtitles, though--they DO NOT match. No idea why, but the spoken words are not even close to the written subtitles, which is frustrating and confusing. Although sometimes French subtitles with English vocal are good, so you can SEE the words they're using. My favorite movies...for ease of understanding...have been Ever After (Drew Barrymore) and Elizabeth-The Golden Age (Cate Blanchet), also French Kiss (Meg Ryan) is good but harder to follow. Somehow the 'court' language in the 1st two films tends to be spoken more slowly, making them easier (for me) to follow. Love all the suggestions above! I don't know anyone bilingual, so I'm in my own "boat of one" with my studying. I also try to think of what I'm doing throughout the day while I'm at home, and describe it out loud to myself in French, making the concept/sentence as complex as I can. I will ask myself "Do I know how to say this in French?" and often I find the answer is YES. So far, that's all I've done, but I'm going to try some of these other suggestions. MERCI!

PS - I also somehow happened to own an early 1900s schoolroom French textbook copy of an abridged version of The Count of Monte Cristo, complete with penciled notes from the 1900s school girls who used it. In the back leaf they have written notes about which boys they like to 'step out' with, which is adorable. What I love about that particular book (besides it being a great story) is that it has a glossary in the back, so you can read it and look up every word you stumble on. Plus it has annotations to a glossary of phrase translations, and study questions as well. :)

There is also www.france2.fr which is a daily news program in France. There are broadcasts at 8,13,20 heures. They are all recorded so you can view them going back as far as a week. I prefer 13 heures. The woman broadcaster seems to talk a little more clearly and slowly than some of the others. There is also fr.yahoo.com (no www), which has almost all the sames news and other stories as US yahoo. Finally, there is a Swiss site www.rts.ch which has a plethora of things to listen to. I've found that their announcers pronounce things much clearer than the French. It's easier to follow along. Check out the Archives section for some very interesting history. Bon courage

You could just take a trip to France (or anywhere else). Start now. Have a walk through Paris with Google Maps. I'll get you started at the Opera. Same place you would start if I gave you directions from the airport: https://goo.gl/maps/N24Ho This wasn't available when I was a kid, but today I can go anywhere instantly. I can read the signs and see the buildings and people. I don't have to pay for a ticket to mess with airport security. I don't have to listen to the noise of cars and ambulances. Have fun. If you don't have a mac or an iPad or something quick and powerful, don't bother. Google needs your PC to have a little power, but if your network is fast enough, you can really move fast through this environment. There are so many photo spheres and slide shows you could never run out of material. And you can move between cities faster than the TGV. Now that Netflix is available in France, you can buy a subscription to unblock-us and you can select France as your region. https://www.unblock-us.com/ What anything you like with French subtitles until you don't need them anymore. -Jason

I love all of these great ideas, and will start using them myself! I'm just getting started, but I have been listening to a French radio station and writing down the song titles that I like and then looking up the lyrics along with the translations. I listen to the song as I read along. It's helping me a lot.

Try "Love Learning Languages with Jennifer".  She is amazing at explaining things and has many videos.  It's a wonderful compliment to our course.  

Don't forget to check out Google Translate too! I never knew it existed, and omg what a cool program!!   I use it on my Android phone all the time--especially when I'm not home at my computer-- and I LOVE IT so much.  

With GT, you can type sentences or paragraphs in French and check your grammar, then hear the spoken words and work on repeating them.  

You can also speak into your phone in French, with GT 'listening', and what's the coolest.thing.ever .. is when GT actually recognizes that you're speaking in French and translates it correctly to English.  I love that, because I can work on my pronunciation and repeat it until GT recognizes it and gives me the correct translation.  Helps SO much with confidence about my accent-- because, if a computer thinks I'm speaking French, I'm doing OK, right?  

I have the GT tab open almost all the time on my computer, so I am always popping on there to type a sentence or check a word or spelling.  Helps me so much to stay motivated, since my chances of meeting a French-speaking person or traveling to France are practically zero...
 

I met a penpal from France on Conversation Exchange.com.  
 

visit france

Well i recomend to you to hear more french music, look for french movies, try to buy book in french and try to undestand them.

I'm just starting out with French and I was wondering the same thing. These are all wonderful suggestions. Thank you!

Popping back in to see if anyone knows whether the French tutor option on Rocket is still an option? I saw it last year but haven't paid attention to it since then, and now it appears to be gone?  

Is there still a French tutor option available through Rocket??

I haven't seen it either. I'm going through the Japanese course now and there aren't any links in those modules either so I think they've discontinued it.

I've been using tutors from italki for French, Japanese, Spanish and Swedish for about three years now, after my first tutor (who I'd been learning from for two years) moved to Portugal and no longer taught during the weekends. It's worked fine. It's been difficult to find a teacher (in French) whom I've been able to stick with for longer than a year (hours change, teachers become complacement and no longer correct, and in one case, a teacher overshared her personal life and creeped me out), but it works for short-term objectives, like practicing the subjunctive for a month or something like that.

Omg torusan THANKS.  

I had never heard of Italki.com.  Checked it out, and I have several trial sessions set up with French community tutors this weekend.  Excellent prices and what a wide range of tutor/teacher choices.  

thankyouthankyouthankyou!

No problem! Glad to help. I think it's the best managed portal/site for finding teachers/tutors out there. Bonne chance !

Try and go to Quebec, that might help with learning French or try and find a tutor so you can try to speak French with him/her.

Try and go to Quebec, that might help with learning French or try and find a tutor so you can try to speak French with him/her.

I agree, the people in Quebec are very grateful that visitors are learning French and English is freely spoken too.