EMOTIONS/FEELINGS In French

True Crime shows/channels

#1. Hondelatte raconte, on Europe 1

#2. Faites entrer l'accusé, on RMC Story

#3. Murders explained

#4. Canal crime

- take an ebook in your target language that you wanna read - convert epub to txt - copy txt into unique wordlist maker (http://caerphoto.com/uwc/) - remove words in the list you already know - maybe focus on keeping the high frequency new words - make this list into flashcard deck badda bing badda boom

I did this with my Turkish copy of Animal Farm and pulled 212 new words for my Quizlet deck

Japanese starter pack

SO you’ve finally said okay, I want to learn Japanese. If you’ve never learned a language before then it can seem daunting but it’s a very rewarding experience! I’m gonna lay out what helped me start and stuff that I think would’ve been helpful for me even early on! But I still recommend doing your own research and trying lots of different methods bc language learning especially by yourself is a very personal experience! This is also meant for absolute beginners just looking to get started so I will try to keep it simple. 

First I just want to say I think your first goal should be “I want to be able to read and write kana fluently” because even just that will open so many doors and send you well on your way, but most importantly because: romaji will not be there for you. At all. And to be able to learn to read efficiently you need to read! Just like when you first learned the alphabet you must try to read everything, try to read tweets, posts, articles from NHK news easy, candy packaging, anything! You don’t have to understand what you’re reading at all, you just have to be able to read it right. And learn this with all the sources I will list in the post don’t try to learn it completely in isolation. Some tofugu kana resources to get you started/supplement other resources: Hiragana guide, Katakana guide, kana charts

Getting started immediately with apps There’s lots of language apps to pick and try out but I think the 2 best options right away are Duolingo and Lingodeer. Duolingo has improved its japanese course so much since I first did it in 2017, finally more lessons so you can use it beyond the beginner stage, separate lessons for katakana finally, and it uses more kanji to really give you a headstart on that front! Its still kind of inefficient in isolation but its so good for getting you started. If you’re fine with spending some subscription money then Lingodeer, a recently paywalled app specially made for asian languages like Japanese, Chinese, and Korean is worth giving a try! Here’s a video review of it by Miku Real Japanese

Textbooks The most famous textbook used in classrooms is Genki! A good book, its concise, streamlined, and efficient! but it’s not really designed for you to study by yourself. Its designed for the classroom and doesn’t really include a lot of content to help you become fluent in reading kana and some kanji. This can make starting feel more daunting and overwhelming for some so a lot self learners myself included recommend starting with Japanese from Zero! Specially designed for self learners and does a slow and thorough approach with an incorporated workbook section! There’s lots more options to explore tho and cough cough pdf versions to check out before you have to settle with a purchase

Youtube  There are so many good youtube channels both old and new to help you at every step! If you need to hear someone explain things for you bc you want to practice listening/pronunciation, you just like lectures, written explanations didn’t help then youtube is a great asset! Japanese Ammo has lessons starting with absolute beginners, if you want to try your hand at doing lessons with no english at all, then Sambonjuku’s basics can help. Japanesepod101′s youtube is also a great place for beginners! This is just a tiny sample of the many youtube channels dedicated to teaching you japanese so if none of these clicked with you then there’s many more channels to try! All linked channels also have videos on kana! 

In summary simply getting started is the first step and when you conquer kana then that’s already big progress! These are the basic tools that helped me simply start so I hope at least one of them can be helpful, and if not then there must be some tool or resource out there that will work for you! And quick note: a book I’m reading right now that I also want to recommend as supplemental reading is Fluent Forever by Gabriel Wyner. Its really good advice on how to approach and start language learning and I agree with everything I’ve read so far, and its just a really encouraging book! I also recommend checking out Tofugu.com which has a lot of great reviews, articles, advice, and resource roundups for you to explore. also shoutout to my fav langblr on here @ohitoyoshi just because. and if anyone reading want to share what helped them get stared then feel free to add on!

A beginner's guide

Bonjour! Is there a list of things that a french beginner should learn, is there a specific order to learn topics in french? Also, love your blog, it helps me a lot.

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Hello, thanks love you too! Here's roughly how to proceed:

#1. Genders.

Nouns, adjectives, determiners and past participles in French are either masculine or feminine. There is no neutral.

Known: LE/LA/L’ (+ vowel) + singular, LES + plural (The girl)

Unknown: UN/UNE + singular, DES + plural (A cat)

Uncountable: DU/DE LA + singular, DES + plural (Sugar)

How do I know what gender an item is?

Those that end with a consonant are likely masculine (Un éléphant), those that end with an -e likely feminine (Une girafe), especially if it follows a couple of the same consonant (Une tasse). A noun or adjective can be ‘gender-neutral’, or épicène (Juge, Drôle). There are obviously exceptions (Nation, Incendie).

What’s an uncountable item?

It’s a group of items that are either too small or too large to be counted: fruit, sugar, flour, people, etc (ex: Du sable, Des gens).

Let’s practice: Le facteur et la boulangère sont mariés. La ministre est sortie. Un chien aboie dehors. J’ai mangé du pain.

#2. Numbers.

To turn a singular into a plural, adding an -s is your most popular option. It can also be an -x (Bijou, Feu), nothing if the singular ends in -z, -s, -x (Nez); some words only exist as plurals (Ciseaux). There are a few irregulars (Oeil/yeux, Monsieur/messieurs, Madame/mesdames, Animal/animaux).

Let’s practice: J’ai deux petits frères qui sont nés (past participle) en 1998. J’ai un chat sur les genoux. Il y a des noix dans mes gâteaux. Mes yeux sont noirs.

#3. Verbs.

Verbs belong to one of three groups: -er except Aller (90%), -ir with a few exceptions, and the bin (auxiliaries Être and Avoir, Aller, -re, -oir, -ir exceptions). They can be modal (Should) or reflexive: preceded by an object pronoun (Je m’appelle).

The most useful verbs are:

Être: to be, avoir: to have, faire: to do/make, dire: to say, pouvoir: can, aller: to go, voir: to see, savoir: to know, vouloir: want, venir: to come, falloir: to have to, devoir: must, croire: to believe, trouver: to find, donner: to give, prendre: to take, mettre: to put down/place, laisser: to let, to need: avoir besoin de (...)

#4. Tenses.

The most useful tenses are:

Indicative present (J'aime le fromage - I like cheese)

Imperfect (J'aimais le fromage - I liked cheese)

Perfect (J'ai aimé le fromage - I have liked cheese)

Future (J'aimerai le fromage - I will like cheese)

Present conditional (J'aimerais le fromage - I would like cheese)

Present subjunctive (Je veux que tu prennes le fromage - I want you to take the cheese) triggered by certain verbs + que.

N.B.: There are irregular past participles (Être: été, Avoir: eu, Voir: vu, etc.).

Let’s practice: Je ne sais pas. Il dessinait bien. Nous sommes venus. Ils te verront quand ils reviendront. Vous seriez partis tôt.

#5. Function words.

Personal pronouns: Tu manges du pain

Demonstrative pronouns: Celui de ma soeur est mieux

Possessive determiners: C'est ton chien

Contracted words: Elle est au parc

Coordinating conjunctions: J'y vais mais j'ai peur

Subordinating conjunctions: Je demanderai quand il rentrera

Linkers: On se voit plus tard

Let’s practice: Je crois qu’elle sera à l’heure mais je peux me tromper. Pourquoi est-ce que tu pars? Nous reviendrons plus tard, quand il fera plus beau. Vous ne devez pas être en retard sans raison. C’est là, celle à droite.

#6. Basic knowledge.

Accents

Adverbs

Calendar

Colours

Conversation

En + Y

Family

Food

Negations

Numbers

Prepositions

Questions

Relative pronouns

Terminations

Time

Tu or Vous

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As you're mastering those, start practising.

Listen to music, podcasts, books while looking at the transcription - don't translate, get used to the pronunciation and the word chewing. Record yourself reading.

Then, start reading. I recommend starting with children's literature, especially books you already know in English. Things like Le petit prince or Perrault's fairytales should be accessible.

Use Reverso and Deepl as if you were paid to.

Study the pronunciation posts. The devil is in the details.

Learn vocabulary every week. Avoid translating English word by word, it's often a fool's bet; make a simpler sentence instead.

Explore my grammar tag once in a while.

un chat / une chatte  a cat (m.) / (f.) un chaton   a kitten un matou   a tomcat un chat domestique   a house cat / a domestic cat un (chat) persan   a persian cat un (chat) siamois   a siamese cat un (chat) tigré   a tabby cat le pélage, le poil   fur les pattes (f.)   paws les griffes rétractiles   retractable claws la queue   tail une litière   a litter box une chatière   a cat flap / a cat door la nourriture pour chat    cat food ronronner   to purr miauler   to meow feuler   to yowl

i’ll be honest: texting in french is somewhat of a nightmare. things are often written phonetically and literally nothing will look like the french in your textbook. however, just like actual french; it may be nonsense, but it’s nonsense with rules.

in general: - no apostrophes - no accents - je/tu + être and je/tu + avoir become one word je suis → jsuis tu as → tas - je + any verb can become one word je dois → jdois - objects become one word je l’ai → jlai - basically anything that can be combined is combined

ajd - aujourd’hui bcp - beaucoup c - c’est dac - daccord dmn - demain eske - est-ce que g - j’ai gt - j’étais je ss - je suis jcp - je ne comprends pas jpp - j’en peux plus jsp - je ne sais pas jtm - je t’aime koa - quoi koi - quoi mdr - mort de rire mm - même oklm - au calme pq - pourquoi pr - pour prcq - parce que psk - parce que ptn - putain ui - oui wi - oui we - ouais ue - ouais qqch - quelque chose qqn - quelqu’un qlqn - quelqu’un qlq - quelqu’un sa - ça slt - salut ski - ce qui squi - ce qui stp - s’il te plaît svp - s’il vous plaît tfk - tu fais quoi tg - ta gueule tjr - toujours tqt - t'inquiète tt - tout wsh - wesh ya - il y a

hope this helps! and although i did make this list based off of things my friends have said, not everyone texts like this - don’t be too afraid!

Executive Dysfunction & ADHD study tips! 😙 🌷 😘

I’ve collected study tips from myself and others who struggle with studying. Here’s a masterlist of strategies people use to help :) For those curious, #3 is my personal favourite and is probably the main reason I didn’t flunk all of my classes this year. Feel free to add your own!

Sleep, eat, exercise. The basics. Treating my body right helps me keep a routine and makes me less prone to impulsivity. This makes it a little easier for me to do the things I need to do and fight back my executive dysfunction.

Play idle games while working. Anonymous says “I get bored very, very quickly and need constant stimulation, so every time I have to wait for something, I will immediately divert my attention. Having an idle game running helps me not to lose too much focus, so I get more work done as a result.”

Use a tutor. Since I can’t follow self-imposed deadlines, I create external deadlines by booking tutoring appointments. This forces me to make sure I have at least a basic understand of the material before the session so I know what to go over. Most schools have free peer tutors available, so take advantage (if your school doesn’t, try a study group)! This is a great way to create deadlines you can follow, and it always helps to study with someone who can answer your questions and keep you on task.

Play music. @luminarily says “Sometimes I sit in silence and I get bored of it or I get a song stuck in my head or something. But I have forcibly linked music playlist and actually doing something I need to do so that when I put on music I am automatically forced to do the work I was supposed to do. So it makes the work and the listening more enjoyable both and it’s easier to stay on task… I use unpaid youtube on my phone so I can’t leave the tab or else I can’t listen to music anymore so I can’t go on my phone. And also youtube mobile lets you set watch time timers, so when my music stops I take a break and don’t burn out!”.

Play ambient noise. Similar to #4. I am not stimulated enough when taking notes, reading textbooks, etc., but listening to music can be too much and makes me stressed. I like to play ambient noise (my personal nerdy fave is Slytherin dormitory ambience on Youtube lol). It’s enough to stimulate my brain, but not overpowering to where I get distracted or stressed.

Block out time to do work. @tidal-rose​ says “I find it easy to do stuff by saying ‘I’ll do it tomorrow.’ But I don’t mean the procrastinate-y ‘I’ll do it tomorrow,’ I mean plan to do it tomorrow. Set aside a block of time when you are going to do nothing but the task. …I just realized this sounds like such a neurotypical answer oh gosh. It really does work to hack my executive disfunction”

Have a plan. If I don’t have a straightforward + actionable plan for right when I wake up, I will just do literally nothing all day. I have to know what I’m going to be doing when I wake up, like “shower, be at the library by 10am, and do practise problems there”. If I only have a vague plan like “study chemistry tomorrow” it’s a lot harder for me to do anything.

Start small. It often feels impossible to do even the bare minimum. When I can’t even get myself to write a single sentence of my paper, I try to do even less than that. Literally just open up a Word document. Even just opening up a blank page is a fantastic start, and starting is the hardest part.

Change locations. The longer I sit in one space putting off an assignment and stewing there in my anxiety about it, the harder it is to start. So I move. Even if I just go from my desk to the floor. Sometimes this can change my headspace enough to make it easier to do what I need to.

In the likely event that this might be helpful to students around the world - so we know that most scholarly articles have to be paid for to access.

I’m not sure if you know this life hack, but the website Sci-Hub unlocks most of them, you just paste the link to the article and chances are it’ll be available to download.

I just figured I’d share this, because I know it’s such a pain when you find a promising article and it’s not free. If this helps a single person then my work here is done.

Cozy Vocab in French

Some cozy vocabulary in French… so you can have a cozy evening!

une couverture - a blanket

une bougie - a candle

une tasse de café -  a cup of coffee

un thé - a tea

un chocolat chaud - a hot cocoa

les biscuits - cookies

une guimauve - a marshmallow

une pâtisserie - a pastry une cheminée - a chimney

les chaussettes - socks

un oreiller - a pillow

un livre - a book

un pull-over - a sweater

un nounours - a teddy bear

prendre une douche chaude - to take a hot shower

Cats and kittens,

Here's a link to a Google doc file I created. You'll find:

Entire classic books written or translated to French (divided by country/continent + by genre in the French section)

The first chapter FR/EN of very famous novels

Quizzes (made by yours truly)

Have fun!