Listed here are 10 good reasons to learn French. Let me know what you think in the comments below, and if anyone can guess what all the French phrases mean, I’ll give you a prize!

1. Live happier, be richer
(le cerveau français vaut deux anglais)

OK, this applies to any language – but studies consistently show those with a second (or more) language live happier lives and make more money in work. A 2004 Michel Thomas report said that lifetime earnings increase by as much as £145,000 on average, while having greater success at dating as they were considered “more intelligent” and “sexier”.

2. You’re in good company
(vous n’êtes pas seule !)

The French government is teaching the language to over 750,000 people through its network of cultural institutions throughout the world. They are added to the 200 million people who speak French on 5 continents. Enough said. Continue Reading

Learning to speak another language as an adult with a method that teaches you like parents teach toddlers (such as the Rosetta Stone/phrase book/Michel Thomas/Pimsleur methods) is quite possibly the slowest and least motivating method available.

Using this method you can, at best, learn to speak another language like a toddler speaks his mother tongue; repeating single words to convey a whole sentence and using verbs incorrectly with no understanding of cultural context (manners, customs and norms) or how to be eloquent in that language.

People choose this method because it gives immediate results (feedback on how well you can say one particular word) and gives the feeling that you’re on the road to full bilingual communication. But this is false, and the end result is likely to be as stated above.

They also choose this method over grammar books and emmigrating to the language’s country. This is understandable – grammar books are dry, they cannot be read from cover to cover and emmigrating can cost jobs, family ties, social ties and financial ruin if unsuccessful. So the current barriers to the two most efficient ways of learning another language are boredom and risk. Boredom is the easiest of these two barriers to break down.

Grammar books are dry because they show systems and rules, things people generally hate.  But the information they contain is everything required to start learning words to place in those systems and rules and quickly become a proficient speaker of the target language. If that stage can be reached, accessing the culture and sounds of the foreign language becomes a lot easier and progress can really be made in double the time a child takes to learn a language.

In order to make grammar books less boring, they need bringing to life. Easy to remember diagrams of rules, comparisons with rules in the native language, music even; anything that can be used as a memory aid that require as little text as possible.

The French Journey will try to focus on providing the following in as entertaining a manner as possible:
First grammar (the bones), then the vocab (the muscles and skin), expressions (movements and gestures), phonetics (perfecting the sound of communications) and finally the culture so that any communication made is correct for the speakers receiving the communication.

Welcome to The French Journey. The site is designed to support your French learning as if it were a journey and this site were the map, hotel or road taking you further or helping you to rest; but only as a support – you choose the pace. I’ll be using diagrams, sounds, video clips, postcards or any other interactive way I can come up with. All suggestions are welcome and please go comment crazy, we’ll all benefit from that.

The author of the site will be me, Luke. I hope that my native English will be able to clearly explain many of the more complex aspects of the French language and help you to tackle the common pitfalls that I’ve noticed learners, myself included, have. I will also be sharing some of the tips of those that find language learning easy, often skills that can be applied to other forms of study.

My own experience involves starting to learn French at a young age, in Canada (although born in England) and then continuing to enjoy it, possibly because of the ego-boost the headstart gave me or just because language learning was pleasurable for me in general. I got the chance to take my French to a much higher level when I went to university in France and sat in labs repeating all the sounds looking at simple diagrams of complex grammar rules, had French literature and art put before me day in and day out for three years. Then came the translation classes, the business classes, the work in French businesses and a whole host of other experiences which I now wish to share with you. But I’m only trying to convince you that I can help you along your French journey, I’ll leave the rest of that judgement* up to you.

I now work as a freelance translator and am forging a career out of languages. So join in and we can help each other.

*All spelling in this blog will be in British English, unless I slip up, then the first person to notice wins a prize.