How to improve your French instantly - powerful hack
Do you struggle to speak French, even though you have been learning French for a while?
How would you like to improve your spoken French immediately?
In this article, I share a powerful trick that you can use right away to become more fluent when you speak French.
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This is something I have shared only with my coaching clients so far.
Each time I give this trick to a client, I can hear the improvement immediately. Their French get much better just by applying this trick.
It’s a bit of a mindset shift too but I promise you it’s pain free and instant.
Is this your current situation?
Assuming that you have been studying French for a while, you probably ran into this issue:
You know some French, but when you want to speak, you just can’t make the sentences you want to make. Your French skills are just not up to speed with the complexity of your thoughts.
Sometimes, it feels like you have the language skill of a 5 year-old. It’s really frustrating because you don’t want to communicate at a 5 year old’s level.
You want to be the adult you are and talk about grown-up topics, also in French.
It’s normal to struggle when you are at a lower intermediate level and you want to make complex sentences to express yourself. A bit like the sentences in this article. Right now I’m not using today’s trick because I’m past this stage. My English is fluent and I can make complex sentences.
But what do you do if you can’t just make complex sentences yet?
It’s not a good idea to give-up, because if you do, you’ll never make progress. And you also don’t want to sound like a child. Or like you’re stupid.
I feel you. Every language learners faces this challenge at some point. All my clients have had it and I’ve also had it in every single language I’ve learned.
You’ll be happy to know that there’s a trick you can start using right now to solve this issue.
So you can’t make complex sentences. This means that you will have to express yourself in simple sentences.
Making simpler sentences
Can you explain your job or your hobby or a challenge you have in simple words? In English first, before you try in French?
Sure you can. If a child walked up to you at work and ask what you are doing, wouldn’t you be able to explain it to them?
This is the trick I share with all my clients when they struggle to express complex thoughts and feel like they can only speak like a child.
Don’t speak as if you are a child. Speak as if the person you are talking to is a child.
Imagine that the person you are speaking to can only understand simple sentences. Whatever you want to say, break it down into very simple chunks. A few words per sentence.
Here is an example of me explaining today’s concept in simple sentences:
Your French is not great. You can’t express complex things. You need an easy solution. Here is one. Break your complex ideas into simpler ideas. Express one simple idea at a time. Every sentence is a simple idea.
It’s ok, and in fact it is a good strategy to rely on the words you know and to swap difficult words for simpler ones that mean roughly the same thing.
You will make much more progress if you speak in simple sentences with simple words, than if you seek to learn all the difficult words and never get to practice.
So go and practice with whatever you already know. That’s how you get better.
As Maya Angelou said “Do the best you can until you know better. When you know better, do better” This applies to speaking French as well.
When you speak as much French as you can with the skills that you have, circumstances and people around you will give you tons of opportunities to improve. A person might give you a better word you can start using, or a better way to express what you mean. You can also learn better or more efficient ways to express your thoughts from any material around you, or from your daily French bath.
So, start practicing now, with however much French you do know, even if you only know a few words.
Your next steps
If you like this way of learning French, you will love to learn with me as a student or client. Please check out:
My 1-1 coaching program, The French Transformation, if you need to improve your French fast.
My group program, The French Fluency Accelerator, if you’d like to join a community of students from all over the world. We have weekly practice calls together and the best online video library to learn French.
Pro tip: you don’t need to choose!
All my 1-1 clients are invited to join the French Accelerator free of charge.
Feel free to book a call with me now to discuss options.
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