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 FSI Language Courses Forum : Learning Languages : General Discussion
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Karat
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Quote Karat Replybullet Topic: How to use it
    Posted: 15 January 2007 at 5:22am
Hello,

I'm sure this question was already asked several times but I read through the forum and found not comprehensive answer. I'm interested in studying French using the FSI courses but I'm not sure how to do this. Perhaps you should add a small section on the website explaining how to use these courses. Do I have to listen and answer (like the Pimsleur method) or do I have to read a unit and listen afterwards? How does it work? I hope you can help me.
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Exocrist
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Quote Exocrist Replybullet Posted: 16 January 2007 at 11:35am
My assumption so far has been to listen to the material alone if I don't have the book available (biking to class, etc).  Otherwise, I listen with the pdf's open on my computer, and I just follow along.  
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Karat
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Quote Karat Replybullet Posted: 17 January 2007 at 6:16pm
And how often should I repeat a chapter? Until I can everything by heart?
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Exocrist
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Quote Exocrist Replybullet Posted: 17 January 2007 at 8:59pm
I guess my advice would be "until you're comfortable with it".  I've heard 80% mastery of a module before moving on, since they review a little bit in the next lesson and build off of it sometimes, but I don't know if that's necessarily an accurate number. 

Repeating never ever hurts.  If you're at all doubtful about your understanding, or you just want to go over something again, go back and do it.  Maybe not the whole lesson, maybe just part of it.  I find that backtracking a little bit, while sometimes annoying, can be very helpful.  For example, if you did chapter 2, maybe next time start out with the last 5 minutes of chapter 2 and then go on to chapter 3. 

Sometimes, it's also helpful to go back and work on different things.  Maybe you want to go back and just listen to a certain grammatical construct.  Or maybe you've got the grammar and vocab down, but a certain lesson provides a good opportunity to practice your accent, or pronunciation.  It all depends.  If you had a native teacher, it'd be a lot easier to know what to do, and you probably wouldn't need any repetition.  Unfortunately, most of us don't have native speakers to teach us.

If you get everything really well the first time, every time, there might not be a need to ever repeat.  If that's the case, I envy you.


Edited by Exocrist - 17 January 2007 at 9:01pm
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