There are 2 levels of FSI French (12 units each for a total of 24 units).
It is hard to compare the number of units from one FSI course to another because more units can simply mean shorter chapters.
Here, the FSI French units are twice as long (at least) as FSI Spanish Basic, with multiple, multiple sets of drills.
From the standpoint of the recorded audio, FSI Spanish (with 55 units) may have about 2/3's the amount of audio as in FSI French audio (with 24 units). That is, FSI French has something in the range of an additional 30 hours of drills.
In my opinion, FSI Spanish is more logically organized for an easy progression. The course follows more cleanly the dialogue, grammar, drill format. With about an hour of audio for a total unit, that is more manageable for a working person to manage in a week.
In contrast FSI French drills go on and on and on, with multiple chunks of grammar and vocabulary lists in the same unit. The end result is one has to pay more attention to the written manual to make sure all grammar and vocabulary is covered, while it makes it less interesting to do long drill segments with little additional syntactical material.
That being said, it looks to me like FSI French covers the same amount of vocabulary and grammar as FSI Spanish, but includes about 33 % more opportunities to speak and listen to the language in terms of drills and audio. Many people don't realize this because Units 1-8 present grammar and vocabulary rather slowly, but the course really starts to pick up by Unit 9 and by 12-24 the course leads one through heavy drilling in the subjunctive and all kinds of drills with prepositions, verb forms, etc. that are the bane of French students everywhere.
As a barrier to completing the course, many people begin by buying Barron's Level One Mastering French (which is really just FSI French Units 1-6), and then give up in frustration because the grammar is introduced exponentially later on in the course, so they never see the benefits of all 24 units if done sequencially.
Because French is harder to speak for most English speakers than Spanish (and a strong American accent supposedly sounds far worse in French than an American accent with Spanish), that makes FSI French the best course for developing mechanical speaking skills.
As a side note, French in Action (in my opinion) is the best course for developing audio comprehension, and it has audio drills, but it does not drill one in the mechanics of grammar and syntax to the same degree as FSI. My belief is a smart approach (and thanks to our for administrator, now free for the FSI coure) is to use FSI French to learn and master grammar and mechanical speaking ability, while using French in Action (also available for free on the internet) to leaven the dry (but extremely useful) FSI approach with entertaining cultural nuggets of information and massive audio immersion.
To summarize: FSI French over 24 units appears to have just as much grammar and vocabulary as Basic Spanish 1-55, but is spread out less logically over extremely long (to the point of being discouraging) Units.
FSI French has 1/3 more audio content than FSI Spanish, and is THE course to use if one needs drilling in French to have unconscious, fluent command of grammar and syntax, with authentic intonation and speech patterns. FSI Spanish in presentation is not only more logically organized into feasible chunks, but is also somewhat more enjoyable. But the FSI French course has its own comparative strenghts, as FSI Spanish actually provides less opportunity for drilling. Perhaps the infinite language drills are not quite as necessary in Spanish, which appears to be more regular in grammar than the more idiosyncratic French grammar...
FSI French is extremely functional (over 24 units) but dry and somewhat painful--much like a root canal. By combining FSI French (which seems to cover about 1 1/2 years of college French in terms of grammar) with the free French in Action course (available on http://www.learner.org/resources/series83.html - www.learner.org/resources/series83.html ), one can mix a spoonful of sugar in with the medicine and make it a far more pleasant process. It is the French in Action course that inspires me to keep plugging away with FSI French.
By the way, I would recommend the same for anyone using an FSI course--use the FSI Course to learn grammar and actually learn how to speak, but supplement with other courses to develop more audio comprehension and vocabulary acquisition, while (even more importantly) finding material that adds a bit of joy to the process.
--John
[edited for clarity]
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