Étudier en France
French Intermediate course B1-B2

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Below are the top discussions from Reddit that mention this online Coursera course from École Polytechnique.

Offered by École Polytechnique. Ce cours de français de niveau intermédiaire B1/B2, conforme aux exigences du Cadre européen de Référence ... Enroll for free.

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Taught by
Julie André
Maître de Conférences en français
and 2 more instructors

Offered by
École Polytechnique

Reddit Posts and Comments

3 posts • 26 mentions • top 18 shown below

r/French • post
132 points • LeVraiPetitRenard
Free Intermediate French Course (B1/B2) from École Polytechnique
r/French • post
127 points • chesscoach_R
Reputable french uni offering free course for B1-B2
r/French • post
64 points • garylaser-eyes
Coursera French Intermediate Course B1-B2. Nous commençons aujourd'hui!
r/French • comment
25 points • Tetrachlorocuprate

This is a great course, very well taught. Was challenging but I learned a lot from it.

r/French • comment
12 points • yolk_sac_placenta

Duolingo's strength is that its gamification makes you motivated to keep with it and finish what it offers. What it offers varies language by language and depends on what you put into it (for example, at least for French, Duolingo has a fair amount of basic grammar and usage--but you can easily skip this content and just do the exercises).

But you can't achieve fluency with just Duolingo. In part, this is because its "mental approach" is all based on translation (e.g. translate J'aime les chiens into English), so it never requires a user to get out of their native language and into the foreign one. It encourages you to continue to think in your native language and translate it to French. Compounding this is the fact that almost no conversational interaction is part of Duolingo--listening to native speakers talk normally, for example, or trying to produce much in the way of speech.

Duolingo is fun and productive, and a great start, but not comprehensive. And it does reinforce some bad habits. When I finished my Duolingo tree and the reverse tree, I added some private instruction and was ready for a course like this, so you can maybe take that as a benchmark of where you can go. After finishing that I switched to a self-created course where I do about a half-hour to an hour of French work each day, of different kinds. I would do two days of speaking with a language exchange partner (or instructor, but of course that means $$--you can find language exchange partners on iTalki or HelloTalk). One day of Duolingo or flash cards (to shore up weak points in vocabulary--numbers remain a sore point with me). One day of conjugation practice (I use Cactus 2000's conjugation game). One day of listening to a French podcast like News in Slow French or InnerFrench. And one day of watching a French TV show. This is in addition to "informal" stuff like trying to get my world news from /r/France.

I'm still not fluent, but I've definitely exceeded Duolingo. And a big part of why I'm not where I want to be yet is that I suspended studying French last year after visiting France and haven't returned it yet. So maybe this proves again that Duolingo's strength (motivation) is probably the most important factor--the best techniques for you will be the ones you can persist with.

r/Idiomas • post
8 points • TrivialSteps
Achei esse curso de francês no coursera é pra nível intermediário B1-B2

O meu francês é meio bagunçado, aí pra quem tá na mesma situação que eu :D https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france/home/welcome

Se alguém animar começar junto, bora. O foco dele é meio em coisa acadêmica, mas acho que compensa aprender assim porque tem bastante conteúdo desse tipo disponível na internet. Eu vi umas aulas de matemática e umas coisas de física, de humanas deve ter mais ainda.

r/learnfrench • post
92 points • slehmann
A1 – B2 French - How I did it and my Resources

Over the past 2-3 years, I’ve taken my French from complete beginner (A1) to B2. This has been entirely self-directed, I’ve not taken any classes to do so, and I wasn’t in an area where I was immersed in French. This is how I did it, along with a whole load of the resources I used to get me there.

For reference, if you don’t know what A1, B2… means, see here. I refer to these levels quite a bit.

Commitment

It’s going to take you time. A lot of time. You can’t learn a language in a month and anyone who says otherwise is spouting bollocks. The key is consistently learning every day, or close to. You need to build a habit of constant exposure to your language, and that’s the only way to make real progress. There are loads of estimates out there about how many hours total it takes to learn a language. I would guess that I’ve averaged about 30-60 minutes a day. When I spent more time each day, I progressed faster, it’s that simple.

The Basics

Duolingo. Everyone loves it. It’s quick, it’s easy, it’s addictive. It’s also shit. Complete and utter shit. You won’t get anywhere with it. No matter how much money they spend on advertising, you will not learn a language from duolingo. I found duolingo semi-useful at very introductory levels because it is a way that you can learn vocabulary, but it’s pretty poor for anything beyond that. Once I got to an A2 level, I quickly found that duolingo was a waste of time and that there were more efficient ways to learn. The one thing it does have going for it is that it’s very good at ensuring you stay consistent. What if there was another app that I could use as the basis of my French learning?...

Anki

Everyone recommends this, and there’s a reason. It’s how many med students get through medical school, and it’s the basis of how I learned French. It’s amazing. All it is is flashcards which get shown to you in a certain number/order every day based on how challenging they are for you. It was the main way I was able to retain what I learned, and it’s brilliant for vocabulary, verb conjugations, and grammar. You know, just the major stuff you need for a language.

There’s an android app which is what I used most of the time, but there’s also a desktop/ios app.

I used three decks, one which I made myself, one that was a vocab deck, and one that was a collection of French sentences. Lots of advice seems to say that you shouldn’t use other people’s decks, and that you should only make them yourself. I disagree. I learned a lot of vocab from these other Anki decks, and it was a good way to reinforce common French phrases.

It’s very important to set the number of cards you see each day to something reasonable. I found seeing a total of 30 new cards over all my decks worked well for me. This didn’t seem like enough initially, but as the number of cards I had increased, this number worked well.

One thing I wish I did better earlier on was creating my cards more effectively. There’s lots of information online on how to do this, including some great stuff on Reddit. I love Cloze cards. They’re a tad weird to learn how to use, but they’re essentially just fill in the blanks. As an example, I struggled with mixing up the verbs demeurer (to remain) and démarrer (to start). I created two cards that looked like this:

Elle ne peut pas _ en place. (She can not _ in place)

And

Nous devons _ un processus dynamique. (We have to __ a dynamic process)

Whenever I saw these cards, I had to fill in the blanks and put the right verb in place. After I created and learned these cards, I never had a problem again.

Assimil

Assimil French With Ease is a classic French learning book which consists of a series of audio extracts which have French/English transcriptions in the text. It’s a bit dated, but I found it was a fantastic resource for me to push me through A2. Assimil’s suggestions on how to how to use their book wasn’t what I followed. Instead, I followed the following:

  1. Listen with the book closed.
  2. Listen to the audio whilst reading the French transcription
  3. Listen to the audio whilst reading the English translation
  4. Listen whilst speaking along
  5. Create Anki cards based on the lesson

Prior to every lesson, I would also listen to the audio of the previous ten or so lessons as well. There’s lots of different twists online that semi-follow the technique I used.

I only used French With Ease, although they also have two other French books: Assimil Business French and Assimul – Using French, which are both at higher levels. All of these books can be purchased or obtained through alternative internet-based means.

Grammar

No one likes grammar. It’s boring, but also necessary. I bought a copy of Easy French Step-By-Step. There’s loads of other grammar books out there, but I think picking up at least one is necessary. I was happy with this one. I also heavily used a youtube channel with lessons called Learn French with Vincent. French grammar is unfortunately stupidly complex, so you’re never going to get it all correct, but a little bit of work here can make you sound like less of a fool!

I'm sure you get the theme by now, but after learning some grammar, I would put cards into my Anki deck based on it.

Langcorrect

Langcorrect is a website where language learners write short blocks of text and native speakers of my target language who are learning another language correct them. It’s entirely free and it has been a really fantastic way for me to get feedback all the way from about A2 until now. When I wasn’t at the stage where I was comfortable speaking with other people, this was my main way to get feedback on my French. Because it is a community-based thing, it is very important that you correct at least as much work as you receive corrections for! Generally, I tried to make my writing entertaining; I would often make them silly stories. All of the corrections I received became Anki cards.

Podcasts

Everyone loves a good podcast whilst commuting. Here’s the ones I listened to:

  • Innerfrench – Really high quality and always recommended. Great for levels A2-lower B1, but you will outgrow it

  • Duolingo French Podcast – Great for levels A2-lower B1. I ripped on duolingo earlier, but their podcast is fairly decent. I found there was a bit too much English in their French podcasts though!

  • Rocket French – Levels A1-A2

  • Coffee Break French – Levels A2-B1

  • Learn French By Podcast – Levels A1-B1

  • RFI – Journal en français facile – Level B1-B2 – A daily news podcast that is done in easy French

Once you reach B1, you start to get to the stage where all the podcasts/resources for learners are too easy for you, but all the native content is too hard. This is what I call “intermediate hell”. To make the transition to native content easier, I found that nature/ecology focussed podcasts were often simpler to understand than others despite their complex topics due to their “David Attenboroughesque” speaking style. One I would recommend trying is Sur Les Épaules De Darwin.

TV Shows/Movies/Videos

There’s a fantastic chrome extension called Language Learning with Netflix that I used heavily. It lets you watch Netflix with subtitles in both English and French simultaneously, and allows you to blur the text out as you progress. It has loads of features like pausing the video after a sentence and so on. It was crucial for me. I originally started with both English and French subtitles displayed, then the English ones blurred, and then both the English and French ones blurred. It’s important to progress away from just having subtitles fully displayed so that you are actually listening and not just reading the English or French subtitles. 😊

Some Netflix series that I watched/would recommend:

  • Au Service de la France
  • Marseille
  • H
  • Appelez mon agent
  • Dérapages

It eventually reached the point where I was just watching whatever trash I could find in native French, which included:

  • Le cercle
  • Plan Coeur
  • Tout part en fumée

Outside of Netflix, there’s an animated series of almost all the Tintin comics, that I’d recommend watching. Innerfrench also has a youtube channel and I quite enjoyed this standup show. In addition, Lumni.fr and FranceCulture.fr both have a large amount of educational video content that I found interesting. Some of it is geo-blocked, but a lot of it is very well produced.

Reading

I found reading crucial to learn new vocab and see grammar in context. I read the following:

  1. Le Petit Prince
  2. Tin Tin
  3. Various young adult fiction
  4. Several books from Mondes en VF

The last one is a series of books that are written specifically for language learners but focus on adult topics. As a result, these books are much more interesting than many young adult books. They also come with an audio version which is a nice accompaniment.

Speaking With Natives

It’s inevitable, and you are going to feel like a fool for the first few times, but you will eventually get over the fear and learn to enjoy speaking. I had a couple of tutors through Italki who I would setup lessons with once or twice a week. I found it incredibly motivating and it was also very noticeable how much faster my French progressed when I was speaking regularly.

There are also a few websites or apps out there that allow you to find language exchange partners. This has the advantage of being free, but I found it challenging to find someone who was motivated and I could speak to regularly. This innerfrench video goes through several of the sites/apps to find a language exchange partner. On a couple of the apps I found people seemed to be more keen to use the apps à la Tinder than for language exchange, as a minor word of warning.

Accent Reduction

Listening to French/speaking it will gradually improve your accent, but I still found mine terrible. I used WorkAudioBook to help improve my accent. It’s a program where you can play an audio file and then record yourself speaking and compare the difference. I used this quite heavily on my Mondes en VF books. It's not exactly the nicest looking program, but it definitely was useful for me.

Another useful resource for me was various youtube channels focussed on pronunciation. One I would recommend is this one (FrenchSounds).

Miscellaneous Resources

My favourite translator website is this one. It provides really nice conjugation tables as well as good sentences in context.

I completed this free online course. I would give it as a decent recommendation if you’re at a B1 level. Some of it is better than others, but I found their sections on pronunciation quite good.

When I struggled to come up with topics to write about, I found this list of topics useful.

My favourite French news sites are RFI and Le Monde, both have large amounts of free content accessible and good apps to read from. RFI also has a large series of podcasts.

r/learnfrench • comment
2 points • RamblingKitaabiKeera
r/learnfrench • comment
1 points • augustabound

I think it must be this one. https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france I was looking this up a while back and only found one course.

r/French • comment
5 points • inverseofblanche

Try edX or Coursera. They have courses from universities all around the world.

https://www.edx.org/course/?language=French (courses in all subjects which are French language)

https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france (an intermediate level B1-B2 class for French students)

https://www.coursera.org/browse/social-sciences?facets=skillNameMultiTag%2CjobTitleMultiTag%2CdifficultyLevelTag%2Clanguages%3Afr%2CentityTypeTag%2CpartnerMultiTag%2CcategoryMultiTag%3Asocial-sciences%2CsubcategoryMultiTag&sortField=

(For coursera, you have to pick a field first, then filter by language, but they have 57 courses in French in Social Sciences alone, and they have other subject areas for business, finance, arts, humanities, math, science, etc.)

Hope these help! They should all be free as long as you only choose to audit the courses and don't sign up for some kind of certificate.

r/French • comment
1 points • mossyandgreen

For those interested, there happens to be another free french course on coursera now. It's for B1-B2 level. Haven't been following the lessons so I've no opinions/comments at the moment. link

r/learnfrench • comment
1 points • bebbex999

https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france/

r/belgium • comment
1 points • robinkak

Ik heb net via coursera een online cursus gevolgd waar ik zeer tevreden over ben.

r/French • comment
1 points • Global__Citizen

I'm currently enrolled in this free course:

https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france

r/learnfrench • comment
1 points • TheRealSulleh

Coursera offers this free course: https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france

​

But it is made for intermediate french learners, level B1-B2.

r/tifu • comment
1 points • atomosk

The real fuck up is you've have 6 years to learn French.

You can do it in one year if you really focus. Here is one and a second resource for you. Don't forget to focus on your listening and conversing skills - you can find a conversation partner online who can give you tips for navigating your vacation.

Of course this isn't to perpetuate the lie, but to thank your in laws for their generous gift of a vacation and not let them down. You should come clean.

r/askTO • comment
1 points • Wonderful__

Try Duolingo. It's not a class, but it prompts you to record yourself (optional), repeat after the words and sentences, and it even has stories.

Otherwise, try TDSB Continuing Education: https://www.tdsb.on.ca/adult-learners/learn4life. I think U of T continuing education also has French classes: https://learn.utoronto.ca/programs-courses/languages-and-translation/language-learning/french. The TDSB courses aren't too expensive.

You can check out Coursera too. They have free courses (unless you want a certificate, but if you just want to learn, it's free). I'm not sure of your skill level, but here's an intermediate course: https://www.coursera.org/learn/etudier-en-france.

r/u_hannaeirene • post
2 points • hannaeirene
Resources to reference while learning French

Hello! I would normally post this in a google doc to come back to as I need the resources, but since I'm new to reddit and trying to get familiar with the platform, as well as this content is relevant for sharing, I figured why not post it here. I'll edit this as I come across other resources that I plan on including in my personal journey through learning French. There are more resources in Phase One right now because that's where I am, but as I find resources above my skill level that I want to use in the future, I'll put them in accordingly.

Frame of reference, I'm just getting started. A year ago I knew zero French, but on an exchange in the Czech Republic (where there were many international students), I picked up a few words/concepts here and there. I've only seriously been studying for the past three weeks (as of July 19th, 2020)

I've divided the resources into phases. They're loosely based on the CEFRL levels, from what I've researched for each resource. Although I don't plan on having A1-C2 here, rather how I feel like dividing things. (I'm no scientist! just trying to organize my thoughts) Ex. many resources say Duolingo will go as far as A1/A2, but B1 would be a stretch. I'll include it in Phase One only.

All resources should be free. Some have a paid option. The only one I'm currently considering paying for is Kwiziq because I really enjoy the learning structure.

Phase One!

Websites w/personal accounts to track progress:

  • Kwiziq with Lawless French (x)
  • TV5Monde (x)
  • Duolingo (x) - truthfully I'm not using Duolingo very much for French, but sometimes it passes the time

Podcasts:

  • InnerFrench (x) - as a native English speaker, I find that this goes slow enough for me to compare unknown words to English and understand the message of what he's saying. Also the topics are very interesting!

Videos/Movies/Shows

  • Rendition of Friends in French (x)

Writing exercises

  • Still looking for something I enjoy.

Language exchange (there's a subreddit for that)

Phase Two!

Websites w/personal accounts to track progress:

  • Kwiziq with Lawless French (x)
  • TV5Monde (x)
  • Coursera B1-B2 Course (x)
  • EdX AP French Language Course (x)

Phase Three!

Nothing yet!