French Experience

An inbuilt audio test makes sure all system requirements are met and equipment is working and ready for you to begin--it's then up to the user to determine how much to cover each session. After an introduction covering the basics and course outline ("Bienvenue") there are 16 units (such as "Famille" and "A Toute Vitesse") with clearly specified objectives neatly divided into two to four sections per unit (for example, "Talking about your job and workplace" and "Numbers 70-100"). Each unit also has a section dealing with pronunciation, a series of video sequences and activities to develop and enhance your language learning. A Study Resources section on the Course Menu that can be accessed at any time for a glossary, language summaries, verb tables, reference lists and interesting "Culturoscopes" (articles about the country, its culture and the people) and the extensive Help menu is only ever one click away.

Course guidelines suggest it will take between six months and two years to reach a level of French roughly equivalent to GCSE level (depending of course upon the amount of time you can commit to study and any previous knowledge). A study tracker means you are in complete control of your learning and you can monitor your progress throughout the course. You can print much of the reference material to enable additional study away from the PC, and assessment exercises every four units will test to see how well you are progressing. Bonne Chance! --Melannie Pring

There are 17 units each with a particular theme and each section within a unit comprises; an audio visual presentation, a vocabularly list, information showing key language structures, a bank of activities and a simple visual presentation giving background information about France and the French.

Each unit comprises a short section providing information on French sounds, together with 2 practical exercises and an interactive video-based role play which is based on the unit theme. There are up to 4 sections on specific topics relating to the unit theme.

This CD-ROM is based on an approach that has been proven to work effectively with both independent and classroom learners. It emphasises: clearly-identified objectives, manageable learning 'chunks', language content relevant to both beginner and more advanced learners, activities to help users put new language in to practice and frequent opportunities to recycle language and check progress.