I thought that maybe I could improve my writing skills and listening abilities by practicing dictations. However, trying one from
www.ladictee.fr was like cold shower on my enthusiasm
First of all, there's the huge ambiguity about what you hear, which you can only resolve somehow after hearing the whole sentence. Then there is a lot of guessing about the singular/plural. Finally when you don't know a word it's impossible to figure it out, what you can produce is just a best guess (or a few guesses) of what's the prefix of the word but you never can produce the full word because of silent suffix.
So I really wonder how is it possible to get through dication in Frech. I would bet that whoever can pass it, has a level C1 at least
Dictation is a great way to practice your spelling while concentrating on sentence structure, grammar and vocabulary. If your listening to A1 French, you should be able to dictate it. The dictation should reflect the level you are at while adding a few additional structures to increase your fluency.
And somehow everything what's dictated is endless loop of: comment ça va, comme si comme si comme si comme sa
Tom is a linguistic genius. Must be a side effect of the horse meat.
So I'm also probably at A0 level, that's why
but seriously speaking, seeing how difficult it is I got the feeling that it's impossible below B2, i.e. before your know large vocabulary set and the grammar is so well grounded in your head that you tend to forget it exists
Dictées are a very useful part of learning French and there are dictées for every level. If you try one that is too hard, you won’t be able to profit from them. The goal is to practice spelling and distinction between all the homophones in French. Unfortunately I don’t know of websites with adapted dictées for self-teaching.
Usually you listen to a dictée once in entirety before beginning to try to write. Then a second time with pauses for writing and a third time to check.
Note that native speakers also use lots of dictée so if you do find them online, be sure you find one that has some kind of learner level attached to it and isn’t one made for testing native speakers in school, which would have a totally different focus and vocabulary. The ones you linked to are for native speaker school children. Most C level speakers would struggle with certain school levels—think back to any English exam and the nearly useless vocabulary we are tested on that no one remembers after passing school ...
I think he meant that he can handle an A0 dictation
I don't know what kind of level you wonder to prepare for. I remember when I studied for my master, DALF C2 - Lettres et Sciences, I hardly invested on it, it was +/- 10 hours per day during 2 months before going to the exam. In that time I found a great website:
https://dictee.tv5monde.com/dictee/ and, more, I bought the CLE book - 250 activités for writing and listening skill, coz I have known the textual composition was so hard, normally 3 different textual purposes are made for that level, at least it was like that...
Alors, j'espère que ces informations puissent vous aider à achiver à vos buts. Bonne chance.
I don't have any official level in mind as my goal. I just would like to improve my writing and general understanding of the language. I already have B1 certificate and any higher one would be of no use for me at the moment. Yeah, my writing skills are perhaps at the lowest qualifying level for B1 conversational skills are no better
Keep in mind that language skill gets rusty quickly if it’s not used. So unless your day-to-day includes some reading in French, your reading and writing skills will only go down, not improve. Duolingo can be pretty simplistic but also a good tool if you like it. I’ve never “clicked” with it but I know a lot of people who’ve made good progress with it. Or watch films with subtitles (the subtitles won’t always follow 100% the oral). The TV5monde linked to earlier is a great resource, I use the teaching part of that site for my classes quite frequently.
Another option is always to look for someone wanting to do a language tandem if you just want a little discussion now and again to keep up your skill.
While learning French at school we did dictations regularly, once we had the basics. So A1. We did them all the way through school.
You know whether it's singular or plural usually from the verb ending. If you don't know a word, then yes, it's best guess.
As far as the whole sentence. Try German. You very often don't even know what the main verb is until the last word! (Which is why German speakers never like being interrupted and insist on getting to the end of the sentence )
Reminds me of my Parisian teacher, who used to recite this at top speed:
Bonjour madame Sans Souci, combien sont ces six cent six saucissons-ci ?
Ces six cent six saucissons-ci sont six sous.
Six sous, ces six cent six saucissons-ci ! Si ces six cent six saucissons-ci sont six sous, ces six cent six saucissons-ci sont trop chers.
Dictation should be A1. Maybe B1 if it’s a bit more advanced.
I’m an french teacher. Dictation is extremely difficult, even for natives. There are so many rules and difficulties in French, even very good older students still struggle. That’s why vocabulary, grammar and dictation are a big part of the syllabus at school.
Out of the six weekly hours of French my secondary students have, I spend one on verbs, one on dictation, two on grammar and two on reading / writing. Which is the norm among my colleagues. And my students are natives...
But you can have dictation at lower levels by keeping it simple. It develops listening ability. I also had regular test involving English dictation. I've never found French difficult. I'm slightly baffled. I'm English.
Yes sure, you can dictate simple easy sentences which are possible even at a very basic levels. However, as soon as you use more complex sentences, it becomes more of a challenge. Some people, you appear to be in that category, have a great memory for homophones, rules and their exceptions.
From experience, when I used to teach non-natives, English people tend to struggle more with dictation because the English system doesn’t focus on grammar. And in French, if you can’t analyse the nature and function of a word within a sentence, you can’t accord it correctly.
For decades I have been amused by my children and grandchildren's dealing with dictées in school. The grandchild who lives with me (we speak only in French, he speaks English to his mum) is about to start CE2/H5, finds reading French easier than English, plays one off against the other especially in (adult) books on astronomy which is his centre of interests. Autistic, he's at least 2 years ahead of his peers in French and maths.
I understand you, and every tips in here are available. Your case is complexity of the language, Linguistics name it as Pragmatism and Polysemy. My experience? When I lived in Geneva, I've enrolled in many different mini courses, as political, social, administrative, economic ones, and others just for learning more the language in pratice. In Geneva has UOG, a school not expensive where I could pay for them. Because my social entourage spoke much slang, so, I've had 2 universes of French. Try also to make part of group in French. I was in churches to be a member of a Choir in French, I swear it worked so well.
I recall that when I learned French, we learned the grammar. I probably know the technicalities of French grammar better than English - it was helped by the fact that we also taught some English grammar. Though I can never remember what a gerund is...
Thanks for the explanation.