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Tools for Intermediate French Students |
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I think intermediate students may be the most difficult group to buy French resources for, because
intermediate is such a vague term. Someone may be a decent conversationalist but not know the grammar, or have all of
the verb conjugations down but speak with a less-than-stellar accent.
Here is an assortment of tools to meet everyone's needs: grammar
references; dictionaries; audio resources, for listening and
pronunciation work; and a couple of "fun" items as well.
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 Les Portes Tordues, by Dr. Kathie Dior
Les Portes Tordues: The Scariest Way in the World to Learn French is a unique book aimed at upper beginning and intermediate students. In fact, it is so unique that it's rather difficult to categorize: it's a bilingual story, grammar review, and audio book all rolled into one.
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Collage : Révision de grammaire
This is my favorite intermediate grammar book, and the one I always reach for
first. Although it is nowhere near as thorough as the Grévisse books in my list
of grammar books, its
explanations are clearer. In addition, there are lots of examples and practice
exercises. (French explanations and examples with bilingual vocabulary lists)
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Le Nouveau Bescherelle : L'Art de conjuguer
Subtitled "Dictionnaire de 12 000 verbes," this is the best French verb conjugation reference, bar none. Instead of wasting space
with hundreds of identical conjugations, Bescherelle has pared down the
conjugations to the bare minimum: one page each for regular -er, -ir, and -re
verbs; a page apiece for passive and reflexive conjugations; and then 77 pages of
irregular verbs. Once you memorize these 82 patterns,
you can conjugate virtually every French verb that exists. French only.
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Larousse Concise French-English Dictionary
Bilingual dictionary with 100,000 entries, including slang, culture, and more. Intermediate students will find that this dictionary has everything they need.
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Le Robert micro poche
The abridged version of Le Petit Robert. This is a good French-only dictionary for intermediate students,
but if you plan to continue studying French, you're eventually going to want the
unabridged Robert, so you might be better off just buying that now so
that you'll be set for years to come (see my list of monolingual dictionaries)
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Street French
While it is essential to master "proper" (i.e., formal) French, it is
equally important to be able to understand and use French slang in order to
really call yourself a French speaker. Once you've mastered all the niceties,
David Burke's Street French Slang Dictionary & Thesaurus is the book
to turn to. Over 1,000 terms and expressions, from familiar language to
extremely vulgar words, are covered - you can pick and choose which levels of
language you are interested in mastering.
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French Lessons, by Alice Kaplan
In this autobiographical tale of life and language, the author recounts how she learned, perfected, and now teaches
French, interweaving French with every aspect of her life. Whether you've just begun studying or have spoken it fluently for years,
French Lessons is an entertaining look at what it means to learn and love the French language.
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Dîner de cons / The Dinner Game
This is one of my favorite movies of all time. A group of friends get together
every week with a guest, and secretly vote on whose guest is the biggest « con. » One fine day, one of the friends gets stuck with his guest, and disaster ensues. Very funny movie, in French with English subtitles.
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