There’s only two more weeks left of the first term of my French classes, so I have a decision to make. Do I continue on with the (very friendly) group I am with, doing French 3 next term, or do I make the jump to a different teacher and Intensive French 3 and 4 next term?

My inclination is to jump. If I do, I can do French 5 and 6 the following term and actually maybe be able to speak with some hint of competence when I am there in October. It’s much more full-on, with classes lasting twice as long and (probably) twice the homework/revision, but possibly will be more rewarding too.

If I jump and can’t keep up because work gets busy or whatever, I can drop back to French 3 or just do French 5 the following term. If I stick with French 3 next term, I am stuck doing only French 4 the following term as they don’t have a 4-5 grouping.

It all sounds much more complicated than it really is.

Meanwhile, though I learned something interesting chatting with my teacher. He reckons that French 5-6 gets you up to “Year 12 standard”. That is when kids have typically learned a language for 6 years.

So in 3 terms of adult ed (6×15 hours of instruction) we are reaching a level that takes school students 6 years to achieve.

This rings true for me on many many levels, with the sole possible exception of practice time. I will need to be more disciplined about revising between classes if I want to stay on top of things in a more intensive class.

Not sure what I will do about a class in Term IV this year. Term IV starts October 6th, so I would miss the first  4 weeks of class … on the other hand, if I don’t enrol in something then I will miss a full term. There’s time to decide that later, though 🙂