As the title says I completed the fifth level of Pimsleur French 5, and I wanted to share what I thought about this and a bit about my experiences with language learning so far. I'll include a TL;DR at the bottom.
Before I bore most of you with my life's story, I'll start by saying that I consider myself nowhere near fluency or any sort of completion after finishing this program - I believe I am in between B1 and B2. The big advantage with this program seems to be that I am relatively easy to understand when I speak and that I feel comfortable speaking and putting myself out there, even when I'm fumbling for words. I don't find it difficult to communicate at a basic level. That's the good - the bad is that my listening - the skill I consider to be the most important in language learning - is not as good as my speaking: by that I mean, it is easier for me to make myself understood than it is for me to understand the responses I get.
I began learning French because I found myself playing a computer game (Albion Online) with a group of Francophones by sheer chance, or at this point, I consider it to be a huge stroke of luck - but I didn't know that it was at the time. This was in April 2019, a bit over a year ago. At first, they told me they would speak English to me, and it would be no problem. Their English abilities weren't exactly flawless, but I became very interested in learning French, because I was hearing it in the context of the game and sounds which I heard repeatedly started to stick as words and phrases now and then. Being Canadian, I thought I knew a thing or two about French due to having taken it in public school, but I soon found out that I knew nothing. I began to use the Michel Thomas Method as it was freely available on YouTube to learn how to put together some phrases, and to my surprise, it worked. I started on Pimsleur after I reached the end of what I could access with Michel Thomas for free. I would try out new phrases and words that I learned on my Francophone friends in the game as I progressed in my lessons to solidify some of what I had learned and to see if they could understand me.
I struggled constantly and wasn't often understood at first. I also didn't often understand much of what was spoken to me, which resulted in a lot of communication in English. However, when I began Pimsleur 3 things started to change. I had built up enough knowledge to actually become understood. When I finished Pimsleur 3, one of my friends remarked "Is that you?! You're actually speaking French!" I noticed a huge improvement from the beginning to the end of level 3, and again with level 4, it felt as though my abilities skyrocketed. During level 5, I definitely learned some handy phrases, but I feel that level 5 held less value than the previous two levels did. Because of this, I am not sure if my time could have been better spent ending on level 4 and focusing on more listening related activities.
Despite its flaws, this program has allowed me to communicate in another language, albeit not fluently, and I believe that it's biggest strength is accessibility: you can do your lessons while doing mindless tasks, such as the dishes, that you have to do anyhow. I don't think I would have been able to complete a program if I had to sit down and do a lesson each day.
I've had conversations with people who I would not be able to communicate with in English, and I've learned things about their perspectives and culture. Since I began learning French over one year ago, and especially since the completion of Pimsleur level 3, I've had some of the most fun I have ever had in my life - the thrill of being able to communicate in something that isn't English, and I didn't even have to travel. I'm very excited to go forward, and I've been using LingQ and Yabla to try and tackle listening comprehension. With the foundation I now have, and that's really what I think this program has given me, a foundation, maybe I have a shot at studying a bit of grammar.
If you made it this far, would you tell me which programs or learning methods you think are effective for improving one's listening ability?
TL;DR
Level at the end appears to be above B1 and below B2.
I always used this program when walking somewhere, doing dishes, something I had to do anyway, so it was very easy to motivate myself to use it.
At the same time as I was using Pimsleur, I was also playing computer games in Francophone communities, practicing and trying out what I had learned.
I feel that Pimsleur did an excellent job teaching me how to speak clearly and to be understood, but it lacks on the listening side of things. I have to spell words by guessing or sounding them out when I write, although, reading isn't much of a problem, and I did not do any of the reading lessons.
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