When I started my intensive French immersion course I tried my best to avoid the English language as much as possible. I also had the conflicting desire to stay up to date with everything that is happening here in France, in my home country of the UK and elsewhere in the world. There are lots of important things happening at the moment which I am keen to keep track of and watch develop during my French language stay. There are many mediums to get your fill of the news here in France; newspapers, magazines, websites etc. but I want to focus on one specific super-convenient type: Applications.
Having French news applications has been a great asset for me for numerous reasons. First of all, it’s free! Just by downloading the apps via the google or app store you get access to live news feeds without having to pay anything at all. A lot of websites are available for free too but some only allow you to read a few articles before demanding a subscription. With apps however, you get access to all of the headlines free of charge.
You get them everywhere as well. You don’t need to stop by a news stand or sit in front of a computer. As long as you have your phone (assuming you are in the majority who have a smart phone these days) you will have constant access to the breaking news and be in the loop continuously. Taking away the effort involved in seeking out news in other mediums makes you more likely to read it, it’s not particularly hard to go pick up a paper or log on to your computer but the ease of just glancing at your phone for a few minutes means that you have almost no barriers whatsoever.
Figure Out How News Apps Can Help You on Your French Language Stay
You can also interact with news apps in a way that best suits you. If for example you are at an intermediate level on your French immersion course you might not feel that reading entire articles is within your grasp yet. This might lead you thinking that buying a newspaper isn’t really worth it just to read the headlines. On a little side note, the staff at the EasyFrench Language School buy a set of newspapers every day for the common study areas so this is one way to get around it at the school but the point still holds for everywhere else. Also, news stations on the TV delve into each topic for a few minutes which may also be a bit much. With news apps, you can delve deeper into the day’s stories if you choose and select other articles based on what you have just read and get that insight you are looking for but you can also just glance at the notifications. The notifications on news apps are great and just pop in automatically so normally when you check your phone there will be a little headline waiting for you explaining the situation that is unfolding. Given the simple communicative nature of headlines, normally they use graspable vocabulary, probably more so than the word graspable. If you don’t know some of the words used, both active and a passive approach have advantages.
If you seek out the meaning of a word you will learn it of course but if you see the word on a notification, don’t understand and just carry on about your business something very interesting happens. You will continue to see the word in all the forms of media that permeate our lives and gradually as you hear more and more about the context you begin to get an idea of what the word refers to. This elongated process really makes it stick in your mind as it has a chance to sink in and germinate.
Often you will receive multiple notifications about the same topic which has a compounding affect too. This is why I think utilising news apps is great for learning French in France and in my experience, they have been a great help and allowed me to meld my desire to get ahead during my French language stay whilst staying abreast of current events.