I’ve been learning French via Duolingo for more than 100 days now.
I also took six years of French in high school and college, so I started with a base of knowledge, though much of it was lost and degraded thanks to the ravages of time.
Duolingo knows what they are doing. I am learning how to speak, write, and read French at a rapid pace.
Yesterday, something happened that had never happened:
I thought in French.
Elysha has asked me to purchase tickets for “Deconstructing the Beatles” at the Schubert in May, and while eating my lunch, I thought:
“Je dois acheter ces billets.”
I need to buy those tickets.
Granted, I had done a Duolingo lesson an hour before, and I have been studying those very words for more than a month, but that sentence came to me in French without thinking.
I don’t think that has ever happened to me.
I’m nowhere near fluent in French. I have miles upon miles to go. But I’m learning thanks to this app, and even better, I enjoy doing it.
I look forward to my lessons every day, and I’m often doing more than necessary simply because I’m having fun.
Thinking in French!
A new thing. A first-time thing. A signal that I might really be learning this language.
