When it comes to learning any language there are 4 main areas for one to progress in. These areas are reading, writing, speaking, and comprehension. In terms of my ability to effectively learn a language, I’ve found over the past year of learning French that the area I primarily struggle with is comprehension. It is this exactly that has made me learn to appreciate The Talkabroad conversations. 

My first Talkabroad conversation of the semester was with a native French speaker from Morocco. This conversation was the best one I’ve had my entire freshman year and I feel flowed the best out of all of them. The conversation progressed throughout the template given to us but the conversation was able to extend past it and still naturally eventually return to the prompt. Asking about the type of bands she liked and different types of songs from those bands really helped me feel more confident in my knowledge of the French language and made me feel better prepared to interact with a real native French speaker in the future. The conversation was very pleasant and all around I only had a few moments where I forgot a word or had to think of a way to properly say or understand something. Meryem was also a wonderful partner and did a good job of wording things in an easy-to-understand way for someone at my level and also reworded things to help.

I think my strengths for this conversation were my ability to adapt to the changing flow of the conversation. Instead of the conversation staying purely within the bounds of the prompt, the conversation was able to stretch beyond and I was able to get past just the generic information. I think my only weakness to be stated for this would be my struggle with forgetting certain words or not knowing certain words used which comes down to me better expanding my vocabulary. 

The way I can better prepare for my next Talkabroad conversation is simply better keeping up with my vocabulary and practicing it. Information leaves my mind very easily unless I’m actively using it and this is why I need to put emphasis on my French routine and using the vocabulary I learn more often.