Well - my preparation is basically finished
I'm preaching on Matthew 27 : 45 - 54. I agonised as much over the title as over anything. I ended up with "Understand the Signs of the Cross". Bit of a play on words, and I think it works in French. If not it isn't a huge problem, but it would be a pity to have a damp squib right at the beginning!
I will check tonight with my usual three-parse checklist:
1) genders
2) conjugation
3) agreements a. adjectives b. past participles
This especially after someone the other day said (he's in bold, I'm in italics)
"Vous parlez bien le français."
"Merci, mais il y a des trous! Il y a beaucoup de choses que je n'ai jamais dits!"
"dites. jamais dites. C'est feminin, choses." (the t is pronounced, because of the e)
Point taken. People notice if you forget to do the agreement of the past participle, even in conversation.
(It's great when people help me like this, though because I am old and dumb I have to rerun the conversation in my head to locate the problem and mentally sort it out..)
In an ideal world I would get someone to check my notes for turn of phrase, too. This is the area where I just need to develop and practice.
It isn't actually an ideal world, and no one else will have checked it, so if some is clumsy, it's clumsy!
But it's a start.
And folks are gracious and are actually spiritually hungry, so there's hope that they'll take the food and not notice too much if the cutlery is round the wrong way!
I will check tonight with my usual three-parse checklist:
1) genders
2) conjugation
3) agreements a. adjectives b. past participles
This especially after someone the other day said (he's in bold, I'm in italics)
"Vous parlez bien le français."
"Merci, mais il y a des trous! Il y a beaucoup de choses que je n'ai jamais dits!"
"dites. jamais dites. C'est feminin, choses." (the t is pronounced, because of the e)
Point taken. People notice if you forget to do the agreement of the past participle, even in conversation.
(It's great when people help me like this, though because I am old and dumb I have to rerun the conversation in my head to locate the problem and mentally sort it out..)
In an ideal world I would get someone to check my notes for turn of phrase, too. This is the area where I just need to develop and practice.
It isn't actually an ideal world, and no one else will have checked it, so if some is clumsy, it's clumsy!
But it's a start.
And folks are gracious and are actually spiritually hungry, so there's hope that they'll take the food and not notice too much if the cutlery is round the wrong way!
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