To get the most from your study time, there are eight essential points to remember:

Little and often is the key – it’s much better to study for 20 minutes every day than for a whole hour three times a week. Vary your studies as much as possible – read for ten minutes, then learn vocabulary for ten minutes, then write something or record yourself speaking.

3. Always give yourself credit for your achievements rather than worrying about what you get wrong.

Don’t be over-ambitious – if you study 100 words but can only remember ten of them after a week, then you’ve learnt much less than a person who studied three words a day but remembers them all. Work at your own pace – Get Into French has been designed to be flexible enough to fit in with your life and preferred styles of learning. Remember, every learner is an individual, so take as much time as you need for things to really sink in. Move on only when you are ready – never mind how fast others might be going.

Don’t be discouraged if you appear to be making slow progress. It’s the nature of language learning that the goal posts are constantly moving. Your aspirations and expectations increase, and there’s always something new to learn. Think in terms of how much you already know, and what you can say. Look out for opportunities to study. Listen to the Get Into French audio CD when you’re in the car, read when you’re on the train, use a personal stereo when you’re walking to the shops, put on the CD-ROM for ten minutes when you’re working at your computer. You need as much contact as possible with the language, along with plenty of variety. Look out for patterns in French. All languages are based on rules and patterns, even if there are exceptions. Realising that a word ending in '-ment' in French (for example 'heureusement', 'lentement' or 'facilement') is often the equivalent of a word ending -ly in English (fortunately, slowly, easily) should help you grasp meanings more quickly.