❤️  love all things French (le fromage 🧀 , le vin 🍷 , le ski 🎿 , la plage 🏖️ , la mer 🌊  , les baguettes 🥖, la gastronomie 🍽️ , la mode 👜  , la nouvelle vague 📽️ ) etc.

💙  love going to France (la Bretagne, la Provence, les Alps, Paris, Toulouse)

❤️  have a holiday home in a France 🏡

💙  have family/friends living in France 👨‍👨‍👧

❤️  love learning 👨🏿‍🎓

💙  love travelling ✈️

❤️  love chatting and socialising 💬

Take your French from 0️⃣  zéro to héro 💯  in a few weeks, in fact days, if you go all in bonkers. 😵  Zoom 🏃🏽‍♀️💨  along the fast-track to learn swiftly to get-by in French or give it a quick🌲  spruce🌲 up for your next trip to la belle France.

There are 15 modules in 'Get Beyond Tarzan Level 1' you’ll learn French in a fun way through a series of practical situations you’re likely to find yourself in: bakery 🥐, café ☕, taxi 🚕 , public transport 🚄 , hotel 🏨 , restaurant 🍽️  etc. with grammar intertwined 🌱 and taught in a digestible way. You'll be up and running quickly 🏃🏽‍♀️💨  if you want to be or you can take your 🍬  sweet time, relax and learn in the bath 🛀 .

Here’s what you get in each module:

📹  A video (around an hour) where I take you step-by-step 👣  through how to build your very own French sentences - you'll be navigating your way around restaurant menu like a local. Soupe du jour anyone 🍲 ?

🎧  An audio MP3 version of the lesson so if you prefer to learn through audio on the go you can do that - in the bath 🛀  or cleaning the loo 🚽  to make housework even more productive!

📜  Written notes on each lesson - you don’t have to pick up a pen if you don’t want to

✍  Practice sentences with the answers so you can cheat if you get stuck

🎶  Extra bits about the French and France – songs, culture, those things only the French do.

You'll become familiar with expressing yourself in the present 🎁 , the past 👶🏻  ('And when I was two...') and be able to tell people what you're going to do in the future. 🔮

'I have recently finished the Get Beyond Tarzan Level Fun Holiday French for Adults 1 with Cecile. I thought it was great. I have studied French at O’ level and used various books and cds but I learnt more about French pronunciation in my first lesson with Cecile that I had in all my previous years of trying. The course was interesting and fun. The videos that accompanied the course were fun and easy to watch. I now feel confident and keen to practise what I have learned when next I visit France. Merci beaucoup!’ Chris Armstrong

Your brain 🧠  will be given a workout by: ordering at the bar 🍺 , introducing friends and family 👪 , ordering ice cream🍦,  discussing the weather 🌦️ , camping and glamping 🏕️ , shopping at the market 🍑,  choosing cheese 🧀, doctors/hospitals/pharmacy 🏥, visiting Versailles 👑 . All this while learning some really fancy pants grammar in a fun way. 

You'll learn how to say things like:

• 'This bar is noisier than that one!' 🍻 🙉
• 'You have drunk my beer!' 🍺
• 'I'd like a gingerbread ice cream with sprinkles in a cone please - no cream.'🍦
• 'Brest was called the chamber pot of Brittany!' 🌧️
• And how to pronounce quand, Caen, camp (Bonus they're all pronounced the same!) 🏕️ 
• 'I knew you wouldn't buy any peaches!' 🍑  🍑  🍑
• 'When I speak French my tongue hurts!' 👅
• 'My husband sneezes eternally!' 🤧
• 'Ow!' 😫
• 'She will have had fun at Versailles!' 👑

'I have tried various French teaching methods - books, Cds and online - but the quality of Cecile's videos surpasses them all. They are bright, engaging and funny and use all kinds of imagery to make words and phrases stick to your brain. She pauses for you to have a go, then builds on each theme, taking turns with you to repeat and expand your vocabulary. The videos also work well as audio, useful on car journeys. These are very polished and thoughtfully produced and make some of the big-name products seem so dull!' Steve Ellis

Perhaps like Steve & Chris (yes, they’re real people – Steve has une maison secondaire 🏡  (a second home) in Normandy & Chris likes to cycle 🚴‍♂️  in France and sample the local 🍺  bière and 🍷 vin). They signed up to my lessons after trying out various courses, apps, books, CDs and finally they had big break throughs.

You’ll be taken from the very foundations of French (alphabet 🔤 , pronunciation 💬 , genders of nouns ♂️ ♀️, greetings 👋 , numbers 🔢 , dates 📅  & telling the time 🕰️ ).

You'll delve deeply into all the tenses (👶🏻 past, 🎁  present & 🔮 future) & moods like the imperative mood (used for giving orders 🎖️) ‘Donnez-m'en deux SVP.’ ‘Give me two of them please.’ and the conditional mood (could, would, should) ‘I would do it if I could but I shouldn’t!’ ‘Je le ferais si je pouvais mais je ne devrais pas!’

Grammar need not be tedious 💤. Splutter not! I have gone to great lengths to make it clear (even if you are grammar phobic) and dare I say enjoyable! 💃

There are over 💯  hours of video here which will see you well on your skippy way to becoming more fluent. 

'I wanted to learn some French. I was working in France and travelling extensively, I even had a holiday home, a Maison Secondaire. So, I needed to get into the French language rapidly. Importantly, I needed both a depth and breadth beyond that of school French and holiday phrase book French. I found all of that in Everyday French with CecileBB. The ongoing course, based around a progressive series of video lessons, backed by summary pages and translation exercises provide an expanding and deep insight into the language. Each lesson introduces you to grammar, vocabulary, common French usage and more. Lessons are also structured into groups where specific themes are developed, expanded and consolidated. From a basic beginning each video takes you deeper into the language. Each lesson is structured to lead you, one sentence at a time, through the grammar and usage to produce execute and accurate translation. By pausing the video and doing everything yourself you can quickly advance and gain confidence. Each lesson is delivered in a fun and interesting way with humour and introduces you to learning devices to help you remember vocabulary and the way to do things. The series of videos forms the perfect archive to return into and consolidate your knowledge. Cecile has a perfect French accent, so, by listening and repetition you also get the ideal opportunity to speak French in a way that the French understand. There is also a wealth of additional video and audio material you can access with the course relating to French life, music and culture. All of this takes you deeper into understanding the French language and people. The French appreciate if you try to speak French. They are more impressed if you can use the correct grammar and idioms. Simply to master pronouns and the proper tenses of verbs shows a mastery that makes conversations more relevant and rewarding. Everyday French with CecileBB gives you this start. It is more than a basic course simply to get by. It is an introduction to sound foundations upon which to build an expanding knowledge of the French language and culture. With it you will learn to speak and understand and to read and to write in good French. I cannot recommend it highly enough.' Professor J I Gillespie

• Get Beyond Tarzan Level 1️⃣  - Fun Holiday French for Adults - Great if you're a beginner or very rusty and want to get on the fast-track. Get by in French quickly after this course. Around 15 hours of video with additional supporting material.
• Get Beyond Tarzan Level 2️⃣  - Fun Holiday French for Adults - Great if you quickly want to be able to express yourself more fluently with some fancier French - different tenses etc. (again around 15 hours of video plus plenty of supporting material).
• Fun French Grammar Courses - There are 14 courses (over 100 videos in total of between 15-40 mins each). You'll be delving much more deeply into the grammar but in a fun, informal, clearly explained way. You can follow the lessons even if you're rubbish at grammar.
• Méli-Mélo (French for Mish-Mash) - Loads of extra lessons about different themes; culture, celebrations (🎄 Christmas, 🎊  New Year, 🐣  Easter, 🎃  Halloween etc.), famous people bios, seasons, songs, poetry, listening exercises, general life, mindset stuff, how to get better at learning/remembering etc.

Whether you go for the fast-track 'Get Beyond Tarzan Level Courses' or the more in depth 'Fun French Grammar Courses' or the Méli-Mélo Mish-Mash stuff - you're covered with different ways of accessing the material to suit your learning preferences (depending on your personality, other commitments and time constraints). 

📹  Videos – oui

🎧  Audios – oui

🎲  Games – oui

🎶  Songs – oui

🔏  Poetry - oui

🕶️  Famous people bios - oui

🎊  Customs & celebrations – oui

🔮  Clear explanations – oui

✍🏽  Done for you written notes – oui

🎪  Fun lessons – oui

👣  Logical path – oui

🔁  Built in repetition – oui

👁️  Daft visual clues – oui

👂 Daft audio clues – oui

👄  Pronunciation simplified – oui

🦁  Confidence tricks (ROAR!) - oui

🧠  Memory prompts - oui

💪  Practice activities – oui

🤩  Personal touch – oui

💶  Affordable - oui oui oui oui!

🐢 You can go at a pace that suits you. It’s taken my local classes around 6 years to do 1-hour/week of lessons with me plus a bit of homework. Now, we're reading French books together to keep the momentum going. 

🐇 One of my students, from Hvar, Croatia went all in and has done it all in just over 1 year completely on her own online 💻 . She has gone over and over the videos and is determined to chat to the next French-speaking people who come to her family’s B&B. The last time a French couple stayed she was too scared to try and was frustrated with herself. She has now put in a lot of work (and I mean a lot) to be much better equipped to attempt a comedy French conversation. In an update she sent me a message to say she had just sung a French nursery rhyme called ‘Savez-vous planter les choux?’ ('Do you know how to plant cabbages?') with some French kids visiting her guest house with their family. She was so delighted. Moi aussi - Me too!

And that’s an important point – if your goal is perfection I fear you’ll be disappointed. If your goal is to have a comedy conversation in French with many mini-mistakes, some dodgy pronunciation, some total blanks with a sprinkling of faux-pas but overall you communicate pretty well – then you’ll love these lessons. 💕

Learning something hard like a foreign language can be like therapy.

As an adult you may hate that feeling of not being able to express yourself as freely as you can in your native language(s). You may feel vulnerable and not in control. But working through those feelings of frustration, discomfort and embarrassment can build up your confidence not only in French but other areas in your life that you’ve been reluctant to tackle for fear of feeling vulnerable, exposed and ‘stupid’.

In the words of Brené Brown 'I want to be in the arena. I want to be brave with my life. And when we make the choice to dare greatly, we sign up to get our asses kicked. We can choose courage or we can choose comfort, but we can’t have both. Not at the same time. Vulnerability is not winning or losing; it’s having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome. Vulnerability is not weakness; it’s our greatest measure of courage. 'Rising Strong: How the Ability to Reset Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead.'

How long it takes you to get more fluent depends on your goals, your beliefs about your capabilities, your reasons for learning French, the time you have and your other commitments.

Imagine that learning French is like climbing a big mountain 🏔️ in the Alps. It's probably unrealistic to think you can zoom up the mountain like a local if you have comparatively little climbing experience. What if you were trying to climb this high mountain, without a map, good equipment, whilst answering work emails, taking your kids along and your ageing mother? 

So set your expectations to a realistic level (comedy French/Franglais usually works), do what you can, when you can with the other life commitments you have. Take breaks, keep coming back, use the resources to help you with how to learn if you struggle with that. Most importantly, be kind to yourself. 

You can speak at least one language - so you can learn another but it may take a fair bit longer! And that's more than okay (at least I think so). 

Me too! I find it difficult to retain info in my (thick) head 🤦🏻‍♀️ . When I want to write notes on something I’ve heard or from a text, even following a recipe, I instantly forget what I’ve just heard, read or listened to. Soooo frustrating 😤  and I wonder if there’s something wrong with me! Are you like that?

My French courses are designed to help you if you have the memory of a fish 🐠 . I use hundreds of pictures so that you have visual cues to make the French stick 🥖 longer in your head.

Through these visual cues plus silliness, 😺 animal impressions, outbreaks of 🎶  song snippets repeated at level ANNOYING 🔊 – the French becomes far more memorable 🧠 .

Plus, because the lessons are daft you get to enjoy what could otherwise be dreadfully tedious - resulting in a 😴  yawn fest or the heaviest eyelids ever! That or a huge urge to purge your kitchen cupboards or dust ornaments that haven’t been touched in 10 years!

'Cecile’s classes are friendly, relaxed and fun whilst being challenging. She is a fabulous teacher, helpful, encouraging, patient and practical in her approach, but most of all you come out having actually learned something. She takes the time to explain things which is important and uses good visual aids to jog the memory. Her lesson support information is excellent with a concise review of the lesson plus videos. This is particularly helpful when you need to think about what you have learned or for those moments of brain fade. I can highly recommend Cecile’s lesson and teaching methods. I look forward to going to class because I know I am going to have an enjoyable time and learn something too.' Joan Mudd

Clearly, you could teach yourself French – there are plenty of free resources out there (you should definitely take advantage of them). But even the top athletes 🎽 👟 at the peak 🥇 of their game have a coach 📢 . You will perform better and make more progress with a guide who is showing 🗺️ you the way, helping with pronunciation 😝, supporting you 🆘 , keeping you accountable and motivated. You’ll get pep talks and reassurance all the way through to keep you on track and inspired 🙌  🙌.

Even if you can't afford a personal French language coach these lessons are highly structured, thought out and engaging because if you're enjoying yourself the tricky parts are more likely to stick and you're more likely to keep learning.  

I couldn’t afford personal teachers and fancy courses when I was learning foreign languages. I had to toil 📚 and motivate myself which was very hard at times. Even though I did persevere, I think I would have learnt faster and gone much further with a livelier presentation of the language and more stimulating materials. Who were your favourite teachers at school? A teacher can make you love or hate a subject. Language learning can absolutely be fun!

'In my first career I was required to give training in many diverse subjects as well as my own engineering discipline, at 42 years old, I trained to be a secondary school teacher. I believe Cecile is one of those rare gems in the teaching world; she easily engages her students, regardless of background or ability. She sets the bar to the right level for each individual while maintaining the class standard. After every class you will leave with more knowledge and confidence. Her classes could be considered as intense due to the amount of work covered, but you won’t feel like its hard work. Cecile’s method is exceptional and geared toward a fast but thorough ability in spoken French while still maintaining correct grammar etc. If you really want to learn to speak (and read/write) French: DO take this amazing opportunity to study with one of the best tutors I have met in over 50 years. If you need any more convincing … she is ridiculously cheap!' Steve

Firstly, it is hard so no wonder you find it hard. Think about how long it took you to learn your native language. Years! But, you can learn to speak a foreign language – if you don’t have brain damage there’s no reason why not. You can learn how to speak conversational French. It will probably be littered with mistakes. If you accept that then you’re more likely to make progress, not give up and have the courage to engage with French speakers even if your French is not top notch.

Everyone is at level rubbish 🗑️  to begin with. Even if you stay at a basic level, make sure you still chat to people in French, people will appreciate you making the effort and having the good manners to converse in their language. Plus they’re so good at French they can fill in the gaps and get the gist of what you’re trying to say.

As they said in Âllo Âllo - 'Listen very carefully. I shall say this only once!' It's okay to be mediocre - just have a go anyway. You can make mistakes in grammar, pronunciation but please don't make the mistake of not just having a go. You'll lose a lot of special moments and connections with people by staying mute 🤭 . Blush your way through the mistakes if need be. 😳 

I can still remember my family ordering food in Kefalonia (a Greek island) by making animal noises 🐔  🐑  - I was about 16 years old and I remember it because it was so funny for us and the staff. 

'The lessons with Cecile have been very helpful to me as I find it very difficult to speak in French. Her lessons have helped me improve a great deal.' Owain Roberts

By the way - you will have done many hard things in life. Learning hard things like a foreign language or how to draw, in fact anything that uses brain power, keeps your brain in better working order. It's a case of use it or risk losing it. 🧠 🧠 🧠

My brother wanted to learn Japanese 🇯🇵  and kept waiting until he had ‘more time.’ Then, he realised that ‘time’ of ‘more time’ would never come. He bought the course and has been learning on and off for years. No regrets – just pride.

It’s hard and he makes mistakes but he loves being able to say this and that. Oh how we laughed when he asked his Japanese girlfriend’s mother if she’d like more black wine rather than red wine 🍷! Brilliant!

He also travelled to various Spanish-speaking countries over the course of a year. He told one shop keeper he was pregnant 🤰 instead of embarrassed 😳  and asked a hotel receptionist if he could hit 🤜  her rather than pay her 💵 . I wish I’d been there to see their faces!

If you’ve been meaning to learn or update your French ‘one day’ for a while, let’s make your ‘one day’ happen now. Try it and see if you like it. You’re an adult – no one is forcing you. Do it because you want to. You can always knock it on the head. 🔨

Bonjour! Comment ça va?

I’m a bi-lingual (French mother 🇫🇷 , English father 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 ) fully-qualified language teacher. I’ve got the teaching certificate 📜  and everything!

I have been teaching languages since 1993 and my other passion besides languages is psychology (I have a Combined Honours degree👩🏻‍🎓 in French & Psychology from Aston University and a Post Graduate Certificate in Education from Leeds University - both in the UK).

I’m fascinated by the different ways people learn 🧠  and I’ve incorporated fun effective elements to suit different learner types into the lessons.

I’ve taught all the age ranges from newly born 👶  (my daughter when she was a baby), children in schools 🏫 , people in businesses 💼  to retired people 👵  👴🏽 . And to people at very different academic levels from a special school to advanced level French learners.

Language learning is for all – and I believe it should be and can be fun to learn a foreign language.

With the Everyday Fun French Clan I teach you how to string together your very own comprehensible French sentences.

You'll remember the trickier aspects of French using daft associations so that you better understand both spoken and written French.

You'll learn how to get a great French accent 👄  and pronounce things so you can be actually understood and more importantly, build up the courage 💪 to actually dare to speak in French to native speakers – eeeek! 😥

If you’re ready to embark on a journey of ups and downs 🎢  to get to the beautiful destination of the speaking 🇫🇷  French world, I’m here to guide you, support you, reassure you, show you short cuts, enjoy the view and inspire you to really learn to communicate well in French. 👍🏿

'Cecile is a wonderful teacher with great fresh ideas on how to teach. Cecile puts a lot of effort in all her teaching. She is trying to entertain students with French. There is an incredible friendly atmosphere in the class and loads of fun. I enjoyed every moment spent in the French lessons and the teacher is most amazing person I have ever met. She can teach, she understands and believes in her students. Cecile proved to me that learning a new language can be easy, interesting and funny.' Mya M

1. Appealing 🦋: The courses are fun and engaging which keeps you entertained and wanting to come back and so you persevere longer than you would probably have done.

2. Gratifying: Building up full sentences from simple to more complicated very quickly without it feeling like a chore. You get quick 🏅 wins🏅, which feels rewarding and exciting. 

3. Practical 🔧 : A mixture of practical language so you can communicate in everyday conversations, daft information to make you laugh 😂  and recognise some of the commonly used French expressions which make up a big part of everyday conversations.

4.💥  Stimulating: There are pictures and quirky associations used to make the information more memorable. Silly ways to remember things, ridiculous sounds, snippets of songs, cartoon images that make the French stick more (French stick🥖 !).

5. 🗂️ Variety: You can watch the videos, you can listen to the videos without all the visual cues which help you to think on your feet, you can read the summary notes and do the practice written sentences to see where your gaps are. Many people think they can remember but then stumble on the written sentences – they will highlight what you need to go over again.

6. Playful 🤹🏻‍♂️ : There are games which are a fantastic way of learning vocab, verbs & expressions without it feeling like a chore and very effective for retaining info long term.

7. 🎵 Tuneful: You get links to French songs 🎤 – another great way to learn a language which is why we teach nursery rhymes to kids. There are some cheesy pop songs and nursery rhymes which use simpler and repetitive language – so you’ll get an annoying few lines stuck in your head on a loop.

'I have gone from knowing a few words on a French menu to being able to construct and decipher some (in my opinion!) quite complex sentences. It feels like this progress has been made almost without trying as the lessons are always fun and full of energy.' Joe Munday