This is the mother of all free online language courses:
http://www.fsi-language-courses.com/French.aspx
My link is to the French page, but there's a German course down the menu on the left (and tons of other languages).
It was originally devised for American diplomats being sent overseas, and is designed to go from complete beginner to reasonably fluent coversation standard.
It's veeeery thorough, to the point of 'gnaw your own foot off to relieve the tedium'-ness, but very, very good, as it makes you repeat the same phrase over and over, with slight variations for conjugation, noun and so on - 'I have a dog, I have a car, he has a dog, they have a car' sort of thing. There are little dialogues, where you first hear the whole thing and then take the different parts within it, as if you're having a conversation.
I have a lot of French learning packs and out of all of them, bought or free, this is the one that gives me the best workout with actually speaking the language, over and over, until my mouth automatically knows the shape of the words and phrases.
To use, first open the workbook for the required level (takes a couple of minutes, it's nearly 500 pages) then have it on the screen whilst you listen to the various 'tapes'.
In the French section, there's also a 'Phonology' course, which takes the language to pieces sentence by sentence, word by word, syllable by syllable, and is immensely useful for improving pronunciation and accent.
Hope this helps.
kodokan
Linear Mode
