Why can't I speak French? (even though I understand it)

I can understand, I can read it but I can't talk!
Write your awesome label here.

You recognise this, don’t you?

You can understand French.

You follow what you hear.
You recognise the words.
You can read more than you expected.

Then someone speaks to you.

And everything slows down.


So what’s actually going wrong?

Most people think the problem is vocabulary.

Others think it’s grammar.

It isn’t.

You don’t struggle because you don’t know enough.
You struggle because what you know doesn’t come when you need it.

So you start building from English.
You check the words.
You hesitate.

And the moment moves on.


Why does it keep happening?

For a long time, it feels like the answer is to learn more.

More words.
More grammar.
More topics.

And for a while, that feels like progress.

But what you end up with is a lot of French you recognise,
and very little you can rely on.


What actually needs to change?

Most people don’t arrive at this on their own.

I didn’t.

When I was 21 and living in France, I reached a point where I had to make something work. I stopped relying on a phrase book and started doing something different.

I kept using the same phrases.
Testing them.
Adjusting them.

Until they started to feel like mine.

At the time, I didn’t have a name for it. I just knew it worked.

Years later, after decades of speaking French and teaching it to adults, I came across the work of Jacqueline Picoche, who had spent 50 years studying how French actually functions.

And that’s when it all connected.

What I had experienced in real conversations, and what I had seen again and again in the classroom, was already there in the research.

What that means for you

You could spend years trying to piece this together on your own.

Or you can start from something that already works.

Between what I’ve lived out in real conversations, and what I’ve seen across thousands of hours of teaching, I can show you how to connect this directly to the grammar and vocabulary you already have.


Don't hesitate

Do the thing you actually want to do 

You don’t learn to speak by waiting.

You learn by speaking.

Not tomorrow. Today.

Record yourself using this month’s word and send it to me.

We’ll start from where you are now, and I’ll show you what to do next.

It can be one sentence. That’s enough.


What to do from now on

Stop trying to add more.

Take one word, and use it properly.

Follow how I ask you to work with it.

Come back to it.

Build with it.

And over time, it becomes yours.


What changes when this clicks?

You don’t reconstruct and analyse every sentence before it comes out of your mouth.

You don’t stop mid-thought.

You stay in the conversation. Listening, responding, contributing.


One of my learners described it perfectly.

She was in Paris, trying to find the Moulin Rouge. Head down, focused on her phone, working it out.

Her friends said, “Look up.”

She was already standing in front of it!


She said from that point forward she decided: 

  • To stop trying to work everything out.
  • To start using what’s already there and in this case was right in front of her.
  • To start being in the conversation rather than being in a conversation with herself.


Not perfectly.

But naturally enough for the conversation to carry on.

See how this works in practice

If you want to understand how this is structured, and how you would start from where you are now, you can explore that here.

So what now?

If that shift is possible,
why wouldn’t it be possible for you?

If other adults have gone from hesitation to flow,
why not you?

And if you can see what needs to change,
why wait?


Start with one sentence

You don’t need to prepare.

You don’t need to get it perfect.

Record one sentence and send it to me.


Empty space, drag to resize
Created with