University of Toronto

I think it's really important to keep up the language when you return. You pick up a lot while you're there. But you need to practice! It's tough 'cause you are no longer living in the language. Oh and I should note that the school has a STRICT rule about ONLY speaking French while you are there. In fact, they reserve the right to kick you out of the program if you are caught speaking another language. This is good if you are more advanced but sucks if you are basic. I know a whole bunch of people who went on a trip and they were all very basic beginners. They totally got yelled at for speaking English!! But really.........if they spoke only French their conversations would have consisted of "Hello, my name is......." or "I am good....." and stuff like that. BTW, there are a TON of students from Mexico so Spanish is pretty rampant. In the residences you are pretty much free to speak whatever language you choose. I have to admit we spoke a combination of English-French-Spanish with each other.

It can be intimidating at first to be the only one in the classroom with a strong accent. It is very hard at first to get use to idioms, expressions and slang language use in everyday conversations. Class presentations are part of the academic assigments in Canadian universities and that for me was my biggest challenge: addressing my classmates in a formal presentation. On the other hand, you will find you have a wonderful source of support not only from teachers and classmates but also in campus. It will challenging at the beginning but it will ease with time.

I hope the locals can pay attention to foreigners in English.

it was ok for me with everything

It was easy to me

It was great.