how much time do I need to learn French?

To learn how much French? If you want to be fluent in speaking, listening, reading, and writing, it will take 7-10 years.

You don’t specify how fluent you wish to be.

I am an ESL teacher so my source for my reply is my training in linguistics. If you study from a book, you will never learn REAL French, as spoken by a native speaker.

I studied french in high school and college for 7 years and the first time I heard a native speaker, I understood very little.

More info is needed to answer your question.

It depends if you are a fast or slow learner. The best way is to go live there and don’t speak English. I would say you will start to catch on in 2 weeks or so. Second best is to find a French-speaking community to visit often and interact with them. Third, take a trip to Montreal in Canada. Fourth, buy CDs and books to learn on your own. A class would help. I studied French and Ienjoyed French movies/TV Shows with English subtitles.

depends how quick of a learner you are. I learned french in half a year by getting a teacher and by buying these cd’s:

Learn French Now!(it’s a cdrom)

Instant Immersion French the euro method( it’s 10 cassettes)

and if you have a mp3 player, an ipod, or a cd player

they have free how to learn french podcasts on itunes

Generally it takes about 2-3 years for anyone to pick up the social language, but that is if you are totally immersed. It takes a total of 5-7 years to learn the academic language if you are immersed in the language and you are taking classes to learn that language. I studied in France after I spent about 4 years learning it in high school and another 3 in college. I still couldn’t understand anyone when I first arrived, but by about 3 weeks there, I was starting to understand everyone, not everything, but it was a start.

French is tricky. I was told that just when you think you know the language, you’ll go to France and they’ll give you funny looks. The only way to really know French is to spend some time in France, and by some time, I mean a year.

well if your learning it with Joubert you kill yourself before you learn it.