FSI Conversational Finnish Course

Finnish belongs to the Uralic family of languages and is spoken by around 5.8 million people, 5.4 million of whom are found in Finland – with most of the others located in parts of Sweden and Norway.

It is an agglutinative language, which means it makes extensive use of affixes to form more complex words, and it also has a complicated case system, making it one of the most difficult European languages for speakers of English to learn.

However, the pronunciation is not too difficult, and it’s written largely as it is pronounced, which helps a little. It is an interesting language to study and will open the door to a fascinating country and culture, and for those who want to try, this free online conversational Finnish course will be an invaluable addition to your study resources.

Course Details

What is the Conversational Finnish course?

The FSI Conversational Finnish course was first published in 1987, making it a relatively recent addition to the Foreign Service Institute’s collection of language teaching materials. It is designed to teach basic communication skills, giving students a level in spoken Finnish that will allow them to function in a range of social and professional situations in the country.

It consists of 14 units in which new language is first presented and then practised using word lists, dialogs and drills. These 14 units are also accompanied by exercises in a student workbook for further practice, consolidating what has already been learned.

You will also find audio recordings for each unit of the main course and the student workbook, allowing you to work on improving both your listening skills and pronunciation in Finnish.

One particularly useful feature of this course is that it separates standard Finnish and colloquial Finnish, teaching both and allowing you to learn the correct language for informal as well as formal situations.

How was the Conversational Finnish course originally used?

FSI Conversational Finnish was originally designed for US diplomatic staff preparing for postings in Finland and represents the first six months of an intensive program that would have left students with a relatively high level of proficiency in the language.

Their time would have been divided between classroom time and personal study time, and they would have been encouraged to use Finnish as much as possible during their course. With such perfect study conditions, students were expected to make rapid progress in the language.

How can you use the Conversational Finnish course?

Although this course was intended to be used with a teacher, it was also designed to be useful for students studying alone. This means that even if you can’t recreate the perfect study environment enjoyed by US diplomats, you can still expect to make good progress in Finnish by studying this course.

All you need to do is work through the main lessons and the student workbook largely as you find them, adapting them to your personal needs and learning style as you see fit.

You can use the wordlists, dialogs and drills to learn new structures and vocabulary, to practice and drill what you learn and to work on improving your listening, repeating as often as required to master the language.

With this course, you need to study the first four units in sequence, but after that, you can study the rest of the course in any order you like, dipping in and choosing the units you feel are most useful or relevant to you.

Taking it further

Textbook

Student Text

Unit	Audio
Introduction	Tape
Unit 01	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 02	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 03	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 04	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 05	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 06	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 07	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 08	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 09	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 10	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 11	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 12	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 13	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 14	Tape 1 · Tape 2

Workbook

Student Workbook

Unit	Audio
Pronunciation	Tape 1 · Tape 2 · Tape 3 · Tape 4
Unit 01	Tape
Unit 02	Tape 1 · Tape 2
Unit 03	Tape
Unit 04	Tape
Unit 05	Tape
Unit 06	Tape
Unit 07	Tape
Unit 08	Tape
Unit 09	Tape
Unit 10	Tape
Unit 11	Tape
Unit 12	Tape
Unit 13	Tape
Unit 14	Tape