I remember in secondary school having to learn English, German and Latin. In primary if we were naughty we were in detention after class and we all had a little red book called
'le Bescherelle'. This damn thing even made in to Wikipedia. It's
the grammar/conjugation bible and god knows we have s||t loads of verbs groups, tenses and declination in French grammar. So the naughty ones got very good at conjugation.
Needless to say English was a breath of fresh air to learn.
