How many times have I heard that whining in Spanish class? Well, guys, I have news for you. (Actually, it's not news if you have been sitting in my classes.)
**NEWSFLASH - If you study Spanish, you are well on your way to learning French!!!**
OK, so why is that? Well, the short answer is that Spanish & French are sort of like brother & sister, or at least cousins. There are many, many similarities in both vocabulary and grammar between the two languages. Whatever you learn in one will help get you a long way toward learning the other - and Italian or Portuguese too.
The long answer has to do with the Roman Empire, the fact that Latin was the language of Rome (the capital of the Roman Empire). As the Romans conquered Europe, the language mutated locally into the various "Romance" - from the word Roman - or Latin-based languages.
Some of the similarities are the gender of nouns (masculine and feminine), agreement of nouns and adjective in gender and number (meaning singular and plural), verb conjugation, formal and informal "you", syntax (word order like adjectives coming after nouns rather than before), and actual roots of words.
The Spread of Latin through the Roman Empire
Latin Language - Roman Empire
Yahoo! en français
French History & Culture from AOL
Beginning French at About.com
Mrs. Cahill's French Activity Page