Rosetta Stone?

[kaoskat]

Anyone have any experience with it? Did you successfully learn a language? I just got it today and finished my first lesson. It was fun but...... It's just...... At the rate I'm going, I'm going to have finished it in less than a month and that just doesn't seem like enough time to learn a language somehow...... I could probably finish it a lot faster even but I'm trying to restrain myself.

[mlp_loving]

It's a computer software, correct? When I was in high school I had to take a class my sophomore and junior year (2007-2008) where I was required to pick a language and use the program. I chose Spanish. It was easy to follow along and I could complete the lessons rather quickly. However, I honestly can’t remember hardly any of what I learned though.

[Princess Lala]

I want a japanese veginner course from this program! Ive always wanted to try it!

[Hervoyel]

My sister-in-law used it when she was learning English, so I've seen it in action (and I've played with the free trials myself).

I think it's great for giving you a solid grasp of pronunciation and grammatical rules and decent for vocabulary, but ideally you'd use it alongside either an immersion situation or a live conversational class.

I just got it today and finished my first lesson. It was fun but...... It's just...... At the rate I'm going, I'm going to have finished it in less than a month and that just doesn't seem like enough time to learn a language somehow...... I could probably finish it a lot faster even but I'm trying to restrain myself.

For what it's worth, I think language courses are the worst ones to rush through and the best ones for repeating content on.

Having said that, depending on the language (its complexity and closeness to languages you already speak), a month can give you a decent working language base, so the timing isn't necessarily a bad thing.

[Galactica]

I haven't used it- but I know the Peace Corps. uses it so it must be pretty good.

[kaoskat]

My sister-in-law used it when she was learning English, so I've seen it in action (and I've played with the free trials myself).

I think it's great for giving you a solid grasp of pronunciation and grammatical rules and decent for vocabulary, but ideally you'd use it alongside either an immersion situation or a live conversational class.

I just got it today and finished my first lesson. It was fun but...... It's just...... At the rate I'm going, I'm going to have finished it in less than a month and that just doesn't seem like enough time to learn a language somehow...... I could probably finish it a lot faster even but I'm trying to restrain myself.

For what it's worth, I think language courses are the worst ones to rush through and the best ones for repeating content on.

Having said that, depending on the language (its complexity and closeness to languages you already speak), a month can give you a decent working language base, so the timing isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I'm not rushing....exactly....It's just I already have a bit of a grasp on it as I took a Spanish course in HS and growing up my best friend was Cuban. So, I'm just hoping it gets a bit more involved than this or it's just going to be teaching me stuff I already know. But today's was more complicated than yesterday's so it seems like maybe it will teach me more than stuff I know already and a handful of words. Though today I learned how to say coffee. Somehow that seems VERY useful. And I have already replayed the first lesson until I've practically memorized it (though I'm not sure that's good) and I'm on my way with the second. Tomorrow I get my first group lesson thingy and I'm terribly nervous. Unfortunately, I don't really have anyone to talk to but I'm trying anyway and I'm reading my little Spanish book I got at the secondhand store and I'm practicing by myself. I may fail completely but I am very determined, so maybe my stubbornness will pull me through.

[Teddy]

I got Rosetta Stone when I first moved to Sweden. It's good for learning some vocabulary and how to say really simple things, but I found it was completely useless when it comes to actually having conversations with people. I quickly learned I needed to enroll in an actual Swedish class where I'd learn how to use the language to communicate. The vocabulary I learned with Rosetta Stone really helped out alot when I first started in my classes though, so it was not a complete waste of time. Just saying taking classes with other people helped me learn alot faster, and learn more useful things.

Also, in class they explain what the rules of grammar and such are, none of that is explained in Rosetta Stone. You just basically have to memorize what the right answers are to get to the next lesson, even if you have no idea WHY that is the right answer. Hard to explain, but hope you understand what I mean. 

Maybe Rosetta Stone gets better with the higher levels, but I got to Level 2 and figured out it wasn't really taking me very far. 

[melodys_angel]

from what I heard, it will penalize you if your 'accent' is wrong...which I find bizarre because there are soo many dialects and accents within a  language..there is no right or wrong.

If you have someone that can fluently speak the language, have them help you^^

[kaoskat]

It doesn't seem to be being any trouble for me with my accent being wrong so far. I don't really care if I say things perfectly. I just want to be able to communicate. Really, more than speaking it, I want to be able to write it, anyway.

Unfortunately, the only people I know who speak Spanish fluently (and the reason I want to learn in the first place), are my sponsored kids and, somehow, I don't think the slow correspondence we use will work for helping me a great deal. I am planning to practice by reading their untranslated letters though! If Rosetta Stone can teach me enough, I think I can manage to communicate with my kids, even if it is awkward. And, in theory, I will get better. If I can catch Elizabeth when she's online, she could probably help me a bit as well. With her trying to learn English and me trying to learn Spanish, I hope we may be able to understand each other better even if not perfectly.

I'm going to work for all I am worth to make this happen. I'm hoping to pick up some Spanish children's books soon, too. I'm going to surround myself as much as I possibly can. Maybe, with all of it together, I can do this in spite of only being around English speakers.

[ponycake]

I studied German in college and studied abroad to learn it and then out of curiosity I looked into the German version. I wasn't impressed with it and wouldn't pay that kind of money for it.   It just doesn't seem like that great of tool and it's not how I would teach it. But that was some years back now. I think I checked out Japanese too. Learned more on my own from free sites.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Hervoyel]

Also, in class they explain what the rules of grammar and such are, none of that is explained in Rosetta Stone. You just basically have to memorize what the right answers are to get to the next lesson, even if you have no idea WHY that is the right answer. Hard to explain, but hope you understand what I mean. 

I think that's intentional in that it's supposed to mimic the way you learn your first language as a toddler.  Parents/care-givers usually don't teach grammatical rules, and yet the kids pick up the rules through use.

I don't think Rosetta Stone is perfect at it (I feel like the Berlitz immersion-style courses do a better job), but as beginner language-learning theories go it's a fairly well-accepted method.