MY DISABILITIES DEPOT
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MY DISABILITIES DEPOT - Rosetta Stone Spanish (Latin America) Level 1, 2 & 3 Set with Audio Companion
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List Price: $539.00
Our Price: $458.00
Your Save: $ 81.00 ( 15% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Rosetta Stone
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Average Customer Rating:   
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Binding: CD-ROM
Brand: Rosetta Stone
EAN: 9781603916738
Feature: Rosetta Stone teaches you a new language naturally, by getting you to think, live and breathe the language
Format: CD-ROM
ISBN: 1603916733
Label: Rosetta Stone
Manufacturer: Rosetta Stone
Model: 20988
Platform: Windows Vista
Publisher: Rosetta Stone
Release Date: 2008-06-16
Studio: Rosetta Stone
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Features
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Rosetta Stone teaches you a new language naturally, by getting you to think, live and breathe the language
Innovative solutions get you speaking new words, right from the start
Rosetta Stone moves forward only when you're ready--you drive the pace, you set the schedule
With Rosetta Stone, you'll discover a foundation of key vocabulary that you'll use to build into a whole new language
Audio Companion lets you take the Rosetta Stone experience anywhere: in the car, at the gym, or on-the-go
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Editorial Reviews:
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Foreign language learning with Rosetta Stone Spanish (Latin America) Levels 1, 2&3 you connect with the world around you. With level one you begin learning fundamental vocabulary and essential language structure, from greetings and introductions to simple questions and their answers. Gain the confidence and enter the intermediate level where you will be able to talk about your environment; give and get directions, tell time, dine out with self-reliance, shop and enjoy basic social interactions. Taking what you’ve learned in Levels 1 and 2, we help you reach an advanced level of competence. This competence allows you to connect with the world around you. You will learn to share your ideas and opinions, express your feelings and talk about everyday life; your work, current events and much more. Now Rosetta Stone with Audio Companion allows the learner to take Rosetta Stone anywhere: in the car, the gym or on-the-go! What is Audio Companion? Audio Companion CDs are activities that correspond to the Rosetta Stone CD-ROM software lessons. The learner can listen to Audio Companion and practice what they’ve been learning on the computer, turning travel time into productive language learning time. Audio Companion lets the student access the power of Rosetta Stone lessons whenever and wherever they want, they can play the CD’s on a stereo, or download them to a MP3 player. It empowers the student and helps reinforce the lessons in any busy lifestyle!
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: This excerpt of a review best describes my feelings about the product!
Comment: Pros:
Method - Rosetta Stone is a joy to use. Each lesson consists of matching captions to pictures. Sometimes it's by seeing the picture and clicking the right caption. Sometimes you hear a caption being read, and you have to click the correct picture. Sometimes you type, sometimes you speak. It's simple, and it offers a major feeling of accomplishment, which motivates you to do just one more lesson. At the end of each unit, you're presented with a 'Milestone,' which plays a series of pictures taken through the eyes of a Spanish-speaking person. When prompted, you speak as the person would speak. It feels really authentic.
Immersion - This is a major selling point of the program. It's in all the commercials and advertisements online. The idea is that you aren't learning to translate, you're learning the language. You see a man waving goodbye, and you see that it's dark out. He says 'buenas noches.' I don't know what that means, technically ("good night", most likely), but I know that it's a farewell greeting to be used when it's dark out. That way, I don't need to translate in my head. It removes the step of 'how do you say that in Spanish?' from your thought process while speaking.
Cons:
Word choice - Sometimes the program seems to teach things unnaturally. For example, I was watching a DVD with the Spanish subtitles on, and the word 'husband' was translated 'marido'. Rosetta Stone teaches it as 'esposo.' After doing some research, it seems that 'marido' is the preferred term, and is used much more often. It seems that the program teaches the more proper form of the language, like saying 'dine' instead of 'eat' in English. I don't know any native speakers with whom I can verify this, but I've noticed quite a few discrepancies between Rosetta Stone and other sources of Spanish. Another is 'nice to meet you,' which Rosetta Stone teaches as 'encantado de conocerlo' (for a man meeting another man). The easier, more common term is 'mucho gusto,' in my limited experience.
Limited options - Ideally, I would like to see a version of this program that also has supplemental material of a more standard variety, such as interactive worksheets and written explanations of grammatical issues. Unfortunately, this clashes with the ideology of the whole 'natural learning' system. Realistically though, you'll need to obtain this information from another source.
Language commonality - I've used Rosetta Stone in a couple languages out of curiosity. They're all exactly the same, which doesn't make sense. Spanish, for example, is very similar to English, except for "ll", "ñ" and a couple other letters. Does there need to be a pronunciation exercise in every lesson? They only go over sounds, like "vo" and "cho", to show you how they're different. Anyone from an English background could tell them apart without thought. I can see how something like this would be vitally important in Russian or Arabic, where you have to learn a new alphabet, but every language is treated the same way.
Conclusion:
Rosetta Stone stands alone, for better and for worse. The lessons and exercises are fun, but it isn't a complete, stand-alone learning solution as you would expect at this price. It's very useful for becoming familiar with a language and building vocabulary, and it's fun and rewarding. Unfortunately, it's held back by its narrow ideology.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Never received it. Thinking the whole thing was fraud.
Comment: One month later I am still getting the runaround from Bently_West and Amazon. I doubt we ever see this product and will probably end up in Small Claims court for the $750.00. We have ordered our last from Amazon.com.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A bit oversold, but still a great learning tool.
Comment: Rosetta Stone oversells itself a bit in its claim that it alone can make you proficient in a language. I think it is prudent to supplement it with some other materials, and better yet find a native speaker to practice with if at all possible. Nonetheless, I think it is an excellent program. Combined with some basic grammar workbooks like `Practice Makes Perfect Basic Spanish (Practice Makes Perfect Series)' and online reference tools it is working well for me.
What I like best is it forces you to learn the language by associating the words with images instead of with a translation. For example, rather than seeing on paper that `la casa' is `the house' you learn to associate `la casa' with an image of a house. I believe this helps me remember things better and not go through the English word `house' to get to the meaning of `casa' in Spanish, but more directly to the image of a house. In other words, I'm not doing translation in my head every time I hear a Spanish word.
I also like the voice recognition feature which helps you learn to pronounce the words correctly. There are lessons that break down the words into individual syllables to help you learn the pronunciation one step at a time. Since Spanish is very consistent in pronunciation, this is very helpful. If I am having trouble getting it right, the ability to compare my sound wave pattern with the native speaker sometimes helps me correct the problem.
Some reviewers have commented that it is too easy to use logic to determine the correct translation to associate with an image. That is, you may be presented a phrase that includes a recently introduced word with only one image to associate that includes that object. By elimination, it is easy to figure out which is correct. However, this does reinforce the learning and it is often used to introduce a new concept. For example: After learning that `mujer' means woman you may be presented with the phrase `La mujer corre' (The woman runs) and three pictures of men doing other activities along with one of a woman running. Having just learned that `mujer' means `woman' it is quite easy to figure out which image is correct, but in doing so you've also learned the new verb `corre'.
The Audio Companion CD's are nothing special--just native speakers repeating the words and phrases presented in the lessons with pauses for the listener to repeat. I use them during my commute to reinforce the previous day's lesson. No translations are presented, but I find that I remember almost everything and hearing and thinking about the lesson again the next morning is helpful in retaining what I learned.
The biggest disadvantage is that no background or formal grammar is presented. I think this makes learning some concepts more difficult than necessary. A good example is the use of the familiar/polite forms of `you' (tú /usted). In order to present this concept, the software shows images of people who are clearly friends in an informal setting, or adults speaking to children along with the phrase `¿Cómo estás' (Familiar/informal `How are you?' with `tú' usually implied by the form of the verb used) This is followed by people in a business setting and wearing suits with the phrase `¿Cómo está usted?' (Polite/formal `How are you?'). This is done repeatedly and you are somehow supposed to reason out the difference. For me, it was more effective to just read an article about this topic and move forward.
The same would hold true for conjugation of regular verbs. Rosetta Stone claims this is a `feature' that is not needed to learn the language at a basic, conversational level. Perhaps this is true, and eventually one would probably get an instinct for how to conjugate verbs without even understanding there are actually `rules' for doing so, but I prefer to understand the rules and patterns of the forms and so I've studied them on the side.
It is important to not rush through the lessons too quickly. I have learned to pause the lesson and take more time to study the words, phrases and images carefully before moving to the next item. I replay the sound track for the more difficult words or phrases several times. Each day, before starting a new lesson, I redo the previous one to help better retain what I've learned. It is also important to do at least a short lesson every day.
Is Rosetta Stone a do all/be all program that will make you fluent in a new language? No, and there is no software or set of CD's on the market that can. Is it an effective tool for learning a new language to the point of being able to communicate and have a foundation for additional learning? If combined with a few extra resources such as grammar workbooks I think it is and highly recommend it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Going full throttle to learning Spanish...
Comment: First, I must clarify that I am currently in the midst of using this program. I am just now finishing up Level 2 out of 3.
Second, I also own Rosetta Stone v2 - German level 1. By throwing myself into German culture--listening to music, looking up translations, reading a book here and there, having a friend speak fluent German--I still know more German than Spanish. It's the language I'm most passionate about because that's where my distant family is from. Working in retail, is it practical in Arizona? No.
So I have begun going full throttle with learning to speak fluent Spanish. I can't imagine the enthusiasm I will have when I can easily answer questions from a Spanish speaking customer. Finishing level 2, do I feel at all comfortable dealing with spanish guests? No. Beyond saying "¿Necesitas Ayuda?" and telling them to hold on one moment while I get a native who works at the store--I'm helpless. I focus on this program, and I understand almost every term taught to me; anything I don't understand, I find a translation and review the lesson.
Three can't inform me much more, especially considering the fact that level 2 contained Shopping/Retail situations.
I am not disappointed with Rosetta Stone, however. I don't have the confidence to easily speak, but I feel that day is approaching. It won't begin with the end of finishing level three, however. Immersing yourself into everything Spanish is a must. Combine this was some vocabulary cards (or use open source mnemosyne), read a book, youtube some spanish shows, find some children's spanish books, etc. Learning a language seems less about taking steps up, but rather filling your "pond" of knowledge. Rosetta Stone contributes quite a bit of water, but it alone cannot come close to filling the pond.
Customer Rating:
Summary: So far, so good
Comment: I have so far gotten about a quarter into level one, so it might be a little early to make a review, but here it goes:
The individual assignments are 5 to 30 minutes long. I am missing a pause button to use if the phone rings in the middle of one of the assignments (there is one between screens, but not if the program expects a response from you).
There are so far lots of repetitions which is good when you are trying to learn a new vocabulary. So far I have not come across word additions that I have not been able to understand, so the system with avoiding translations seems to work fairly well, too. Best of all is the feedback on pronunciations, where the screen tells you which word in a sentence is wrong, and you can click the built in recording to hear it again, so you can improve.
The audio companion does provide additional repetitions, but here you lack the feed-back which is a great part of the program part.
Cheers
NJL
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