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This second group of people often has the worst accents. That's true only if you consider the comhrehensive set to consist in the first set (I out of III). I really think this is a good method of learning, particularly Chinese. You're not even going to learn the basics with these 7 CDs. It might sound like a lot of pauses and repetition would be good, but I can just repeat the cd myself (and I did). Since the hardest part of Mandarin is the pronunciation, I figured the best approach would be to go alphabet-free for the first few years of my study. Also, the add above says this is the "first half" of the comphrehensive set.
I didn't expect to learn a ton of Chinese, just to practice pronunciation, but even I was surprised at how little Chinese I ended up learning by the end. The people I know who speak English as a second language best are people who learned it by watching TV, not by studying. It is indeed the first half of the first set of the comphrehensive set.I would recommend these CDs to anyone just starting out. These CDs just allow you to listen and try to imitate, which I think is the best way.Now the bad thing is that you really will not learn very much. What you will learn is several phrases (and most of the individual words in those phrases), but I've listened to these CD's over and over for the past year (to practice the pronunciation multiple times) and what I've learned from these CDs in the past year I feel I could have learned in about an hour or two in any European language (for which the pronunciation is a lot easier). There are so many pauses and repeats in the CDs that I think they could easily have taught twice the material in the CDs provided. I'd rather they put more material on the CD so I could learn more once I finished learning a CD.
This product is amazing to put on your iPod. Because its aim is to teach through ideal amounts of novel material and repetition, no rewinding is required. I listened to each lesson 2-3 times before moving on. Best language learning tool I've encountered so far.
This approach is sound- it is similar to the one used at the MTC (Mandarin Training Center) in Taipei when I was there in 1990-1993, The center is under the Taipei National Normal University- I appreciated this approach over the typical USA approach (Audio-lingual method) because by starting with simple meanings, and whole context learning- your mind begins to develop new patterns of thinking, and the proper holistic and integrated foundation for communicating in a new language. When you really want to learn -studying in one of the countries is best to put everything together.
I am fairly good at languages and find myself a bit surprised at all the glowing reviews for this product. In addition, the male speaker, who predominates, pronounces the same phrases differently several times in different sections of the lesson. The phrases themselves are not particularly useful (I have spent a week so far trying to learn how to say "I speak a little Chinese" which, in fact, I obviously don't). Explanation is kept to such a minimum that the student is required to deduce sentence structure (for instance, we are told that the syllable "ma" is used to make a phrase negative, but we are not instructed as to where to place it in a sentence -- after the verb. Memorization is difficult without written materials or writing things down to reinforce them. the noun. At a dense half an hour each, the lessons were just not concise enough for me to remain focused on the material. (And both speakers speak WAY too fast).
at the end of the sentence). Also, the instruction stresses the importance of matching one's pronunciation to that of the native speakers, yet the two speakers, one male and one female, pronounce phrases distinctly differently. The most interesting thing is, the lessons manage to be too long and too fast at the same time. Personally, I would prefer a package with more concise, memorable lessons, more useful phrases and more consistency in pronunciation.
I purchased this to learn some Chinese to help me when exchange students visited. I progressed well using this during my commutes between home and work. I spent about 2 weeks with it. I haven't re-visted it since then. I recommend this for folks that want to learn Chinese "passively" while working out (I-Pod) or durring a commute. Learning to read and write, etc., would require something with a workbook.
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