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Colloquial vs Teach Yourself | ||
Tags: Colloquial (program) | Teach Yourself | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| pineappleboom Groupie United States languageloft-ashley. Joined 5251 days ago 66 posts - 76 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, French, Russian | Message 1 of 9 31 July 2011 at 7:19am | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't know if this has been discussed before, but I couldn't find any past threads.
I have noticed that these two series are often compared. However, I have only ever used Teach Yourself. I just wanted to know everyone's overall opinion of Colloquial in comparison to Teach Yourself. Also, does Colloquial really teach colloquial language, or is that just a fancy title for the series? Thanks, I look foward to your replies! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| watupboy101 Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4901 days ago 65 posts - 81 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 2 of 9 31 July 2011 at 8:57am | IP Logged | |||||
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I've never use "Colloquial" but I've heard the two products have the same approach... and they are big competitors.
So from what I've heard they are nearly the same. (Don't trust me on this though). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5007 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 3 of 9 31 July 2011 at 2:27pm | IP Logged | |||||
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From what I've seen in a few of these courses (have been looking the most at the Swedish ones, and chose colloquial) and in some threads, it depends on the language you want to study. Both are based on the same approach and ressemble each other a lot but one might have better course for one language and worse for another.
I believe the Colloquial is just the fancy name. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| KCor Groupie United States Joined 5006 days ago 50 posts - 72 votes | Message 4 of 9 31 July 2011 at 3:11pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I have used both the Teach Yourself and Colloquial series for German and I would
recommend the Colloquial version over TY every time if I was asked to only pick one. That being said, they're both very helpful and can be attained quite cheaply. I'd say do both. I will do them both again for my next language. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6009 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 5 of 9 31 July 2011 at 3:42pm | IP Logged | |||||
The Gaelic course definitely teaches the standard language, so it's only a name.... 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 5128 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 6 of 9 31 July 2011 at 5:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
What specifically do you prefer with Colloquial over TY? I've only compared the two for one language (Norwegian) and have my own opinions on the differences (I like the exercises and puzzles in Colloquial, for instance), but I'm curious to know what specific differences you like. R. == 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7154 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 7 of 9 31 July 2011 at 7:09pm | IP Logged | |||||
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It's better to think of TY and Colloquial as competing brands since the authors have a fair bit of a freedom in how to express themselves when teaching the target language. As others have said, read reviews for each course that you're considering rather than stereotyping one series over the other.
For my money, the best courses from these two series have been: Colloquial Czech TY Czech TY Estonian Colloquial Hungarian (old edition by Payne) Colloquial Slovak TY Serbian ...while the following I wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole. Colloquial Estonian Colloquial Slovene (current edition by Albretti) TY Slovene The rest that I've used are rather middling and so don't stand out for me as highly positive or highly negative. Don't forget that courses in the series "Spoken World", "Hugo" or "Living Language" usually go for about the same price and are broadly similar in format but are sometimes better-received than what's in TY or Colloquial where applicable. Don't forget either about the learning materials for the target language that escape most people's attention because they're not from the big-name publishers but instead from publishers in the countries where the languages are spoken natively. The following threads should be useful A stereotypical but essential question Choosing between TYS & Colloquial Colloquial Colloquial and Teach yourself Colloquial Dutch, or Teach Yourself Dutch "Colloquial" methods? Colloquial vs Teach Yourself Portuguese Long Sweep Technique for TY & Colloquial Regarding Czech - the Colloquial series Swedish: TY vs. Colloquial vs. FSI Teach Yourself and Colloquial Teach Yourself and Colloquial Cantonese "Teach Yourself" or "Colloquial" Teach Yourself products Teach Yourself Series vs. Colloquials The good and bad of Teach Yourself The Colloquial series? 11 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| KCor Groupie United States Joined 5006 days ago 50 posts - 72 votes | Message 8 of 9 01 August 2011 at 1:30am | IP Logged | |||||
It seemed to me that their explanations on how to apply the information provided was much more clear than in TY. However, I did go through the entire TY book before I started doing the Colloquial counterpart, so perhaps a bit more exposure could have provided me an edge that I attributed to Colloquial's method. But again, I think I paid between $6-10 for each of them from eBay and was able to download the audio from a torrent. At such a low price I don't see a reason not to do both. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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