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Assimil Using Spanish - A Cautionary Note | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Will Senior Member United States Joined 6946 days ago 165 posts - 165 votes  | Message 17 of 59 12 June 2006 at 7:06pm | IP Logged | |||||
I do not have the Assimil Spanish course but as someone who may purchase it in the future, can I ask you if the English translations hamper your use of the course? I would like to know if the English translations would hamper MY use of the course before I spend the money on the course, but I know you couldn't tell me if it would or not. So I'd like to know how the translations are affecting your use of the course. Specifically in the above quote this part really caught my attention:
Are the translations supposed to be an essential part of the course? If so, how is it suggested that the faulty translations be dealt with? I would find any information you care to give helpful. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Brent Groupie United States Joined 7022 days ago 55 posts - 54 votes Speaks: English* | Message 18 of 59 12 June 2006 at 10:35pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't think the typos really affect my use of the course. They're generally pretty obvious. It's just really annoying and unprofessional.
A few translations are questionable though. Early in the course, one sentence is "Tienes un transistor español." The translation given is "You have a Spanish transistor." What does that mean? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Andy E Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 7111 days ago 1651 posts - 1939 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French | Message 19 of 59 13 June 2006 at 2:53am | IP Logged | |||||
I didn't find it a problem in the "With Ease" book - there are often a mixture of literal and smoother translations in the English with the differences (usually) consistently marked. That is, literal translations are in round brackets ( ) and words that are omitted in the Spanish but a necessity for an English sentence - perhaps an article or preposition are placed in square brackets [ ]. The advanced course is a different matter entirely - translations are nearly always literal and sometimes wrong - I get the impression the translation was not done by a native English speaker and I'm convinced I could have done a better job of it myself. In the French version, however, they retain the use of the round and square brackets and, as I have already noted, there are often different notes provided. Is it a hindrance? Definitely, because regardless of anything else, it slows down progress through the lessons. I now check both versions - notes and translations and if I'm still not sure it's dictionary time. Have I thought about not using it? No - the sheer amount of vocab/idioms being presented or re-presented as a reminder and the pace* of the recording outweighs any misgivings I might have about the quality of the translations and notes. Andy * the speed of the audio is often faster than several of the on-line audio resources I make use of. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| fanatic Octoglot Senior Member Australia speedmathematics.com Joined 7154 days ago 1152 posts - 1818 votes Speaks: English*, German, French, Afrikaans, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch Studies: Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Modern Hebrew, Malay, Mandarin, Esperanto | Message 20 of 59 17 June 2006 at 6:03am | IP Logged | |||||
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Being an enthusiastic user of Assimil, I have read this thread with some concern. Here are some of my thoughts.
Firstly, most of my courses are the old Without Toil programs. Secondly, as the books are reprinted and the audio is rerecorded, small changes are made. Sometimes it is to give a more realistic price of, say, a cup of coffee. This has not been a problem for me when the audio gives one price and the old book gives another. Sometimes I have two copies of the textbook, maybe one I picked up cheap in a second hand bookstore. The new book often has similar changes where one or two words are changed to make the book more up to date. This has in no way impeded my study of the language. My Russian Without Toil is quite different in English to the German version, which is newer and changes the lessons from about lesson 50 onwards. I have the audio for my English based textbook so that is what I use, although I have enjoyed reading the German textbook. I have two versions of French With Ease and they are very close, but with a different number of pages and different number of lessons. I bought the English textbook and Cds as well as cassettes. I downloaded the Russian version with more lessons and with subtle alterations to the early lessons from the Internet. I downloaded the audio for the upgraded version with the extra lessons from the Russian site as well. I had no qualms downloading the Russian version without paying as I had already paid for the English version. Not knowing which book the audio belongs to or, having the textbook in one language, I am sometimes tempted to buy it in another language as well to pick up differences and to see if I understand some translations and explanations better in the other language. This is a problem if the versions don't match. It hasn't caused any problems for me up until now but it still worried me to see that there is a problem and causes difficulties for some on the forum. So far as typos go, I haven't found any that I can think of. One of the best textbooks for learning Russian that I have, printed in America, has a Russian word printed upside down in the first lesson in the book. That wasn't a problem for me either. By the way, transistor was commonly used to mean transistor radio in Australia in the seventies and the translation, Spanish transistor for a radio manufactured in Spain would have made sense to readers back then. The only other With Ease program I have is Dutch With Ease and I have found no problem with it. I only have Spanish Without Toil, but even there, there are subtle changes with prices and some terms between the older textbook and the new. Edited by fanatic on 17 June 2006 at 6:06am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7213 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 21 of 59 15 July 2006 at 4:09pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm on lesson 55 of 60 for my first pass (wave 0) through Using Spanish. I'm using the course as supplementary material. As noted above, the English translation is quite weak, but I'm getting a lot out of the course. I'm looking at a 3 wave approach. The Introduction to Using Spanish doesn't mention the waves, but it does say "30 minutes a day" and the lessons are split up so as to have weekly revisions. Other than wave 0, which is my own misuse of the course, waves 1 and 2 were gleamed from other posts on how to use Assimil. There were alternative forms of wave 1 described that didn't include looking away from the book and repeating each sentence, but I choose that technique because it will add some more challenge. The biggest difference in the wave/0/wave1/wave2 described below is that the course is not split in half during the waves. Using Spanish doesn't seem to be to be progressively more difficult. I.E. lesson 1 is just as challenging as lesson 60. The indentations in the format below are like a programming construct. Do the indented stuff while the non-indented condition is going on.
wave 0) While audio for lesson repeats: Silently read translation, notes, and lesson. Get cleaned up and dress for the day. Listen to and read the lesson again at night. wave 1) While audio for lesson repeats: Read aloud along with audio. Read translation and notes. Play audio for lessons N-2, N-1 and N. Get cleaned up and dress for the day. Read each sentence of the text aloud, then look away from the book and repeat it (morning and evening). wave 2) While audio for lesson repeats: Read aloud along with audio. Read translation and notes. Read Lessons N-3, N-2, N-1. Play audio for lessons N-3, N-2, N-1 and N. Try to follow audio aloud while cleaning up and dressing for the day. Write out transcript for lesson N-3 using translation for assistance in the evening. Create three CDs that each contain about 3 weeks worth of lessons. There are 60 lessons in total. The second and third CD have some earlier lessons repeated for the N-i reviews. These are lesson numbers for each CD laid out by week: 1 2 3 4 5 6 8 9 10 11 12 13 15 16 17 18 19 20 18 19 20 22 23 24 25 26 27 29 30 31 32 33 34 36 37 38 39 40 41 39 40 41 43 44 45 46 47 48 50 51 52 53 54 55 57 58 59 60 During wave 0, I've spent additional time on the weekend reading and listening to the lessons. My goal with wave 0 has been primarily to understand the material and get through all of the lessons. With that lower bar nearly complete, I'm raising the bar to a more normal level for wave 1 and 2. The lowered bar of wave 0 was very helpful for me to just get through the course. Using Spanish uses European Spanish and is focused on Spain. I would have really liked more coverage of Central and South America, as far as the geographical, historical, and cultural content of the lessons. The lowered bar of wave 0 helped me to plow through those mental obstacles as well as clear the hurdle of the poor English translation. Edited by luke on 15 July 2006 at 4:14pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| fanatic Octoglot Senior Member Australia speedmathematics.com Joined 7154 days ago 1152 posts - 1818 votes Speaks: English*, German, French, Afrikaans, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch Studies: Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Modern Hebrew, Malay, Mandarin, Esperanto | Message 22 of 59 15 July 2006 at 9:31pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Luke, your description of how you do wave 0 is similar to my first wave. I only concentrate on understanding the written and spoken text. I do play the audio through about five or six times through the day and I do play through previous lessons as often as I can.
I don't worry about the vocabulary that slips through the cracks; I pick that up with future revisions. I find that this is more than sufficient to make the second wave quite easy. I also find I have memorised much of the text just by repetition. I don't try to memorise anything. I just let it happen. I am not concerned if it doesn't happen. This takes most of the stress and work out of learning. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Andy E Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 7111 days ago 1651 posts - 1939 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French | Message 23 of 59 17 July 2006 at 3:35am | IP Logged | |||||
I've been adopting a similar approach to Using Spanish, except that I'm not bothering with a convential second wave at all. All I have been doing is listening passively - the only "active" effort, I have been doing relates to ensuring I've got the exercises "down pat". As fanatic has said, repetition alone causes many of phrases to be memorised. Also when using other passive resources, such as newspapers, books and radio/TV recordings, I often find the Assimil vocab appearing which also reinforces the learning. Andy. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Farley Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 7100 days ago 681 posts - 739 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, GermanB1, French Studies: Spanish | Message 24 of 59 17 July 2006 at 7:56pm | IP Logged | |||||
My experience with Using French has been that the “exercises” represent the heart of the structure and vocabulary for the lesson. Master the exercise and you have the lesson.
Again, a similar story with Using French, I have run across numerous instances of Assimil vocabulary in audio and print, enough to reinforce all those elusive words. For instance I was presently surprised that I could easily understand the recent “Tour de France” and the “Bastille Day” audio news clips based on previous Assimil lessons. Edited by Farley on 17 July 2006 at 7:56pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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