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Why not try to remember MT material? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Wulfgar Senior Member United States Joined 4669 days ago 404 posts - 791 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 17 of 39 30 June 2012 at 8:17am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
which is why it's ok, and in fact a good idea, to have the vocabulary well memorized while taking it. It become much more effective when you know the vocabulary. Struggling with vocabulary when trying to learn grammar is not helpful; this is one of the few programs out there where one can overcome this problem quite easily.
Memorizing some words is more relaxing than making frequent vocabulary mistakes in my experience.
The only bad thing about repeating would be if you do it so often that you memorize the sentences without understanding the grammar, defeating the purpose of the program, which is to give the students the knowledge to produce sentences on their own. I don't believe the problems you list are significant. A serious student will get enough exposure to overcome either of them.
It's pretty much impossible to murphy-proof a program for a casual learner. So learn the vocabulary and repeat the courses if you want. There is little danger to serious learners. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4535 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 18 of 39 30 June 2012 at 2:59pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
This is the way I feel. If I am constantly making mistakes with the vocabulary then I get a little frustrated. At least if I can remember the vocab then I feel less stressed whilst listening and learning. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5781 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 19 of 39 30 June 2012 at 11:38pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
You shouldn't really be struggling with the vocabulary, though (see below). What I meant was that you shouldn't expect to remember all the vocabulary after the course. At any given point you are not supposed to be struggling with the vocabulary necessary for that sentence. Of course it will happen occasionally, which is why I said it was nothing to worry about.
Well,yes. In my experience too, but I don't really find either very relaxing. More importantly I know many people who would find memorising words very stressful indeed. An important part of the way the courses work is by removing stress and mental blocks of all kinds. It is interesting that many people who don't like these courses simply don't like Michel Thomas' voice or the sound of his dentures or whatever, thus his little speech at the start will have failed to get them to relax. I found the original courses amazing fun. At times I literally couldn't put them down and went 6 or 7 hours at a stretch without tiring. I have never experienced anything like it in any type of learning. If you are not getting this feeling then you are missing an important part of the power of the method. Now if memorising vocabulary before doing the course (from transcripts or whatever) helps you do that then great (it wasn't necessary for me); but I find it difficult to believe that you can have that amazing experience whilst simultaneously trying to memorise vocabulary as you go. In fact if you are making frequent (as opposed to occasional) vocabulary mistakes then you certainly weren't experiencing what I am talking about, so I can see why you felt the need to start memorising vocabulary, but that's not the full power of the method working as it's designed to. Obviously if a method does not work for you (and Michel Thomas clearly failed to get you into that relaxed state) then it is quite intelligent of you to adapt it, and a useful suggestion for anyone reading this thread in the same boat; but I strongly suggest anyone new to MT tries to use it as designed first. If it works you're in for an amazing learning experience.
I disagree and not only from personal experience. Cainntear (until recently MT's biggest champion on this forum) for one stated that he stopped repeating when he noticed he had started to learn one of the mistakes made by one of the students. You do, however, give an additional very good reason for not repeating!
Well, I suppose not. The point of my story, though, was to give an example of an intelligent person getting bad results by using MT as a traditional learning tool rather than as designed. My fault for including the irrelevant ending to the story (I knew at the time I was making a mistake).
My own opinion remains that learners should exercise caution with this. Edited by Random review on 30 June 2012 at 11:55pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gala Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4548 days ago 229 posts - 421 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 20 of 39 01 July 2012 at 11:37am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
I'd heard of this course before I joined this forum, but it's so expensive (at least in the US) that I never considered buying it. Then all of the talk of it here aroused my curiosity, so I just listened to a sample, which, to be completely honest, left me dumbfounded. I can't see how a "wonderful pronunciation" could possibly be a result of this course, if the sample I just listened to of the Spanish is any indication. Michel Thomas's accent when speaking English was so thick that I couldn't even understand all of it, and his Spanish wasn't much better, and the "students" were worse yet. Practically everyone in the beginning Spanish courses I took could parrot a word they just heard better than that. Maybe their presence is some sort of psychological tactic to make the listener feel really swift. Which has its place, being relaxed and confident can help, but there really should be examples worth following. Maybe the reason so many people think this course is great is because it strokes their egos, but from what I just heard I can't imagine that it gives them any kind of preparation for conversation with native speakers. Even cheapo courses like Behind the Wheel and Learn in Your Car are better than what I just heard. Edit: The "grind" method is indicated with courses like FSI, where you have a native accent and natural idiomatic speech patterns as models. After reading Random Review's post more closely, I see that perhaps there is something more subtle going on with this course in terms of teaching grammar.....something that wasn't apparent in the sample. However, from just that sample I'm convinced that you should NOT give this repeated listens. Are grammar books really that bad?! At least they won't teach you the wrong way to speak... Edited by Gala on 01 July 2012 at 11:57am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4535 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 21 of 39 01 July 2012 at 12:02pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
From the posts I have read so far regarding the MT course, I would say that it is not surprising that you do not think the course would be worthwhile. See this quote from random review
I am assuming that he is saying that the course is not designed to teach you great (or even good) pronunciation and grammar by just listening to the first 2 CD's. In order to get the benefit from the course, you have to listen to the whole course. I have only just started learning Italian so I obviously don't know this for sure (maybe someone else who has some experience can either agree or disagree with me?) but I do know that a lot of people really rate MT as a starting point. I also believe (again, only from what I have read on these forums) that the MT course isn't actually ever going to give you excellent pronunciation or vocabulary but what it will do is give an excellent foundation in the grammar of the TL. This is certainly what I hoping anyway as otherwise it will be a complete waste of time :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| numerodix Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 6781 days ago 856 posts - 1226 votes Speaks: EnglishC2*, Norwegian*, Polish*, Italian, Dutch, French Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 22 of 39 01 July 2012 at 12:05pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Gala, it probably depends on what you perceive being the biggest hurdle for you. To me
the pronunciation is a drawback, but the easy way to learn the basic grammar is a massive benefit that I don't get from any other resource the same way. So I can quite easily put up with the accents such as they are and later on find some other material with which to work on accent. Edited by numerodix on 01 July 2012 at 12:06pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gala Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4548 days ago 229 posts - 421 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 23 of 39 01 July 2012 at 12:42pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Yeah, I'm willing to believe that the sample I listened to was too short for me to judge
the magical technique the course ostensibly (and may well genuinely) have for teaching grammar. For those that feel the need for that then by all means, go ahead, but I would again caution against repeated listening at the risk of picking up a terrible accent and unnatural and un-native speech patterns. Numerodix, you're right that it depends on learning style.Grammar was never a hurdle for me; I did fine with the old-school book-instruction for that. I only needed audio-lingual instruction for picking up the fluidity of the natural spoken language. FSI has done wonders for me in terms of that, even though I haven't encountered any new grammatical concepts in it (and no new vocabulary that isn't diplomacy/military related.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5781 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 24 of 39 01 July 2012 at 2:43pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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@Gala: your Spanish is way too high a level for this course. I love the Michel Thomas
courses and will always start a language with them where available, but if you already know all the verb tenses etc then it will do nothing for you....it's for beginners and false beginners, or people who have soaked up a lot of vocabulary but never quite got the grammar. Try it in a language you don't know. I think his best course is German. As for pronunciation, you can see above that this is one of the reasons I'm against repeating the courses. That said Cainntear argued persuasively that (with the possible exception of French) he does a good job of teaching a phoneme map of the language. My take is that as long as you don't spend too much time on the courses and move on to material using native speakers straight away then he is right. I think you are way too hard on the students (a lot of people are on this forum). These are not language learners, they are ordinary people and I can assure you from experience with people asking me how to say X in Spanish that many people are just as bad. Also this course is not parroting, so you're not concentrating 100% on pronunciation, but also on making the sentence. As for grammar, as long as you don't try to learn the course (see my post above) you'll come away with an accurate knowledge of a lot of grammar, especially verb tenses. Do you know of any other course that 13 hours in has students forming their own sentences with the imperfect subjunctive?! @Numeropdix: I more or less agree with you, except that I don't consider the pronunciation that much of a a drawback as long as you use the course as designed (I agree it becomes one if you start repeating). Used properly the two courses add up to 13 hours and probably take about 20-26 hours of your life. Edited by Random review on 01 July 2012 at 3:48pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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