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Michel Thomas

 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes Post Reply
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nway
Senior Member
United States
youtube.com/user/Vic
Joined 5416 days ago
574 posts - 1707 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean

 
 Message 353 of 405
08 February 2012 at 5:13am | IP Logged 
hrhenry wrote:
A few months ago (just after they released their repackaged courses) I asked about any new courses coming out and they flat out said NO new courses were on the table. Seems like a suicidal thing for a company to publicly say, but there ya go.

I can't help but feel like an MT course might just be a product whose cost exceeds its revenues. I'd imagine an incredible amount of time and investment must go into planning, organizing, recording, and producing each course, and yet when I check Amazon, only the original French course has a significant number of reviews, and many of the releases for the newer courses literally have zero reviews. It doesn't seem like courses for the big languages like Portuguese, Mandarin, Japanese, Russian, and Arabic are bringing in much profit, so I can't imagine they'd spend more time and money investing into more fringe languages like Polish and Greek, each of which literally has only one review across all the different editions (Foundation, Advanced, Vocabulary, etc.).

Edited by nway on 08 February 2012 at 5:14am
1 person has voted this message useful



zekecoma
Senior Member
United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5345 days ago
561 posts - 655 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: German, Spanish

 
 Message 354 of 405
08 February 2012 at 5:44am | IP Logged 
Random review wrote:

@ zekecoma: Michel Thomas' German accent is not perfect, he wasn't native, but I
believe it was very good (hopefully someone can confirm that). I don't think it
matters, though. If you can tell that his accent is not 100% German then why are you
using a beginner's course?


Simply because I need to relearn the words, that I have forgotten, then move onto
pimsleur afterwards, then pick up my other books. I need to get back into German.
1 person has voted this message useful



zorglub
Pentaglot
Senior Member
France
Joined 7001 days ago
441 posts - 504 votes 
1 sounds
Speaks: French*, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: German, Arabic (Written), Turkish, Mandarin

 
 Message 355 of 405
08 February 2012 at 9:38am | IP Logged 
Random review wrote:
I found the random long silences in some Assimil courses
amazingly annoying, but I haven't let that put me off using their excellent courses.


I love those silences:
They are the silences in the "exercise" part.
I take advantage of them to make new sentences, when shadowing.
2 persons have voted this message useful



zorglub
Pentaglot
Senior Member
France
Joined 7001 days ago
441 posts - 504 votes 
1 sounds
Speaks: French*, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: German, Arabic (Written), Turkish, Mandarin

 
 Message 356 of 405
08 February 2012 at 9:48am | IP Logged 
kmart wrote:
Raчraч Ŋuɲa wrote:
But what are "learning styles" and "learning preferences"? Are they different? Maybe a learning style to someone is a learning preference to another.

And why is it that so many of these people, getting the visual learning "style" that suits them, have such appalling pronunciation skills? Because they are trying to use the pronunciation rules of their native language to pronounce the target language. They'd be better off if they stopped trying to read the words and listened to them (OK I'm really only able to talk about native English speakers here, that's all I've had the opportunity to observe).


I agree. My take is one should not START learning a language with a course that displays a written text. Once you see it written you're fried because indeed the word seems to be processed in the circuits where our brain transcripts rwriting into speech, with the native language processor.
Once you teach your brain this way i think it is quite hard to improve.
I'm not certain more than a level 1 wih Pimsleur for instance, is needed before starting something like Assimil.
2 persons have voted this message useful



zorglub
Pentaglot
Senior Member
France
Joined 7001 days ago
441 posts - 504 votes 
1 sounds
Speaks: French*, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: German, Arabic (Written), Turkish, Mandarin

 
 Message 357 of 405
08 February 2012 at 9:52am | IP Logged 
zorglub wrote:
I have seen some persons unable to actually progress in a language because they "know" they have to learn with bad programs , in my oPinion (exercises grammar conjugation tables) and seem to be faced with a high level of anxiety when trying to use what i deem efficient self learner programs such as pimsleur or assimil or michel thomas


I see exactly that.

Thee are people who seem to get panicked when faced with something that s not grammar rules and exercises, the hair shirt way of learning languages. SO they give up or struggle and don't reach good verbal skills.

Again, maybe only the equivalent of one Pimsleur level is enough to start woth a written and audio course such as Assimil.
1 person has voted this message useful



zekecoma
Senior Member
United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5345 days ago
561 posts - 655 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: German, Spanish

 
 Message 358 of 405
08 February 2012 at 11:27am | IP Logged 
nway wrote:
hrhenry wrote:
A few months ago (just after they released their
repackaged courses) I asked about any new courses coming out and they flat out said NO
new courses were on the table. Seems like a suicidal thing for a company to publicly
say, but there ya go.

I can't help but feel like an MT course might just be a product whose cost exceeds its
revenues. I'd imagine an incredible amount of time and investment must go into
planning, organizing, recording, and producing each course, and yet when I check
Amazon, only the original French course has a significant number of reviews, and many
of the releases for the newer courses literally have zero reviews. It doesn't seem like
courses for the big languages like Portuguese, Mandarin, Japanese, Russian, and Arabic
are bringing in much profit, so I can't imagine they'd spend more time and money
investing into more fringe languages like Polish and Greek, each of which literally has
only one review across all the different editions (Foundation, Advanced, Vocabulary,
etc.).


But remember that not everyone does reviews. I do them sometimes, but not all the time.
1 person has voted this message useful



Random review
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5784 days ago
781 posts - 1310 votes 
Speaks: English*, Spanish
Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German

 
 Message 359 of 405
08 February 2012 at 2:46pm | IP Logged 
zorglub wrote:
Random review wrote:
I found the random long silences in some Assimil
courses
amazingly annoying, but I haven't let that put me off using their excellent courses.


I love those silences:
They are the silences in the "exercise" part.
I take advantage of them to make new sentences, when shadowing.


I hadn't thought of it that way, it's while shadowing I find them annoying. I'll give
your suggestion a try.
1 person has voted this message useful



Random review
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5784 days ago
781 posts - 1310 votes 
Speaks: English*, Spanish
Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German

 
 Message 360 of 405
08 February 2012 at 2:53pm | IP Logged 
zekecoma wrote:
Random review wrote:

@ zekecoma: Michel Thomas' German accent is not perfect, he wasn't native, but I
believe it was very good (hopefully someone can confirm that). I don't think it
matters, though. If you can tell that his accent is not 100% German then why are you
using a beginner's course?


Simply because I need to relearn the words, that I have forgotten, then move onto
pimsleur afterwards, then pick up my other books. I need to get back into German.


Well, I wouldn't have used Michel Thomas for that anyway, so you're not losing out by
skipping him.
When used for what they're actually designed for his accent really is not a problem, so
I guess your annoyance is yet another one we have to chalk down to misleading marketing
from Hodder and Stoughton.


1 person has voted this message useful



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