|
 |
Michel Thomas Documentary Now Online | ||
Tags: Michel Thomas | Video | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes  Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 41 of 47 18 May 2011 at 6:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
As a "serious language learner" who has studied a dozen languages, I'm quite happy being able to maintain a conversation with a native speaker. Reading a newspaper article is nice, but it's not my main goal. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| ericg1977 Newbie United States Joined 5603 days ago 15 posts - 17 votes Speaks: English* | Message 42 of 47 19 May 2011 at 8:03am | IP Logged | |||||
|
I see that I got myself in some hot water by using the term "serious language learner", and I am not able to define it. Truthfully, other than viewing the documentary, I have not experienced the MT method. I did like the setting of the classroom, and I like the theory behind his pedagogical approach though.
On the other endof the spectrum, in 9th grade Spanish, our teacher insisted that we learn all 17 tenses with all of the conjugations. Everyone in the class had to get 100% on verb conjugations, or the whole class had to retake the test. In the end, all 30 some students memorized conjugations in 17 tenses! His approach to language learning was "your brain is a sponge and it just has to absorb the material.". 18 years later, I still can't get the conjugations out of my head. Of all of the commercial language learning programs I've used, my favorite is Hugo. I like the focus on using 3 minute dialogues to teach vocabulary/idioms/grammar/comprehension at the same time. The dialogues are always entertaining. On the other hand, Pimsleur's dialogues are too short in my opinion. It gives some people a good feeling to hear a 30 second dialogue where nothing is understood, and after 30 minutes, the same dialogue sounds almost as natural as your native language. I just wish this could be done with a 3 minute dialogue as opposed to 30 seconds. But I've also discovered that sometimes the best material for learning languages are the same programs used at universities, they almost always have mutli-media material, rich dialogues, exercises, practices, etc. I hope I don't get people too upset, but my impression is that much of the commercial self taught programs on the market are designed for people who don't necessarily have much of a background in learning languages, or for whom language learning is hard, whereas the programs used in universities are for more serious learners. Are there universities where MT/Pimsleru/Rosetta Stone/Hugo,etc are used? You could say that it's because professors want to sell their own material, but I think it goes to show that the target market for commercial language learning is quite different than univeristy programs. Comprehensive programs like "Al-Kitaab fii Ta'allum al-Arabiyya" for Arabic. "V'puti" for Russian. All of these programs have rich dialogues, both audio and video, they take snipets from movies/news broadcasts, and use them to show grammar, not to mention all of the exercies and reading. These programs can be used for the self-taught student just as well as the commercial programs. I think too many "serious language learners" are jumping too quickly at whatever is on the shelves of the foreign language section of your local bookstores. Edited by ericg1977 on 19 May 2011 at 8:06am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Welltravelled Diglot Groupie United Kingdom Joined 5862 days ago 46 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, French | Message 43 of 47 19 May 2011 at 12:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
|
Personally I think this documentary is fantastic to watch. Regarding the way Michel
Thomas teaches, I think it shows you just how useful his approach is for people who struggle with languages. That does not mean it will not be useful for those who don't struggle but I think they are the learners who experience the greatest benefit. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| amethyst32 Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5649 days ago 118 posts - 198 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, French | Message 44 of 47 19 May 2011 at 11:18pm | IP Logged | |||||
That's probably true; the other day I came across the OLI French programme from Carnegie Mellon (it's free online for anyone who wants to use it) and I was really impressed. I think if you followed this course, you would be at basic fluency by the end of it, but purely as an introduction, I prefer MT. Many of the other commercial programmes seem to teach in an unnecessarily pedestrian way and I don't like that. The only ones I've found which don't do this are MT, Assimil and Paul Noble. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| megazver Triglot Newbie Lithuania Joined 5994 days ago 34 posts - 52 votes Speaks: Lithuanian, Russian*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Polish | Message 45 of 47 20 May 2011 at 10:22am | IP Logged | |||||
I find this somewhat I ironic, since I recall Michel literally doing this at the end of his Spanish course. He made the pupils list all the tenses they learned. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| stout Senior Member Ireland Joined 5371 days ago 108 posts - 140 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 46 of 47 27 May 2011 at 6:29pm | IP Logged | |||||
|
I watched the MT documentary and I confess I was quite impressed by MT...I think that the
education establishment were scared of MT because he had the potential to modernize language learning and would put the traditional establishment out of business. Farewell Michel Thomas...R.I.P. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6011 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 47 of 47 27 May 2011 at 11:55pm | IP Logged | |||||
In the English-speaking world Teach Yourself and Colloquial are starting to gain traction as university course books. For example, the University of Nevada in Reno uses Colloquial Basque for their Basque courses (although as I understand it the book was written by members of the UNR faculty anyway) and I believe the Open University in the UK are using Colloquial Italian for their beginners' course.
Why do you need snippets of news to show grammar? In the equivalent of 3 full-time days, Michel Thomas's courses (ie ones he did, not the ones other people did) cover the majority of the basic grammatical building blocks of the language. Using so-called "realia" introduces a massive dependancy on specific vocabulary and cultural factors that themselves have to be taught. The learning becomes a mash of things you're trying to learn, things you are learning just because they're there, and things that you haven't learned yet that you are expected to ignore. MT's focus on almost pure grammar covers ground very quickly by avoiding ambiguity and distractions. It doesn't matter whether you're an experienced language learner or a new one -- it's very quick and very effective. No-one has ever taught me as much in as little time in any of the languages I've studied (look left!), and I certainly can't teach myself that quickly. Edited by Cainntear on 28 May 2011 at 12:02am 4 persons have voted this message useful |
If you wish to post a reply to this topic you must first login. If you are not already registered you must first register
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
