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Your favorite language program? | ||
Tags: TellMeMore | Fluenz | Living Language | Colloquial (program) | DLI | Linguaphone | Teach Yourself | Platiquemos | Rosetta Stone | Michel Thomas | Listening-Reading (L-R) | Pimsleur | Language Program | FSI | Assimil | Book | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 5133 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes  Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 265 of 376 24 February 2012 at 4:00am | IP Logged | ||
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I know Busuu's been mentioned in one of these 33 pages, but I thought I'd bring it up again.
I signed up with them sometime last year when they first offered Turkish as one of their languages, then promptly forgot about them - I'm not really sure why. Anyway, a couple days ago I was going through old email and was reminded of my account, so I decided to give it another shot. I'm impressed. I wanted to start at their A2 level course and go from there, but it either wasn't allowed or I wasn't able to figure out how, so I had to go back to the beginner A1 course. I'm glad I did. It's been a really good refresher, as well as picking up some new vocabulary. I'm only about half way through the A1 course after two days, and I can honestly say it's much more complete than, say, Teach Yourself Turkish, or even FSI. But I think what probably impresses me most is the social factor. Sure, there are other sites that offer a social aspect to learning, but I've not seen so much social interaction as I have on Busuu. Lang-8 comes close, but you don't get the camaraderie of shared courses like you do with Busuu. After every single exercise I completed, within seconds I had corrections, encouragement and requests for friendships. I've not yet tried the chat and other realtime features, but it looks pretty good. Knowing full well that they didn't have any Georgian course, I still specified that I was learning the language. It gave me the option to search for native Georgian speakers and returned pages of users, so that may be an option for lesser spoken language conversation partners. Anyway... if you've not yet had a chance to check it out, I recommend it. R. == Edited by hrhenry on 24 February 2012 at 4:02am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Bjorn Diglot Senior Member Norway Joined 4871 days ago 244 posts - 286 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: German, French | Message 266 of 376 24 February 2012 at 5:09am | IP Logged | ||
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I agree, Busuu is good value for money. You get access to all languages. If you will be away from your computer you can download pdf and mp3's.
They also have apps for iPhone/iPad. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7208 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 267 of 376 29 February 2012 at 3:31am | IP Logged | ||
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For intermediate Spanish I like http://ssl4you.blogspot.com/, http://rojasspanish.com/, and http://spanishpodcast.org/, which all have free podcasts that are meant to be informational. E.G., the content is all in Spanish, but the podcaster circumlocutes in order to help you understand. SpanishPodcast also has some photos with descriptions which are also good for immersion style learning and they are enticing for travelers. Transcripts are available for free for SpanishPodcast and SSL4you (Spanish as a Second Language for You).
As far as courses for French, I like Assimil New French with Ease, and Using French. The all French audio and brief lessons are easy to use. Great for the hobbyist language learner. I also like http://es.wikipedia.org for extemporaneous immersion learning and http://translate.google.com for creating quick fairly literal although imperfect translations on the fly. This is great for listen-reading. For free audiobooks in Spanish, sometimes with bilingual text, http://albalearning.com is great. For French, http://www.litteratureaudio.com/ is amazing. Edited by luke on 29 February 2012 at 3:41am 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| paisley Groupie United States Joined 5715 days ago 59 posts - 60 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 268 of 376 04 March 2012 at 11:08pm | IP Logged | ||
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I just started up with Mandarin again after starting to learn it maybe 2 years ago, and I threw my Rosetta Stone in the trash, and now I am love love loving my FLuenz Mandarin. I actually look forward to using it. Granted, my only other software type stuff is LiveMocha and i've used Pimsleur for Spanish in the past, Fluenz mandarin is the easiest thing ever.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| joesoefkalla Newbie Indonesia Joined 4715 days ago 22 posts - 22 votes Studies: English | Message 269 of 376 08 April 2012 at 8:52pm | IP Logged | ||
Is Rosetta Stone Mandarin really really that bad? Why didn't you ask for a refund instead of throwing it to the bin? 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| sillygoose1 Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 4639 days ago 566 posts - 814 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, Spanish, French Studies: German, Latin | Message 270 of 376 14 April 2012 at 6:31pm | IP Logged | ||
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Assimil Ease/Toil/Using & Old Linguaphone!
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Wulf Newbie United States traditionalisth Joined 4577 days ago 10 posts - 17 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Persian | Message 271 of 376 21 May 2012 at 12:18am | IP Logged | ||
Wow, useful only if you're actually affiliated with the US government, since they have to authenticate your affiliation before you access the stuff, which you would know if you ever actually tried it yourself. That has literally got to be the least helpful link I have ever followed on any forum ever. In my quest to learn Persian, even an Ebonics link would have been more useful. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 5133 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 272 of 376 21 May 2012 at 1:21am | IP Logged | ||
Don't be such an ass. One link from the front page (on the Language Materials Distribution System page) there's a link for all of their Familiarization and some Headstart guides (as well as other materials, depending on language) here. No authentication needed. You *are* out of luck for Persian though, other than a Headstart 2 and Language Survival Kit - which is still worthwhile to look at. R. == 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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