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Michel Thomas, Assimil or Pimsleur? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| re4lover Groupie Egypt Joined 5465 days ago 63 posts - 66 votes  Speaks: Arabic (Egyptian)* Studies: English, Russian, Modern Hebrew, Aramaic | Message 25 of 37 31 July 2010 at 1:07pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I did what they advising me here to do with Assimil Listening and read notes then review and practice with exercise 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6039 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 26 of 37 31 July 2010 at 2:44pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Actually, I think you're falling into the same trap as most of the language learning community has in the last 50 or more years: you're seeing the speed of produced language as an independent goal in itself -- but it's not. Language is a series of choices. If you teach only fixed phrases, you're reducing the choice considerably, so one choice results in a long series of sounds. If you're working at a grammatical level, you're increasing the number of choices the learner has to make, so increasing the thinking time. I believe that part of the reason that so many courses work at a phrasal level is nothing to do with linguistics or pedagogy, and any argument based on that is just post hoc justification. As a teacher, it is very difficult to sit there as a student stumbles through a phrase the way the students on Michel's own recordings do. This leads the teacher to start to try to make it easier for the student. Fixed phrases come out quicker (as above), so the teacher sees this as easier and therefore better. Unfortunately, it's only easier because it doesn't actually practise the skills the student actually needs to develop. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| michaelmichael Senior Member Canada Joined 5285 days ago 167 posts - 202 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 27 of 37 31 July 2010 at 6:17pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Not entirely sure what trap I'm falling into, I still recommend MT before anything else (well almost, i read the intro of 501 verbs by barron and a 6 page quick review of the grammar just to organize the 10 pronoun families in my head). I had a long winded reply, but i deleted it since i am still not sure what you are advocating. My impression was that you think grammar is more important than lexical drills. Is that what you are saying ? By fixed phrases you mean Je voudrais boire.... and then adding different prepositional phrases right ? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| johntm93 Senior Member United States Joined 5355 days ago 587 posts - 746 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 28 of 37 01 August 2010 at 1:19am | IP Logged | ||||||||
1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| johntm93 Senior Member United States Joined 5355 days ago 587 posts - 746 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 29 of 37 01 August 2010 at 1:20am | IP Logged | ||||||||
1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| pineappleboom Groupie United States languageloft-ashley. Joined 5281 days ago 66 posts - 76 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, French, Russian | Message 30 of 37 02 August 2010 at 2:12am | IP Logged | ||||||||
It helps to shadow along with it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| zorglub Pentaglot Senior Member France Joined 7028 days ago 441 posts - 504 votes 1 sounds Speaks: French*, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: German, Arabic (Written), Turkish, Mandarin | Message 31 of 37 02 August 2010 at 1:18pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I think there can be no rivalry here.
Pimsleur is quite expensive. MT follows and Assimil's the cheapest. Pimsleur is VERY quickly rewarding, you can actually use some survival language after only 10 lessons , and it's possible you sound very close to a native. As long as you need not say more than Hello, where's Hotel Colombus, would you like to have a drink at the hotel and the like. Yet, this is very simple, painless and useful to show some courtesy when travelling abroad. You get bored in course 2 (lessons 30-60) then you pick up some more interest but at the end of 90 lessons , you do have some communication skills, know how the language works, but do not understand much because you vocabulary is poor; you may have a very good prinunciation also , becaus eas you dod not access written material you dod not get parasited by it and "how you think it might read". Above all, you're ready to acquire much more; more easily, I think. In 3-4 months (if you do it almost daily which I recommend)you'll be amazed at what you're able to say. You can build phrases never heard before. MT is slower and as said earlier is very smarty done so that you internalise grammar painlessly. As with Pimsleur you can do it while driving (slowly) or walking the dog/cat/turtle/naja. Vocabulary is as light as Pimsleur's but I can't really make my mind about which of Pimsleur or MT 's better to start with. I'll trigger Caintears throwing lightnings at me , but I find PImsleur might be a better start that will optimise your pronunciation. After Pimsleur , MT is probably very useful giving you more insight into the structure and inderstanding of the grammar. After either one or both (I favor Pimsleur because after 90 lessons you won't get lost abroad, and it is very quickly rewarding), then coes the time to expand your culture, vocabulary and anchor grammar by using the language. This is where Assimil is very good for most languages I tried it for (German, Italian Spanish Portuguese) or my wife (English for Frenchies). As I said earlier, I find both recent and older Arabic courses terrible. It is smartly done, each lesson has loads of ne words, you meet real language complex structures progressivemy and afte 6 months you can be very very good. I like others insist on revising as often as possible the audio once you understand what's being said. Shadowing (while running / walking the crocodile / bear/dog or while doing only that if you've got time to do it) will markedly increase your abilities to understand and speak. While shadowing, a good trick I found is trying to invent my own new phrases and the audio track slows down , ie during the "exercise" section. None of these 3 courses is for the ol'timer who wants to learn languages as they teach 'em at school , grammar books tables of pronouns, declensions, word lists. Mr Micheloud has tagged this the "hair shirt way of learning languages". I agree it is a scrapy hair shirt and above all it very likely works much less than these 3 courses combined. But it seems some learners are distressed by what does not look like a scholarly language course and are sort of taken by panic when they start these "modern" course. Even though they can see the results on people who used Pimsleur and Assimil, they think it's the learner who has extraordinary abilities, when it' only the course that is brilliant. The learner only has to follow the instructions, add some shadowing, and enjoy learning. Enjoying these courses is probably the key. But in order to enjoy it , one has to put aside one's bias. This does not stand for some of the learners here who unlike me seem to really have extraordinary abilities for learning languages. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6039 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 32 of 37 02 August 2010 at 1:46pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
The trap is this:
This implies that other courses give you the speed to speak fluently -- but they generally don't. What they give you is the ability to parrot fixed phrases rapidly. What you are describing as a disadvantage of the MT approach is nothing unique to it. But it is in fact an advantage. If you learn fixed phrases (and yes I do mean je voudrais boire... and the like) you are not learning to choose the words and this makes it harder to separate the words later when needed to. I've heard learners so heavily drilled in one set of questions and answers that when asked a fairly simple question they've answered a completely different one, based on a similarity of one or two key words in the prompt and one of their classroom questions. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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