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Michel Thomas 2009 Edition | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| legasp Newbie Ireland Joined 5484 days ago 23 posts - 21 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Greek, Ancient Greek | Message 17 of 27 01 July 2009 at 1:35pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Kugel did you use MT for German and if so did you go beyond the Basic German course?
I've used it up to Basic German, but CD 7/8 just confused me, and I've not moved on to the Advanced course. Am I missing out? Does it get better? e.g. vocab course, language builder? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5822 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes  Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 18 of 27 01 July 2009 at 8:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
Which is fair enough, given that the course promises the moon on a stick. Hodder definitely oversell it.
There's no pause buttons and no pronunciations, because there's no audio at all! I find that pretty limiting, personally. As for the other learners' mistakes, I personally found it bearable on the grounds that I made about 50% of the same mistakes myself. Even if I hadn't done, the simple fact that you're listening to a "live" lesson means that the whole thing had to be paced to match a learner. I personally found that Lyazel's Lithuanian course jumped around too much, and I had to look back. I reckon this is because he's not paced the course against a learner. Ignore the particular niggles about accent and the recording format, and imagine taking a course with a native speaker who could do exactly what Thomas did, and you'll see that the biggest bonus of the Michel Thomas method is that you either teach it right or it falls apart -- there is no "survival tactic" for the teacher that allows the student to show progress that isn't there. Remember when you compare the Michel Thomas course to other courses that it is only a 12-hour course -- it's not really designed for repeated listening -- whereas a lot of the other products on the market are supposed to be studied over the course of a longer period of time, often with some repeating. So while it might not teach you everything you want to know, it's still a very efficient use of time. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| TheBiscuit Tetraglot Senior Member Mexico Joined 5734 days ago 532 posts - 619 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Italian Studies: German, Croatian | Message 19 of 27 02 July 2009 at 5:33am | IP Logged | |||||
Don't worry too much about CD 7/8. I think he's just trying to show how German prefixes work. Just understanding the concept is enough to move on. I think my favourite was actually the language builder as it incorporates material from both the beginners course and the advanced. The advanced one doesn't really get that advanced but does build really well on the basic one. I was expecting a good explanation of articles and adjectives but it never came... I'm going through the vocab course at the moment but it's just so tedious and irritating. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Kugel Senior Member United States Joined 6349 days ago 497 posts - 555 votes Speaks: English* | Message 20 of 27 02 July 2009 at 9:07pm | IP Logged | |||||
Yes, I used the MT for German for the basic and advanced courses. I recommend them, but I think having a grammar manual is necessary. If anything, studying the MT courses will give you insight into how German can be taught efficiently. Some things that I found odd in the MT German courses: MT waits until the advanced course to teach the auxiliary verb "haben" for the past and perfect tenses. This I think is strange because the 3rd person verbs, at least the regular weak ones(regular), already gives what's necessary to construct the participle for the present and past perfects. Only little notes are needed afterward in order to get the right participle. And if my memory is correct, MT didn't make the connection between the 3rd person present verbs and the past/present participles. No concentration on cases and prepositions. Totally screws up on teaching the zu constructions. There are even errors on CD 6 track 9. Becomes difficult to keep track of all the rules MT gives towards the end of the courses. Sure, the rules are simple enough to understand, but you might as well just read them from Wikipedia if it's all about firing out the rules in order to appease the 8CD template for the publisher. This might seem like the MT courses for German aren't good. Maybe they aren't? I'd still get them simply because they are interesting to look at, especially if you are into language learning and the philosophy behind it. Edited by Kugel on 02 July 2009 at 9:08pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Kugel Senior Member United States Joined 6349 days ago 497 posts - 555 votes Speaks: English* | Message 21 of 27 02 July 2009 at 9:35pm | IP Logged | |||||
Yes, the Lithuanian course could use an outline or some page that keeps track of what's going on. Then again, the learner could keep track himself with a notepad. But consider if the courses had audio done professionally, expanded to 40-50 lessons, and edited for mistakes by a grammarian. Would they be superior to the $60 Hodder and Stoughton courses that are done by folks who have advanced degrees and the backing of a multi-million dollar publisher, which is in turn part of the huge French conglomerate Lagardère? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5822 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 22 of 27 02 July 2009 at 11:07pm | IP Logged | |||||
You're missing the point -- one of the main strengths of Thomas's approach (when he does it right -- even he slips up from time to time) is precisely because there is no need for the student to keep track of things. No looking up, no looking back, just running with the flow of the course. Edited by Cainntear on 02 July 2009 at 11:08pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Kugel Senior Member United States Joined 6349 days ago 497 posts - 555 votes Speaks: English* | Message 23 of 27 03 July 2009 at 9:39pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Running with the flow of the course I think is harder than periodically checking an outline of what you need to know in order to grasp the next grammar topic. I think this is true especially with the Spanish courses regarding the verbs. The only reason why the MT courses can get away from not having a "cheat sheet" to refer to is because of listening to the 2 learners' mistakes. But why not just go straight to the source instead, not relying on other people's mistakes for recollection of grammar?
The Mandarin course repeats every word in English for just about every prompt! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| icing_death Senior Member United States Joined 5672 days ago 296 posts - 302 votes Speaks: English* | Message 24 of 27 04 July 2009 at 5:23am | IP Logged | |||||
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I use Michel Thomas to supplement other aspects of language learning. It gives me a really fast boost in grammar.
For this reason, I use it exactly as they say - no memorizing, etc. I wouldn't do this if it was my only material for learning a language, but I can't imagine a situation in which it would be. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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