jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6922 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map
| Message 57 of 104 12 November 2009 at 12:50am | IP Logged |
Have you checked this thread?
Audacity - batch mode
Edit: Oops, beaten by a couple of minutes.
Edited by jeff_lindqvist on 12 November 2009 at 12:51am
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Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6907 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map
| Message 58 of 104 12 November 2009 at 9:21pm | IP Logged |
Urban_Sasquatch wrote:
Hencke wrote:
After finding out through other sources exactly what the differences were between those sounds, and after practicing doing them myself, I started hearing the difference too, and after that I could carry on using Pimsleur to much better effect. |
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Do you mean you could hear the differences in the sounds <I>in general</I> or that you could now hear them in the Pimsleur recordings and were then better able to use it? |
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I mean both: In general, and on the Pimsleur recordings as well.
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tsneds Newbie Cyprus Joined 6966 days ago 23 posts - 26 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Japanese
| Message 59 of 104 14 November 2009 at 2:54pm | IP Logged |
maaku wrote:
I did all three levels of Japanese. Was it worth it? Absolutely not. I want that part of my life back. Seriously, had I spent that half hour a day doing say Assimil instead (just an example, as a course comparable in length and daily regimen), I would have been much better prepared for my first trip to Japan. As it was, I spent most of my time there hoping I'd find myself in one of the pre-scripted touristy situations for which Pimsleur trains. It didn't teach me to use or understand natural language in the slightest (i.e, i couldn't have even the most basic conversation about anything while I was there). I'm only glad that I didn't waste too much money on it, having bought it used.
EDIT: That said, I may be a bit emotionally invested in this one. Japanese was my first self-study foreign language, and Pimsleur Japanese was the first home-study course that I had the tenacity to see through to the end. I put a lot of hope and expectation into it, and it didn't deliver. In hindsight I shouldn't have expected as much as I did, but nevertheless I still feel (and my follow up experience demonstrates that) a proper course would have given me more payback for the time I invested into it. I know Pimsleur is a popular approach on this forum, but I'm staying honest to my experience. |
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Oh man,I thought I was the only one!
The Pimsleur Mandarin really helped me with tones and when I lived in China I did get compliments on my tones but like you said,the Japanese helped with nothing because no one really ever says any of the things you practice on Pimsleur.
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Hashimi Senior Member Oman Joined 6272 days ago 362 posts - 529 votes Speaks: Arabic (Written)* Studies: English, Japanese
| Message 60 of 104 16 November 2009 at 10:45pm | IP Logged |
I have a transcript for all levels in Pimsleur Japanese course (3 levels.) Using this transcript, one can study the three levels in 3 weeks instead of 3 months.
There are about 750 words in the whole course (not 500 as someone reported and much less than the 2500 that the company claims it has.)
The third level teach you sentences like:
(from lesson 29 in unit 3)
Not very advanced, but it is useful for beginners tourists (or for someone who want to study a little in the language.)
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gah Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5505 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Portuguese
| Message 61 of 104 17 November 2009 at 3:08pm | IP Logged |
Hi folks, been a lurker for a little while here. This particular discussion is one which is fairly useful to me at this point in time as I'm using Pimsleur to help me start learning Brazilian Portuguese. It is slow admittedly, but I'm finding it easy to fit it into my lifestyle so far as I listen to it on the train to and from work. The plan is to listen to one lesson per train trip, although this may change as the material advances, so I should hopefully do the whole 90 lessons in 45 working days.
I chose Pimsleur because the alternatives, Michel Thomas and Assimil, which immediately sprung to mind when I started looking for materials aren't that suitabable as the former covers European Portuguese with a tiny part of the material dedicated to the Brazilian version and I don't speak French so the latter is out of the question at the moment.
I'm not under the illusion that Pimsleur will make me fluent or anything like that, but I would say that it is helpful in drilling stuff into your head so it sticks. If people have alternative audio learning products to help me with my Portuguese I'd be all ears.
Edited by gah on 17 November 2009 at 3:18pm
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zenmonkey Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6565 days ago 803 posts - 1119 votes 1 sounds Speaks: EnglishC2*, Spanish*, French, German Studies: Italian, Modern Hebrew
| Message 62 of 104 17 November 2009 at 6:12pm | IP Logged |
Hi gah,
Another Portuguese learner on Pimsleur! Must be something in the water? Welcome on board we are two or three working with that these days -- I'm going through that material as reasonably fast as I can and looking to add Assimil soon (yes, the French one) I've bought a couple of books and are adding them to my material visible on my log here.
I'll complement Pimsleur with content from this Portuguese Learning Material
Good luck!
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daristani Senior Member United States Joined 7157 days ago 752 posts - 1661 votes Studies: Uzbek
| Message 63 of 104 17 November 2009 at 6:57pm | IP Logged |
If you're looking for materials for Brazilian Portuguese, don't forget FSI:
http://www.fsi-language-courses.org/Content.php?page=Portugu ese
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gah Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5505 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Portuguese
| Message 64 of 104 17 November 2009 at 8:49pm | IP Logged |
Excellent, thank you for those suggestions, I will definitely be delving into them. Time isn't particularly an issue for me, I'm not due to go to Brazil until 2011. The best language "resource" I have is my Brazilian girlfriend who is helping me along a lot.
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