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Which of these Russian programs is better | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5173 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 1 of 6 14 March 2010 at 12:06am | IP Logged |
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I want to start seriously studying Russian. I haven't decided which program I want to use, but I am debating between these: ~ the old Assimil Russian Without Toil, ~ the Living Language Ultimate (Beginner-Intermediate), ~ Modern Russian (1 & 2, with audio) or ~ the Princeton course I will probably run through the Michel Thomas course first, as it seems like a good place to get a basic grasp of the language, but after that, which of these is the best to get a solid foundation? Does anyone who's used any of these programs have any positive or negative experiences to share? I would like to go through one of the above programs first, then I'd probably work my way through the New Penguin Russian course, which I've heard really great things about. I just don't want to start with something without audio! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| hobbitofny Senior Member United States Joined 6011 days ago 280 posts - 408 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian | Message 2 of 6 14 March 2010 at 12:36am | IP Logged |
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I would recommend Modern Russian 1 and 2 with use of Princeton Course to help explain the grammar. If you finish Modern Russian, you will find New Penguin Russian course to be review. You would be better to follow Modern Russian with the Advanced Living Language Ultimate course. It would add to your general vocabulary. However the next course after Modern Russian really would depend on what your plan for the use Russian.
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| OlafP Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5213 days ago 261 posts - 667 votes Speaks: German*, French, English | Message 3 of 6 14 March 2010 at 12:51am | IP Logged |
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Learning Russian is not going to be a walk in the park. You will need more than one course. The old "Russian without Toil" seem to be very good. I'll probably switch to it from the 2008 "Le Russe", which I've gone through up to lesson 60, but I can't take any more of these stupid and embarassing texts. The old Assimil courses contain texts by Pushkin and Chekhov instead. The contrast couldn't be any bigger.
As for the Living Language courses, I only know the one from the Basic series. What I didn't like about it is that the book has lots of errors, and the Russian texts have no accents. Instead of putting some accent marks above the letters, there are often plain English texts that explain how the stress of a verb changes through the times and conjugations, sometimes they need half a page to explain it for one verb, whereas accent marks wouldn't have taken any space at all. The structure of the lessons is weird. There is way to much English on the recordings. If you only use the recordings of the full dialogs, you're left with almost nothing. On the other hand, the depth of the course is not bad. The vocabulary thaught is okay and the grammar points give quite some details. I don't know the Modern Russian courses, and I only had a short look at the Princeton course. Princeton seems to be quite easy, because I could understand the dialogs of the advanced chapters immediately without looking at the text. I may go through the whole course anyway over the next weeks. What you will need with Russian are some drills to get familiar with conjugations, declensions, the rule of numbers, aspects of verbs, verbs of motions and what not. I'll start to go through the Cortina Method Russian next week. This is a book with loads of exercises on the points mentioned above. It's from the 50s, so some vocabulary might not be up to date. I think the book is out of print already but you still can get it from some shops for what I would call a symbolic price. I also ordered the Penguin course, because some people were whining in Amanzon reviews that it is too hard, so it is probably good. And I should get an old second hand Russian Made Simple in a few days. Edited by OlafP on 14 March 2010 at 1:03am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5173 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 4 of 6 14 March 2010 at 1:21am | IP Logged |
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OlafP - I actually have the Cortina Method (in Russian, and a few other languages), but I don't have the audio. Does anyone know where I could get the audio?
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| hobbitofny Senior Member United States Joined 6011 days ago 280 posts - 408 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian | Message 5 of 6 14 March 2010 at 5:51am | IP Logged |
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Modern Russian has many drills and much audio. Those are its two big plus items. It is much like the FSI German in teaching the language. Even if you go with another course. The drills in Modern Russian will be helpful for you.
The Basic Living Language series are no where near as complete as the Ultimate seres. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| josht Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6224 days ago 635 posts - 857 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Spanish, Russian, Dutch | Message 6 of 6 14 March 2010 at 5:56am | IP Logged |
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I would recommend the Assimil Russian course (the old '51 version, or the 70s version, if you are advanced enough with French or German), along with the New Penguin Course. I've not used Modern Russian, but I have looked at the Princeton course, and the biggest issue that I have with it is that, while it has many exercises, there isn't an answer key.
Regarding the New Penguin course, it's not nearly as terrifying as some reviewers paint it. It's grammar heavy, but that's to be expected with Russian. :-) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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