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"You should just use Rosetta Stone" grrr | ||
Tags: Rosetta Stone | Usefulness | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Hobbema Senior Member United States Joined 5540 days ago 541 posts - 575 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Portuguese, French, Dutch | Message 25 of 36 19 June 2010 at 10:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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I went through 2-1/2 levels of the Rosetta Stone Brazilian Portuguese. My company bought it for me, so I didn't personally lose out on the deal.
The program crapped out on me halfway through level 3 and lost my records of what I had done and where I was. But even after all that, the glorified word-picture association method trained me to do things like - point to a dog and say "Cachorro. Sim. Cachorro". I could point at a blue car and say "carro azul". That was about it. What I really needed was to learn how to say things like: "What medicine do you have for diarrhea?" and "The ATM just ate my bank card, does anyone speak English?" and "How did so much beer end up on my hotel bill?" Rosetta Stone didn't teach me to do that, but maybe I just didn't identify the picture correctly... Edited by Hobbema on 19 June 2010 at 10:20pm 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| hypersport Senior Member United States Joined 5680 days ago 216 posts - 307 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 26 of 36 20 June 2010 at 1:28am | IP Logged | ||
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I can only speak for the Latin American Spanish from Rosetta Stone. I did volume 1 and 2 about 4 years ago when I decided I was going to learn Spanish.
I got a lot out of it, I thought it was very good. But then again, I wanted to get a lot out of it. It's the same with everything in life man, people want something for nothing and something to complain about. I get a laugh every time one of these threads comes up to bash Rosetta Stone. There isn't one course that is perfect. A few under your belt and then native materials should get you on your way. If you have Rosetta Stone and you can't make sense of what you see in the pictures, you need to invest in some books, get proactive and figure some stuff out. That's what I did, I figured it out and made damn sure I knew what I was looking at and how to differentiate that from the other photos. I started using what I was learning with natives right from the beginning. One Mexican who spoke good English asked me how I knew so much Spanish and the only thing that I had used up to that point was Rosetta Stone. As always, the real results come for those who truly want it and are willing to do whatever it takes. For these people Rosetta Stone can be a great tool alongside many others. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Hobbema Senior Member United States Joined 5540 days ago 541 posts - 575 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Portuguese, French, Dutch | Message 27 of 36 20 June 2010 at 5:47am | IP Logged | ||
hypersport, I am with you all the way on the value of personal motivation and using whatever materials are available for language study. If Rosetta Stone is of any help to any one at any time, then I am glad to hear it. I would be more gracious towards Rosetta Stone if it weren't for poor customer support and ridiculous user rights policies. I wrote a requisition to purchase a copy for my company because I figured 4 of us involved in international business would be able to use it to at least orient ourselves towards learning a language we did business in. I later had to explain to my boss that oops, only one of us could use it because it only supported a single installation on a single computer. It's their right to enforce what policies they feel necessary; I myself feel this is wrong and overly restrictive, but that's neither here nor there. Yep, I admit, my mistake, my responsibility in not researching the product enough. But after my experiences with bad customer support with frequent software bugs in every unit, I feel I have the right to complain. I'm not criticizing your post; my gripe is with the company. But if there are those like you who have had good success with the method, I think that is very much worth discussion. Edited by Hobbema on 20 June 2010 at 5:50am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Chris Heptaglot Senior Member Japan Joined 6920 days ago 287 posts - 452 votes Speaks: English*, Russian, Indonesian, French, Malay, Japanese, Spanish Studies: Dutch, Korean, Mongolian | Message 28 of 36 20 June 2010 at 9:21am | IP Logged | ||
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stout, I echo your support for the Hugo 3 Months courses. They are a great start to learning any language, and the more popular ones also have follow-on courses, available in a pack.
There are so many better ways to spend your money than investing in Rosetta Stone - Living Language Ultimate Spanish, Linguaphone, Pimsleur, mayve even Fluentz, but I have never used it so I can't really comment. 'But even after all that, the glorified word-picture association method trained me to do things like - point to a dog and say "Cachorro. Sim. Cachorro". I could point at a blue car and say "carro azul". That was about it.' And that just about says it all about Rosetta Stone - phrases with no understanding about how to put them into a sentence. All RS can be is PART of the language-learning solution, but even then, I could learn so much more, in far less time without the vague pictures and 'happy sounds'. 'If you have Rosetta Stone and you can't make sense of what you see in the pictures, you need to invest in some books, get proactive and figure some stuff out.' So you pay all that money and you still need to buy extra books and resources to work it all out? Again, that says it all! Why not just buy a good, grammar-based course with audio and learn properly from the start? The RS is a gimmick. This just adds more to the pot of proof. If RS works for you, and you're happy with the results, then knock yourself out! Just be aware that a far cheaper program like Rocket Spanish inlcludes similar software as part of the program, and it actually shows you what you are supposed to be saying. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| doviende Diglot Senior Member Canada languagefixatio Joined 5785 days ago 533 posts - 1245 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Spanish, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Hindi, Swedish, Portuguese | Message 29 of 36 20 June 2010 at 9:33am | IP Logged | ||
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Perhaps it will help you respond differently to your coworkers if you take a different view of why they are telling you to use RS. Imagine being in their shoes, perhaps not knowing any other languages except English. They imagine that learning languages is an impossible task, and their only idea of how to do it is to go sign up for a course at school (which they have horrible memories of, from high school).
Now, imagine what they think of you, going off on your own to study a language without signing up for a school course! You're trying to do the impossible, and they might not have ever heard of anyone doing that. Then one day, they see some stupid ad. It explains what sounds like a great idea...you don't need classroom learning if you "learn like a child would learn it". Somehow they imagine that since this is the first time in their life that they've heard about such a miraculous idea, then obviously you haven't heard about it either. They must rush off to tell you! I think perhaps your coworkers are just trying to find some common ground with you, and help you out a bit. All they know about self-study of a language is what they've seen in Rosetta Stone commercials, so it's the only way they can say something related to the topic. Perhaps you could respond with "It's interesting that you brought up Rosetta Stone. I've heard of it and I've discussed it with people online. Have you ever thought of learning a language too? We should talk about languages on our lunch break, and I can tell you about the other study methods I've heard about!" Answering your coworkers with less sarcasm has at least two benefits. Firstly, they still get the message that you already know about Rosetta Stone, but now they're actually more likely to treat you nicely in the future because you haven't mocked them. Secondly, and perhaps most importantly, it will alleviate stress for you. When you take the time to consider the other person's possible point of view, and then formulate a friendly answer, then it actually is less stressful on your own mind and emotional state. Talking to people in a sarcastic or disrespectful way is actually more stressful for you, and treating people nicely can have a therapeutic effect. If you always have to do the snappy comeback, you might be making your own situation worse, both externally and internally. Your coworkers probably aren't all morons, they just don't know how to talk about language learning, so they're trying whatever they can. Maybe some of them are actually interested :) 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| BlondGirl Groupie United States Joined 5356 days ago 49 posts - 101 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 30 of 36 20 June 2010 at 3:40pm | IP Logged | ||
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Doviende,
I appreciate your input, but "You should use Rosetta Stone" is not much different than what is typically experienced by young mothers who are offered unsolicited "advice" from "well-meaning" people. Another example is for someone to walk up to an overweight person and suggest salad when the person is eating a cookie. It is rude to tell people what choices they "should" make. The comments are usually made in passing and there is not much time for a lengthy, meaningful discussion. The people who are genuinely interested, stop for a moment and we exchange whatever info to share our learning materials or they pull out jump drives for me to copy information. (I have a great collection of flash cards for Mnemosyne, for example, that I am more than happy to share.) When people are saying that, it doesn't usually sound particularly considerate or caring. It just seems smart-assed. And if I had not tried your approach for the last 3 years that I have been studying, I would not be asking for suggestions for quick comebacks. Sometimes, my response is simply, "If Rosetta Stone was so helpful, don't you think you'd see me using it since I already own it?" (My son got it because we live in Houston and he was working in a restaurant. Can you guess how much Spanish he speaks? You can probably guess it: Restaurant Spanish that he picked up at work.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| doviende Diglot Senior Member Canada languagefixatio Joined 5785 days ago 533 posts - 1245 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Spanish, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Hindi, Swedish, Portuguese | Message 31 of 36 20 June 2010 at 4:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can see your point, but I assumed that the people who are coming by to give you this stupid "advice" are new each time, rather than being the same person saying the same advice over and over again despite your patient explanations.
If it's new people every time, giving you the advice for the first time, then it doesn't matter what you say to them...there will still be new people shooting their mouth off. In this case, it seems to me that the only logical course of action is to change your own interpretation of it in order to mitigate the harm it does to you. Now, if it's actually the same jerk saying "get Rosetta Stone" every day, then ya, you need snappy comebacks because they might actually make him stop. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| BlondGirl Groupie United States Joined 5356 days ago 49 posts - 101 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 32 of 36 20 June 2010 at 4:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yeah, sometimes it is the same people. I have worked in this company for several years and while some faces come and go, the "advice" is typically from someone who has seen me studying for a long time and is just telling me to do it the easy way. (I wonder why they assume I am so stupid that I wouldn't have tried an easy way already??
The truly ironic thing is that sometimes I get these comments from people who don't speak English very well. HAHAHAHA (I have suggested that my company sponsor some sort of ESL class for employees to do on their own time. Sigh.) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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