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Audio to "Colloquial" series books | ||
Tags: Colloquial (program) | Book | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Juаn Senior Member Colombia Joined 5144 days ago 727 posts - 1830 votes  Speaks: Spanish* | Message 9 of 26 24 July 2015 at 10:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
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It seems though they'll be jacking up the prices to compensate. When you click on "Buy the book!", new book editions for most of the languages without the CDs seem to be scheduled to be released for $65-$80. So they're making you pay for the audio regardless.
These are fairly slim and basic manuals; there is no way they can justify charging $65 for them outside rare and understudied languages with few resources. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 6955 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 10 of 26 24 July 2015 at 10:20pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I already have all of the Colloquial courses that I'd ever want for my target languages. The value in Routledge letting the audio be free is if I could say get a copy of the textbook which matches the audio for about $20 max, then I'd pull the trigger. Otherwise paying over $50 for the book when the audio is free isn't often a good deal when most languages have viable alternatives at a lower price.
3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Speakeasy Senior Member Canada Joined 3851 days ago 507 posts - 1098 votes Studies: German | Message 11 of 26 25 July 2015 at 2:49am | IP Logged | |||||
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Been There, Done That
In response to the question concerning one's experiences, I have used the Routledge Colloquial series for German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, and Polish. Generally speaking, I was pleased by the individual products and the overall approach. Nonetheless, based on my small sample, I found that their "Introductory" courses seemed to fall into two surprisingly different categories: Simple Tourist-Speak Courses: A1 Level These courses lead the student through common, predictable situations such as arriving at the tourist destination, arranging for travel to the hotel, arranging for hotel accommodations, ordering in cafés and restaurants, arranging for a tour of the city, etcetera. The level of language is "transactional" and the vocabulary rarely exceeds 1,200 words. While the basics of the language's grammar are presented in support of the dialogues and exercises, the emphasis tends to be on "getting by" during the brief visit to the country. So, for the one-time traveller to a foreign land, these courses are just great! These courses "could" be used to launch a student on a more serious study programme, but I surmise that is not their primary intent. To my mind, the First Level Colloquial courses for German, Spanish, and Italian fall into this category. More Intensive Beginner Courses: A1-A2 Level These courses, too, lead the student through common, predictable situations. However, the complexity of the language moves beyond that of the basic transactional level towards building a solid basis for more serious follow-up study. The vocabulary is richer and more advanced grammatical concepts are introduced. Given my previous experiences with the courses that I mentioned above, I was rather surprised by the greater depth provided in the First Level Colloquial courses for Dutch and Polish. More Audio, Please! For years, many publishers have included roughly 2 hours of audio recordings in their Beginners' Language Courses. So, Routledge's inclusion of two-CDs-worth of audio is not at all unusual. Nonetheless, in the Colloquial courses that I mentioned above, I always felt that something was missing; that is, if only Routledge had included just one additional CD of audio exercises, their courses, they would have been just perfect. Free Online Audio I like the idea and I suspect that it is driven by technology, costs, and marketing. Not too long ago, the owner of a small, specialty language-course-bookstore in Montréal told me that the major cause for returns was damaged or unreadable CDs. This represents frustration for the student and additional costs for the seller and the publisher. By rendering the audio recordings available online, the publisher is in a better position to ensure that the student has a reliable source; they also reduce the delivery costs and eliminate the source of a problem and an irritant. I like Routledge's marketing approach of making the audio recordings freely available ... oh, you would like the transcriptions and lesson notes as well? No problem, we just happen to have the book available. Shall that be one copy or two? Also, have you taken the time to review the massive amount of "free" audio available for other languages and, if so, while we're processing your order, would you like to order additional books for other languages? 7 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4643 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 12 of 26 25 July 2015 at 8:02am | IP Logged | |||||
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Thanks for ruining my Friday night! ;) I spent the entire evening downloading the audio
files. On the one hand, it's great to get so much audio material for free, on the other hand, if they're going to charge about € 65 for their books now, that'd be a little bit out of proportion. Generally, I can recommend the Colloquial series although some of the books have quite a steep learning curve (Russian, Icelandic, Japanese) while others are better phrasebooks (Irish). I'd say it's quality material though and you can definitely learn something. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| kyukumber Newbie Japan Joined 3533 days ago 11 posts - 30 votes | Message 13 of 26 25 July 2015 at 2:39pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I've compiled a list of all the links to the zip files for batch download:
ttp://www59.zippyshare.com/v/KT0WpuWn/file.html Just open the HTML file with a browser of your choosing and you're good to go. I don't know anything about HTML/CSS or coding, so it's just a basic table. Nothing fancy. The links for Kazakh, Welsh and Urdu don't seem to work. I wonder if anyone managed to download those files. I enjoy making lists.
Had you waited a bit longer, Josquin. Too bad. Edited by kyukumber on 25 July 2015 at 6:24pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4643 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 14 of 26 25 July 2015 at 3:29pm | IP Logged | |||||
Dammit! ;) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4320 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 15 of 26 25 July 2015 at 4:43pm | IP Logged | |||||
Could you report the combined file size of the collection? I probably should free up some space before initializing a batch download. Edited by daegga on 25 July 2015 at 4:43pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4643 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 16 of 26 25 July 2015 at 5:15pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I downloaded everything, even the, for me, downright useless courses like English and
German and it was 8,6 GB total. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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