Rosetta Stone Version 3: Chinese Level 1,2 & 3 Set with Audio Companion

Rosetta Stone Version 3: Chinese Level 1,2 & 3 Set with Audio Companion | The Great Wall and Rosetta Stone: World Wonders

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Rosetta Stone Vers...

	Rosetta Stone Version 3: Chinese Level 1,2 & 3 Set with Audio Companion Mac OS X, Windows \| Rosetta Stone, 2008 average customer review:based on 39 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Chinese is Hard, Rosetta Stone Makes it a Bit Easier

Chinese is not an easy language to learn. Let's face it, they're all hard. I was fortunate as my sister and I were kinda raised all over the world. We both speak fluent French and Spanish, both do a smattering of Italian and Portuguese, because my old dad really wanted his girls to be world wise.

I've spent the last couple months with Rosetta Stone for Japanese and it's working well for me, so now I'm doing the Chinese as well. It's harder than Japanese and like Japanese, the grammar is very different, but Japanese isn't tonal, so maybe that's why I find it easier. Also, I learned Hiragana and Katagana right away, you can't do that with Chinese. Reading in that language is going to be forever beyond me, I'm afraid.

So other than that how do I like the Rosetta Stone for Chinese? Well, having actually been immersed in a few foreign languages when I was a child, I have to say that I like it a lot, though I imagine it's a bit harder for students of English than Spanish or French would be, because, as I've said, the grammar is so different and I think you probably have to spend more time on your listening and repeating skills than you would have to with a language that uses the Roman alphabet.

I don't recommend more that forty-five minutes or a hour a day with the program, because I think you need time for the lessons to sink in before moving on. Actually a half hour in the morning and again in the afternoon, if you can swing it, would be good, I think anyway.

And the most important thing about the Rosetta Stone is that it doesn't make Chinese a chore. Just take it slow and easy and let it gradually sink in. Rome wasn't built in a day, after all.

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The Great Wall and Rosetta Stone: World Wonders

I have wanted to learn Chinese ever since I visited Beijing two years ago but thought the complexities of the language would make learning it forever out of my reach. Besides, it's not like there are a lot of Chinese Language instructors at local universities.

I took Japanese at my local university last year and did not learn nearly as much as I did using the Japanese Rosetta Stone.

So, when I saw they had the Chinese version, I decided to give it a try.

Here's what I love about this program:

1. What I really love about this Rosetta Stone is that you can wear headphones, listen to a word or phrase, and then repeat back what you heard. If you say it wrong, the program corrects you and has you say it again. We did not do that in my university class...it was all rote memorization and listening to our professor yammer on and on.

2. Rosetta Stone costs about the same as a university course, but allows you access to the "instructor" after you have completed the lessons. You can refresh your memory whenever you want.

3. Rosetta Stone is so easy to use, you literally plug and play.

4. The program tracks completed lessons.

5. Rosetta Stone has impressive photographs that help cement the word/phrase in your head.

6. The lessons are brief. My university class lasted 2 hours. By the end of the period, my head was swimming with unfamiliar words. I like that the lessons on Rosetta Stone are only 30 minutes long.

7. Rosetta Stone is so convenient. You can learn Chinese from the comfort of your home, before work, after dinner, in between your favorite tv shows. (You can even order sweet and sour chicken from your favorite Chinese restaurant and eat it while practicing with no worries about the smell annoying your classmates. How cool is that?)

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Dynamic Immersion is Working for Me

I've been using Rosetta Stone for two months now and I have to say that it really does simplify learning a language. Actually, it teaches you like you learned your crib language. Well, not quite, but it tries, sort of.

There are no English words in these lessons, you learn your new language by associating words in your new language you don't know (yet) with photos of things you know. The new word for run with the spoken phrase, pictured with a boy running for example.

You learn through Rosetta Stone's speech recognition system. You work on reading and pronouncing your new words and you get feedback immediately, which helps to make the new language sink in.

Rosetta Stone calls their learning method Dynamic Immersion and it seems to work. At least it's working for me, in three different languages.

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If You're Serious, this is the Best Way to Learn a Language

It seems to me that Americans are pretty much known world wide for their lack of languages skills. When we travel, we seem to expect everybody to speak English. If they can't understand eggs over easy, then we come home and tell any and everyone who will listen, how backward those people in Japan, Spain, France or Sweden are.

And am I any different? I'm an educated person, but not a word of Italian or Chinese do I speak, though I've spent the last month and a half studying Japanese and Spanish, so I guess you could say that I'm working hard to dispel the myth that American's can't learn a foreign language. We can. My Japanese is not so good, but the Spanish I've been working on for the last six weeks, well, I've really surprised myself.

I've put aside studying those other languages for a bit and have been concentrating on Italian and Chinese, Italian for the last couple weeks, wondering will I be able to retain what I've learned and be able to grasp the new languages. Italian, yes, but the tonal inflections in Mandarin are very hard for me and they put a Chinese friend into stitches every time I try them. It seems I'm having a bit of trouble trying to say what I want. I guess that's why they say practice makes perfect.

Back to the program. Level One is supposed to give you a foundation in essential vocabulary and it does, at least it seems from my point it gives you what you need to get around a bit. There is no translation, instead you learn by looking at pictures and hearing the words, much like a child growing up and let me tell you, sometimes I feel like a child as I work through the lessons.

Level two builds on the vocabulary, taking you from simple sentences to some that are a little more complex. That's where I was when I wrote my reviews of Spanish and Japanese at only a couple weeks. I'm confident about moving ahead in Italian, Chinese is going to take more work, it's harder, don't let anyone tell you any different. I'm guessing you could be pretty fluent in a Romance language in six or seven months with Rosetta Stone. It'll take you a lot longer with Chinese, my opinion. Still, like my reviews of the other languages, Italian and Chinese both get five stars.

If you're serious about learning a foreign language, get Rosetta Stone, you won't be sorry.

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Very well produced program, but still very hard to learn to speak accurately

The Rosetta Stone (RS) learning interface is well designed and very clean. It is the most user friendly language learning program I've experienced. What's more, the user interface applies to all of their language modules so learners of multiple RS language modules will be comfortable and at home with the "dynamic immersion" approach.

At best, the RS Mandarin will train you to be conversational in Mandarin. It will not allow you to recognize and write Chinese characters easily- that is an entirely different discipline better served by other instructional approaches. It is possible to speak and not be able to read the characters at this stage.

Mandarin is hard language to speak for most westerners. The 4 primary pronunciation tones (see Wiki's Pinyin article for an excellent overview) sound subtle to western tongues and are very hard to pronounce for the typical English speaker. This is because the way the mouth (lips, tongue, breathing) moves in pronouncing Mandarin is completely different to speaking English. My wife, an American from the South who speaks English with a somewhat relaxed and dragged out accent, has incredible difficulty in discerning the tonal differences, let alone pronouncing them accurately. Discerning and learning these tonal differences is crucial to successful conversational Mandarin. If you remember the 70's-80's Kung-Fu movies, they sometimes have a Westerner as a sparring combatant and they will sometimes speak some Mandarin in between the flying punches. To the Mandarin speaker, it always sounds really funny because they have typically messed up the tonal inflections. For example, "ma" can mean mother, horse, to scold, to wipe, a question, measles, etc., when used with the correct tone and context. So, to avoid speaking "Kung-Fu Mandarin" (comical and embarrassing in a business meeting, but at least it gets them smiling), it is essential to listen to the Mandarin speakers on the RS software very very carefully and practice repeatedly. That said, the speakers on the RS software have clear excellent accents but the microphone pronunciation feedback tool is not tight enough and will tolerate tonal mis-pronunciations.

If you are learning Mandarin alone, it would be very helpful to still seek a native Mandarin speaker. It helps to observe the mouth when pronouncing the words (I wish RS would have avi's of the speaker's mouth up close as a pronouncing aid). It also helps to be corrected immediately to avoid entrenching bad habits. And if you are finding an instructor, get an educated person that speaks with a proper accent. You want the Beijing news reader quality. China is a large country and speakers from different parts of China have very different accents. For example, speakers from HK or Canton will often speak (if they even can!) Mandarin that is heavily tinged with a Cantonese accent. No point learning that. Should you be discouraged? No!!! If you are in China or get Chinese cable programs, you will notice some westerners on the language and outreach programs. Folks, these guys speak a brand of Mandarin with such accuracy and poise that would put most native speakers to shame!

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, page 5, 6, 7, 8

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