[Closed] Anyone used Rosetta Stone?

I've been thinking the same thing....

Depending on your morals, there are cheaper ways of obtaining it I imagine.

Used for (attempting) to learn thai. Only lasted a couple of weeks with me, but that was more down to my laziness than the actual program. I can still remmeber most of the words in the first couple of stages so it does work.

Oh and as hinted at by Ewan, no need to pay that. Email in profile if you want the details

HI joe
YGM

It's something I am def interested in too.

i haven't tried rosetta stone, but i can highly recommend [url= http://www.michelthomas.com/ ]michel thomas[/url]. he begins by discussing the similarities between english and your chosen language, so your vocabulary expands enormously with this concept (e.g. any very ending in "ent" is spelt the same but pronounced with the emphasis as "entey"). then he introduces verbs to link the nouns/pronouns together.

each cd course has a "thick" student that you correct verbally, and a clever student that you aim to emulate. this accelerates the learning process.

it works very well for me.

we used to be the Uk distributors before they set up their own offices in the UK,
Its good software, it uses emersion techniques where you learn words for images rather then the french for ball is ballon you see a picture of a ball and then the french is spoken to you, its how you learn as a kid as you point at things and get told what it is rather then knowing what it is and the learning the different words...

but some of the same technology can be found in cheaper products:

http://www.avanquest.com/UK/education/language-learning/french/Berlitz_French_Premier.html

the rest is down to the vocab library.

But that was a few years ago, still made me enough money to get my cotic so always have a soft spot for them, also if you do go that route, Amazon always has a very good price rather then via stores in airport or out of inflight magazines etc...

Go to your local public library. If they dont have them in stock they will order in lanugage packs on CD for you. This will cost only a couple of quid. MP3 them. Sorted.

The range of stuff on offer is amazing if its anything like our local library network.

I have Michel Thomas (German, but also borrowed French and Spanish), and have also had a play with Rosetta Stone. I really can't see how they can justify 300 odd quid for Rosetta Stone imho. Both are interesting in that you just follow the CD/Software and don't have books etc., but tbh, if you aren't using the language then what you pick up very quickly from both will quickly evaporate.
Michel Thomas does a little bit of explaining, and covers a few common areas of mistakes, but in RS you fend for yourself. Maybe French is easier that way than German, which has too many words for "the" and too many endings, which even vary when used with "the" or "a". Maybe I'm just making it more complex for myself by thinking of the case tables, rather than just using the emersion technique?

Rosetta Stone I find is excellent helps you pick things up very quickly, yes it is very expensive though. I h :wink:ave heard it's available to rrent though. 😉

I got it free through my work.

I found it hard work, I would have preferred the ball = ballon route.

Strangely enough I was plodding through it and the kids wanted to know what I was up to. They thought it was a game so I let them have a go and left them to it. In a few hours the 6 year old was way past the level it had taken me a few days to get to and was quite good at it. Must be the way their brains are wired up.