Rosetta Stone



Late to the party, but yeah, this song fucking rules. Thumbs up bros

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIJAfbiRX7s]Tool - Rosetta Stoned (last 47 secs in video response) - YouTube[/ame]
 
Beach Affiliate said:
Doing my research on Rosetta Stone but finding a mixed bag on reviews of its efficacy.

Have any of you gay webmasters used it with success?

Looking to grab the Level 1, 2 & 3 set for Latin to freshen up my skillz before moving on to some other, more functional languages like Spanish.
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I took Latin for 4 years in High School. If I had to go back to it I am beginner level. In high school I was average, probably middle of my class. Some mofo's were crazy good at translating. It started getting hard when we would just sit and read the Iliad all day. I will admit Junior/Senior year I started to tune out a little bit.

I started Rosetta Stone German last weekend. I used to think Latin was so hard that learning any other language would probably be as hard as it. Dude, German is sooo easy compared to Latin. I think Latin is probably one of the gnarliest languages you can learn besides Ancient Greek (I also took in high school as an elective - fuck if I know). Recently, what was nice was German had some common rules that I already knew from Latin.

The one thing I will say is I have already gotten confused on a few issues in German and it would be good to look at a German grammar book. There is literally no English explanations in Rosetta Stone. They teach you by showing you pictures and making you match what they say in German to the picture. It's almost like playing a game while learning and can be fun.

I have some family members who speak German so it's also nice I can practice with them and ask questions.

So far I enjoy Rosetta Stone and I find my retention rate with the material is pretty good. I guess that's my review. :)
 
I definitely don't think it's worth the cost. I'd recommend taking a college class if you're okay with dropping that much money on learning a language. There are plenty of free/low-cost resources that can aide you in learning foreign lingo.
 
You can take the lessons online at rosettastone.com and don't have to buy the entire software package. It's $20/mo.. not that bad.

In a class, I would be learning maybe 3-6 hours a week.

Online, I can learn 3-6 hours a day if I want to. Bigger bang for your buck. Depends on what you are looking for.
 
I torrented it and went through the entire German program through the advanced sections. You aren't going to be able to have an intellectual conversation in the target language after you've finished it, but you'll have a pretty good basic understanding of how adjectives, verbs, etc. function, sentence structure, and a pretty decent number of words to get you started.

I think people who go into it thinking that they'll be fluent after finishing it are looking at it the wrong way. It isn't going to leave you with a vast vocabulary, but it gives you the basic language skills and knowledge to pick up childrens books, magazines, etc. in your target language and at least be able to follow along with a dictionary to fill in the blanks. With that foundation in place you can continue expanding your vocabulary and understanding of the grammar a lot easier than trying to start by learning grammar rules and whatnot from a boring textbook.
 
Not sure where I read it but the article suggested the best way to learn any language is to throw yourself in amongst it where you must learn the language in order to survive. Apparently in situations like that, your brain is able to learn language much in the same way a child is able to do so because they need to learn how to communicate to survive.
 
I actually speak and understand a lot of german from using a book/audio series many years ago. It's not rosetta stone, but I can't remember the name of the program off the top of my head.

I'll have to dig it up and post later.
 
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