Customer Reviews

Czech (Pimsleur Language Program)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

On the plus side, the voice actors used in this course are very good. Most words are spoken clearly and are easy to understand.

The biggest downside with this product is the very limited vocabulary introduced here. If you are buying this course as a basic introduction to the Czech language, it will fill your needs very well. Although, is an "Introduction" worth the nearly $250 price tag? If you are buying this course in the hopes of carrying on a conversation in Czech, think again. There is just not enough vocabulary presented. This is solely due to Pimsleurs decision to waste vast amount of CD time, repeating past lessons. While repetition may be a very effective teaching tool in a classroom setting, it's a gross waste of time with recorded media. With recorded media, if I haven't mastered, or have forgotten, the vocabulary from a previous lesson, I can always go back and replay it as many times as is necessary. While reusing words learned in previous lessons, in new context, would be a good thing, don't waste time in following lessons repeating instructions and pronunciation that have already been covered. Instead, if Pimsleur had used that time to introduce new vocabulary, the course would have been excellent.

Another major short coming with this course, is the lack of any kind of written support material. For the $240 price tag, they could have included a small dictionary, or at the very least, a written list of the new words introduced in each lesson. Such a list would also be very helpful for review. Unfortunately, you get nothing. So if you want to review what a particular word means, good luck trying to find it among the 30 lessons. Perhaps Pimsleur intentionally omitted a word list so as not to draw attention to the very small number of words covered in the course.

The final major objection I have with this product is the packaging. Packaging may sound trivial, but if you want to use this course on your daily commute, or on a trip, plan on having to buy a separate carrying case. The course comes in a huge, gaudy, cheap plastic box measuring 11x13x1.5 inches. Making it totally impossible to pop in your briefcase. And what's even worse is that the case doesn't hold the CD's securely. Whenever I close the box, the CDs would come loose and bang around against the inside of the box and the other CDs. Obviously this would cause irreparable damage to the disks. Why in the world would they not package these disks in a small CD wallet with separate sleeves for each CD? Yet another very bad decision by Pimsleur.

Bottom line; think hard before spending your money on this course. Sadly, right now there are not a lot of Czech courses to choose from. I've taken two language courses by Rosetta Stone, and they are fantastic! Unfortunately, Rosetta Stone does not yet offer Czech. I also purchased the Czech course from the Foreign Service Institute, and it's nicely done, includes a larger vocabulary, and is cheaper than Pimsleur. (Plus it also comes in a nice Prologic Case.) However the vocabulary is definitely slanted to the requirements of the statesman/politician, rather than colloquial "on the street" Czech.

I cannot tell you how pleased I am with the Pimsleur program for Czech. I only wish they had a more advanced version I could move on to! I also purchased the Berlitz cassette, and if I had not had Pimsleur first, I would have thought Czech was impossible. This product in a wonderful way to learn a little Czech for a trip.

I agree with the other review from the person who used the tapes with the abridged lessons first. I went through the abridged tapes and would also rate them as 5-star. There were a few errors in the tapes that hung me up, but overall I would rate the tapes very highly. I wanted more Czech! I eagerly awaited the Comprehensive lessons on CD.

The first three lessons went fast - I did them all in one sitting. After that, things got down to a more usual pace. There are some differences in how things are said, but I presume that is a matter of difference of interpretation. I have found fewer errors in the Comprehensive version.

I am on lesson twenty now. The things I dislike about the lessons are: Many times they don't slow down and allow me to catch the pronounciation of the words. Sometimes they teach the word as sounding masculine or neuter, yet I would swear that I hear it pronounced with a feminine ending when they use the word in a sentence. Example: five or more crowns (korun). I keep hearing a 'ah' attached to the ending. If this is normal, I wish they would tell me. As stated in the other review here, they do not allow enough time for me to formulate the answer. The tapes were much better at this. Lesson 17 drove me out of my mind. I was eager to grasp new words, but that lesson was almost entirely review. I believe that lesson introduced me to two new words. They spent at least a dozen lessons on the "would you like/I would like" (chtel byste) variations. Things get very dry here. There seem to be endless phrases where the guy is trying to get the gal to go out with him and get something to eat or drink. On many occasions I found myself thinking, "please, let's move on to something else." The lessons as a whole could be spiced up.

My expectations were that I would be able to speak Czech at least at the level where I could hold my own with my relatives. To do this, they say you need to know about 800 key words. These lessons are presenting new words at the rate of about six or seven words per lesson. Doing the math, you can see that this will leave you well short of the 800 word vocabulary. If they had spent less time reviewing at the beginning of each lesson, they could have doubled the amount of words in my vocabulary. If I really feel the need for review, I just replay the lesson. Putting a review of the previous lesson at the beginning of the next lesson is a waste of time.

All things said, I don't think there is anything better on the market for teaching Czech. If so, I'd like to know about it. My thoughts are that this product could have been improved. I wish Pimsleur would take the book "Colloquial Czech" and turn it into audio lessons. This would be the perfect combination. At the very least, I wish Pimsleur would come out with Level II and Level III lessons.

Bottom line: The lessons are good, but my expectations were higher. I got spoiled with what I learned from the few tapes in the abridged lessons.

Footnote:

I have finished all the lessons now. Looking back at what I have learned, I can tell that I am not nearly proficient enough to ask even simple questions while travelling in the Czech Republic. I do not know the days of the week, the months of the year, simple directions such as north, south, etc. I do not know how to ask someone what their name is. They were very good about teaching numbers, but they stopped at 297. They could have very easily taken the numbers to 9999. The tapes taught the words for some of the basic foods. None of that is found in the CD lessons. Pivo and vino - those seem to be the two major food groups in the CD lessons.

Pimsleur really needs to come out with level 2 and level 3 lessons. As I stated above, they need to emphasize the key words of the language. I still feel the lessons are 3-star.

I know it is the basis ofthe Pimsleur method to have everything delivered into the ear. But this has at least a couple of downsides, one inevitable, one aggravated by how this particular recording seems to have been done. The inevitable problem is the inability to consult some accompanying study guide either to look up a word or phrase or for a fuller explanation about how or when, say, word order or endings are used in the manner presented on the tapes. I gather the whole method is premised on NOT studying but just following the spoken examples, as we do when children. But most of us do not have two or three years of all day interaction to pick up the language as we did so long ago. To help the process along some supplementary material (even if in phonetic approximations rather than in actual Czech) would be extremely hepful. If you can't recall the Czech word for beer, it would be nice to have a resource in which to look it up. But all of that is a built in downside to the entirely aural Pimsleur method.
Not inevitable are the shortcomings of this particular set. I agree with a previous review that not enough time is given to respond. Also there is the problem of modeling your own mastery on speakers as indistinct and inconsistent as these. Another reviewer mentions that he sometimes hears another syllable we were not led to expect on some words. I hear it too. Another problem is the speed and lack of clear articulation. It is no answer to say that this is how Czech is actually spoken in the hurly-burly of native conversation. This is designed to be a teaching model for someone to clearly understand and to follow (without, under the Pimsleur method, recourse to anything else). There are Mississippi field hands, Liverpool dock workers, and Bronx waitresses who speak a kind of standard English. Their use of the language may be regionally colored but otherwise quite correct. But I would never offer their way of treating the language as the pattern for someone learning English. If the speakers more slowly and distinctly articulated the Czech responses ( the male speaker is much worse than the female) it would be clearer how the words are making the sentance and how the endings are to be distinguished. The rapid fire mush mouth is tough to make sense of. And it would seem to be BECAUSE Czech has sounds that English speakers do not make, that the Czech articulation should be slower and more distinct, even at the risk of some artificiality.
It would also be helpful if the our prompter would offer more explanations of things we need to keep in mind. More "did you hear how. . . " and "note how the . . ." and "be careful to distinguish the X, which means Y, from the Z which is used to. . ." would clarify matters. There is some of that, but it is mostly "listen to this." Sometimes word order and sentance structure are never explained or even mentioned. Just following, then, an example is much harder, especially when the exemplar put it into one great slurred blurt.
Much more care should have been taken with articulation, explanation, and consistency. I also agree with the technical criticisms made by others about how the discs have been tracked. But that is a minor inconvenience compared with constantly backing up the disc while yelling "WHAT did he say???"

this set of tapes is a great way to start learning czech, a very difficult language. the voices are clear, everything is repeated by both the male and female speakers, and the production quality is very high. and the system really does work - i can't believe how much i retained from each lesson to the next! i only wish there was a more advanced series as well, because after finishing these tapes - though i feel very proud of what i do know - i realize that i actually still know very little! highly recommended for beginners who want a solid start to learning czech.

Pimsleur doesn't try to be as extensive as some other taped courses such as the Language 30 series which I also regard very highly, but what Pimsleur presents is organized so you will learn it completely. From knowing no Czech, you can at least master a number of key expressions. It is more fun to travel if you can speak a little of the language, and it reflects well on Americans. A student would benefit from taking a class, and then listening to the tapes again. Pimsleur was recommended to me by a top language instructor and I've been quite pleased with it.

You can do it while driving, jogging or exercising. It will provide you with the essential language survival skills before you go there. And the "natives" appreciate that. :-) I just wish Pimsleur offered the higher levels In Czech that it offers in some of its other languages for in-car-stereo facilitated learning.

Czech is a very difficult language to learn, even if you have studied other languages. If you have some basic knowledge of Czech or very little, this a good series to help you learn survival Czech. It doesn't require the "brain-strain" of too much memorizing. Yet this series is easy to work with and increases knowledge and confidence. I only wish that it had several levels beyond for the more serious student of ceski jasyk.

I have so much enjoyed listening to the tapes in my car and learning the Czech through repetition. I admire the ability of the authors in how they put this together that made it such a building block process. My only regret, now that I am on the last tape of this set, is that they don't have a sequel so that I could gain more knowledge of Czech using this method.

This course is alright for acquiring a very tiny amount of Czech, but it shouldn't be assumed that one will be able to function well in the language once one has finished the course. It works very well, however, as supplementary speaking practice with a good Czech text such as New Czech Step by Step.

If you plan to use the tracks on these CDs in your MP3 player, be aware that the electronic labeling of the tracks and the CDs is very sloppily. At least one CD comes up in the computer as part of an Italian course, and one as Greek. Some aren't labeled at all.

A downloadable version of this course is also available, but unfortunately it works only in Windows and on devices that work with Windows Media Player, which shuts out most of the MP3 players on the market.