Customer Reviews

Golosa: A Basic Course in Russian, Book I (2nd Edition)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I am on the brink of completing an intensive Russian course (1 year of Russian compressed into one quarter) which has used this series. Over the course of 8 weeks with the two books and a PhD candidate as my guide I have found myself possessing enough proficiency to converse with a couple I met on a bus, to listen to the news in Russian, and assume I could keep my head above water were I to travel.

The authors' approach is vastly different from other texts I have encountered. A large number of listening and reading excercises accompany lessons on grammar and a wealth of vocabulary. Texts and dialogues, unlike other texts, are not overly glossed and seem to focus on adding unknown words and phrases, forcing the student to pick out what he or she understands to follow the action. Such an approach approximates what a student might experience in a real world situation.

For a student or teacher of early Russian classes I believe there to be few better books. I could not recommend the text and the authors' approach more. Although I would suggest awaiting the 3rd edition (the current edition is rife with confusing errors and typos as well as a cumbersome delivery system for the accompanying audio) the issues can be surmounted by a dedicated student and/or knowledgeable teacher. They do little, however, to detract from the overall quality inherent in the books' approach to learning.

I used this textbook in an intensive Russian class I took in college. It follows the standard textbook format: Each chapter introduces a grammatical concept and new vocabulary. There are a few short dialogues and several exercises to reinforce the grammar and vocabulary. There are also exercises at the beginning to practice cursive in the cyrillic alphabet. At the end of the book there was a grammar reference so it was easy to review and brush up on previous lessons. It was a perfectly good textbook to use as part of a class.

In this case I also used the workbook and tape set. The workbook has additional exercises for each chapter in the book. It helped, but isn't necessary since things are covered in enough detail in the book. The tapes were helpful for picking up on how to pronounce. Russian pronunciation is very tricky. Basically they contain spoken versions of the dialogues in the text and a few simple exercises. I would just try to repeat after them to pick up on how to pronounce. The tapes are only useful as a supplement to a class, and not to teach you Russian on your own.

This and Golosa Book 2 is a good textbook set to use as part of a class. I used it in college but it would also work for highschool. It did a pretty good job of explaining things and covered the concepts adequately. Teachers will want to know that there is a third edition out now.

If you are trying to learn Russian on your own: Don't try to use this as a tape and book set. It isn't designed for this and unless you have superhuman amounts of natural aptitude for Russian it isn't going to work. Instead find a good tape and book set specifically designed for studying on your own. If used copies of the Golosa books are on sale dirt cheap then consider buying them for the exercises and to use as a grammar reference, but don't expect to learn Russian from them alone.

This book series, in my experience, is the best way to start learning Russian. It is more helpful in conjunction with the workbook, and most helpful when combined with the written exercises in the workbook and oral exchange with other people (there's a tape series that goes with this, but if you have people who are learning with you to talk to, the tapes aren't really necessary). It covers all the basic conversational topics like greetings, weather, telling time, etc. And for the most part, the phrases in the book (even the colloquialisms) are still in use today. So if you want to start learning Russian, order this book and the workbook right away!

The only people who should get this book are people who are forced to because their school uses it. It is poorly planned and hard to find topics that you want to review. The worst part about this book is that it has no answers to the exercises in it making it usless for anyone wanting to advance at their own pace or for self studiers or even know if they are on the right track! A waste of money. Get New Penguin Russian Course instead for a fraction of the price it is way better than any of the books that the universities are using.

Unfortunately this one of the better text books for the Russian language available. Before you buy this product look at the author's names. Neither is Russian. I am American High School French teacher and fluent in French having learned it by textbook and real world exposure. Before buying any language program make sure at least one author is a native speaker of the foreign language and the other is a native speaker of your own language. Although this book has extensive explanations of how the complicated noun declensions change, it does not provide a sufficient amount of real world examples as to when or how to use them. Although present tense verbs are clearly explained, the perfect and imperfect for past and future are not presented clearly. Many sections are poorly conceived. For example, one chapter section which explains time of day, only instructs you how to tell time on the hour but not how to say any minute, quarter or half hour interval. The book's illustrations are the worst I have seen in any modern foreign language textbook. Picture examples in the book, which are supposed to inspire you to think, only serve to confuse the reader. I completed this course solo along with the lab manual. It was not a pleasant learning experience. I would only suggest this book to someone who is taking a course in a university and that a native Russian who speaks PERFECT English is teaching the course. I would not suggest this book to any one trying to go it alone. Good Luck to you all.

I notice a lot of these reviews say "not for self learning!!!" Of course not, it's a language! Only the basics should be self taught like the alphabet and some basic grammar so that you can save yourself some time and money with a tutor. If you're enrolled in a Russian class, that's already in the curriculum anyhow. If you're going to learn a language, you're going to have to have the self discipline to dedicate a lot of your free time to self study along with a tutor or someone willing to help you learn. You can also find people online to speak with living in Russia(or said language). I would plug a site that I've used for that purpose, but I don't know if Amazon would consider this comment spam. Self study alone will not do anything but teach you basics that you probably won't be able to apply much.

I stydy russian language for some years, and recently I re-started, using the volume 2 of Goloca. I became so found of this method that decided to have the number 1 also, despite my russian to be more for the second or even third. But I want to have both due to its beautiful language, contemporary texts, grammar and up-to-date approaches. I really reccomend it for those interested in studying this inteligent language. For those
that are just starting with russian, it will surprise that a so complex language can be quickly understood and give fast confidence in its use.

An excellent beginning text for learning Russian. It was very helpful to me in getting a start on learning this language, and I highly recommend it to anyone. The exercises are useful, the explanations are instructive, the diagrams are useful, and the text is well-written.

I have been studying Russian for several years now in college and the textbook that we used was "Live from Moscow" and "Live from Russia" but in those books, as any, there are some things that simply aren't explained well so I used this book and the next one as a supplementary learning device. It worked masterfully! It seems that the things not explained in this book well, the authors of "Live from Moscow/Russia" explain much better and vice versa. If you are using this book and having trouble I would certainly advise you to use the other books as well. They ARE more expensive (upwards to a hundred dollars brand new and with a workbook) but if you're serious about learning Russian then I definitely suggest it. Best of luck!

After going through this book -- I'm well equipped to enter a russian department store and charge like crazy. In fact, I've even been asked to help other american tourists get around in a department store. What you learn is how to buy things, order things. Russian culture doesn't seem to be very important. Instead of learning words like "war" or "literature" you learn "hat department" and "credit card." Perhaps it's the lack of interest/demand for good russian textbooks in the States. The grammar explainations are fine. Quite good in fact. I'm just depressed at what these authors think is of interest to an american/english audience. I can't imagine anyone interested in such an extremely materialistic introduction to Russian. Sadly, I haven't found any alternatives. But if I had to start learning Russian again -- I really would not use this book. You may learn some grammar -- but you'll end up learning words like "credit card" before words that will really help you experience Russian culture.