Customer Reviews

Japanese III: Pimsleur Comprehensive

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I have covered all of the Pimsleur Japanese language tapes. I was initially satisfied with the Japanese tapes but then I listened to Pimsleur's Chinese tapes. Listening to those, I realized that there is far less of a systematized approach to the Pimsleur system than I had originally thought.

Japanese III is asking listeners to compose/repeat simple five word sentences. Furthermore there is insufficient reinforcement of some of the materials used in earlier sections. For example in Japanese II listeners learn how to use the rather complex phrase for asking someone to hand over something. However, after this expression is introduced in a few of the Japanese II tapes, it disappears into oblivion.

What particularly surprised this listener was that the sentences which students are expected to compose in the basic Pimsleur Chinese I tapes are far longer and more complex than the sentences which students are asked to compose in intermediate/advanced Japanese III. This reviewer feels that the Chinese phrases are too complex and the Japanese phrases are too simplistic. Thus Pimsleur is inconsistent.

I had greater expectations from Pimsleur. I still find that their stuff is the best audio material that is available but it is this reviewer's opinion that they do less than they claim to do. If you need to learn Japanese in a hurry, however; they will be a valuable help.

My primary gripe is that the prompts in English are inconsistent and unnecessarily backwards, grammatically. For example, the announcer gives the following prompt in English; "The coffee of that coffee shop is delicious". Not only is that sentence grammatically awkward, it doesn't match the grammar of the correct translation in Japanese. The correct response in Japanese is simply, "That coffee shop's coffee is delicious". There is no reason why the prompt cannot match this. I really wish Pimsleur cleaned up these inconsistencies for a more productive and less frustrating learning experience.