Customer Reviews

Pasajes: Lengua

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4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
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I use this book with my fourth year High School Spanish class. I have been using it for 3 years and have found it to be an excellent basis for conversation practice. The content in most of the chapters is interesting to the students so they enjoy talking about the subjects and learning the vocabulary by using it in real discussions. It's a buy!

There are many Spanish textbooks out there, but this is one of the few that makes teaching yourself easy and interesting. (Learning at school as I did kills any enthusiasm for studying. To catch up on two chapters when I switched into Spanish IV, I studied constantly - with enthusiasm and interest - for two days and was able to learn them well enough to take the chapter tests. But as soon as I got into the class, my enjoyment of studying immediately vanished as we dragged through the lessons with much busywork and silly activities).

Although it begins with the basics, this book is not designed for beginners. Rather, it reviews all Spanish from the basics to more complicated concepts for those who already have a base in Spanish.

It's a fast but thorough review that gives an overview of all the rules and provides the nitty-gritty details and exceptions to help you completely master the basics, something probably not done in lower-level Spanish. It's designed for students who have already taken about two years of Spanish.

The book does teach vocabulary, but its main emphasis (and strength) is in grammar, so make sure you have a solid vocabulary. Particularly helpful is the "Ojo" section, which explains common mistakes, such as words that are the same in English but different in Spanish, "false friends" (what appear to be cognates but are actually unrelated words), etc. (Examples: to work = trabajar (as in a job or labor); funcionar (as in a machine, watch, TV, etc.). Another: to support, which can be sostener, mantener, apoyar, all depending on the specific usage.)

With the textbook and the workbook, you can go through the book quite quickly. Ignore the exercises in the book itself and the video sections, because the workbook is really the best way to practice what you learn.

The vocabulary taught is sometimes silly but a lot more useful than certain other textbooks. However, it doesn't prepare you for actual conservations, only school-like discussions about the environment, gender roles, etc.

Overall, it's a very good textbook. It's a bit expensive to buy on your own, so I'd suggest either taking a class which uses this book, or finding a cheap used copy.

I have taught out of Pasajes Lengua from time to time over the last 10 years throughout several editions. The Fifth Edition, with Rodney Bransdorfer added to the author team, appears to be their hottest edition yet. The grammar activities are better organized and cleaned up, and the presentation in the book is sharper and more comprehensible than ever. While many texts just lose steam after several editions, Pasajes has hit its peak!

Why must today's textbooks writers nearly always revert to political themes? From Chapter 1 (Tipos y estereotipos) the authors LIBERALLY (no pun intended) salt the text with their political philosophy. Another example is the slum lord who exploits the poor single mother in Chapter 5. Given that today's textbook writers are graduates of the 60's and 70's, I guess this is no surprise. That said, I also find the layout of the book wonting and too complex. Between the textbook, the accompanying "Cultura" book, the combined lab/workbook and the tapes, you're looking at some serious coin to buy supporting materials for an intermediate Spanish course. Add in a dictionary, 501 Spanish Verbs, a tape recorder/player and notebook, and I have to carry it all around in a small suitcase. It also becomes challenging to coordinate all the assignments between the different books. Enough with "learning systems". What ever happened to a simple, straight-forward textbook? Of course, there's even more stuff for the instructor (videos, instructor's manual). Surely these good caring folks couldn't be that heavily motivated by money -- could they?

just wanna post a follow up to one of the other reviewers of this book who said this text is too political. WAKE UP UGLY AMERICAN.
this is about the spanish language, and in Latin America, its not an opinion to say "the workers are being exploited" its the reality. more and more gringos are learning spanish and are realizing our countries hands arn't so clean when it comes to the spanish speaking world. in my opinion, this book is not political. it doesnt even touch on the violent US-imperialism that has been oppressive to this region since the end of colonialism! read your history and then you can enjoy this textbook with its helpful grammar exercises.