Customer Reviews

Polish, Conversational: Learn to Speak and Understand Polish with Pimsleur Language Programs (Pimsleur Instant Conversation)

5 star:		(3)
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2 star:		(2)
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This has to be the easiest way I've ever come across for learning another language. There's no book, it's purely audio based (8 CD edition) with each lesson being about 30 minutes. As Polish contains many sounds that we simply do not use in English, I had to listen to most lessons twice before being able to remember and pronounce all the words correctly. New words are introduced syllable by syllable and every phrase you learn is repeated numerous times in conversations in later lessons. My only minor quibble would be that as this is an American series, there's no provision for those of us in the UK in the sections that focus on how to say your nationality and monetary units. Hardly a major issue!

By the end of this 16 lesson course you can expect to be able to give common greetings, ask for and understand basic directions, arrange a meeting, count to 49, buy drinks in shops and a fair bit more.

My Polish wife found some of the pronunciation grated a little but that it was more than passable and probably easier for a non-polish speaker to learn from than a native Polish speaker would be.

I did learn some from these lessons, but I found that there were too many gaps to make it really useful. We do learn to establish if the person with whom we are speaking speaks English and/or Polish, but we do not learn how to become acquainted. It would be useful to know how to make acquaintances through questions like "What is your name?" We only learn formal forms of address. Another gripe that I have is that the pronunciation is not consistent. There is too much of an emphasis on translation from English into Polish and not enough on trying to think in the language. Yes when we are learning our native language as children we learn to speak before we learn the grammar, but we are immersed in the language. Yes, this course is easy, but we do not really learn to communicate.

Travelers wanting to learn basic Polish for traveling will like this program. It presents words and phrases, then continues to incorporate them throughout the remainder of the program. It presents words uniquely (from my experience), as it presents the pronounciation from the end of the word forward. It's a great program for auditory learners.

The only drawback is the lack of visual materials to follow along with or refer to.

I was used to Rosetta Stone and Instant Immersion, so I was greatly disappointed that the Pimsleur product is conversational only without any graphic verbiage. I chose it because time was short and I didn't want to spend a lot of money, but it would take lots of time to get any use from Pimsleur. I bought an inexpensive guidebook with excellent instruction on pronunciations and got along adequately. As always, knowing other languages facilitates the learning process, and it's always fun, but Pimsleur was not for me, so I'll out it on Craigslist and hope to get some money back.

The Pimsleur Polish CDs are the absolute simplest way to learn to speak Polish HANDS DOWN. That's saying a lot, since Polish is one of the harder languages (harder than German for example). When I took several years of German in college, I learned all the correct grammar using a textbook; but you know what, I still couldn't speak much of anything, and now remember very little. When speaking, you simply don't have time to think about the correct gender, case, declension, etc. While you are thinking about such things, the other person is five sentences beyond you already!!! Speaking needs to be trained so that it is automatic, not based on thinking. Isn't being able to speak the language, usually the real reason you learn it? After all, when you are a kid, you don't learn grammar until you already know how to speak. Speak first, grammar later.

That's what you get with Pimsleur. A pure audio learning course, for someone with NO experience in the language whatsoever. When new words are introduced, they are introduced slowly . . . syllable by syllable . . . by native speakers. After the word is built and practiced, it is then spoken at full speed after that. Repetition is designed to make it automatic, so you don't have to think and you can build up speed.

Some critics here have pointed out that they repeat some basic phrases too often, but actually I think it is a tactic to give you a little break when learning some new phrase . . . and to distract you so you start to forget the new phrase, and then they can ask you the new phrase again to reinforce it. In some later lessons, some sentences seem too complicated and long, but I think the point is to get you to understand how to construct sentences. Conversation doesn't shift from man's perspective too often in the early lessons, mainly because the sentence structure is actually different from a woman's point of view (crazy Polish language!), and it would be too confusing otherwise (so this is actually a plus I think, not a negative).

NOTE: All the Polish CDs on Amazon by Pimsleur are, in fact, the same; you just get a different total number of lessons. You get 30 of them with Comprehensive I ( Polish, Comprehensive: Learn to Speak and Understand Polish with Pimsleur Language Programs ).

Quick & Simple ( Polish, Q&S: Learn to Speak and Understand Polish with Pimsleur Language Programs ), Basic ( Polish, Basic: Learn to Speak and Understand Polish with Pimsleur Language Programs (Simon & Schuster's Pimsleur) ), and Conversational ( Polish, Conversational: Learn to Speak and Understand Polish with Pimsleur Language Programs (Pimsleur Instant Conversation) ) are just the first 8, 10, and 16 lessons respectively of Comprehensive I.

If you know you really want to learn a lot of the language, just buy the Comprehensive I; however, if you are unsure, you can buy one of the smaller sets . . . good news is that if you do that and later decide on Comprehensive I, you can buy at a rebate that's included in the smaller set purchase.

No Comprehensive II yet (as of June 2011), but they will make it eventually if enough people buy Comprehensive I and pester the Pimsleur publishers via email about making it. Until then, supplement what you've learned with Michel Thomas Polish Beginning ( Michel Thomas Method' Polish For Beginners, 8-CD Program (Michel Thomas Series) ) & Advanced ( Michel Thomas Method Polish Advanced, 4-CD Program (Michel Thomas Series) ) and/or Rosetta Stone Polish ( Rosetta Stone Polish Level 1-3 Set ).

If you want to save a lot of money, buy this product instead of Rosetta Stone. You won't be disappointed. I learned Spanish with Berlitz and Pimsleur comes close to having an individual tutor like Berlitz. Very inexpensive and effective. One caveat, I grew up listening to the Polish language and knew a few words and phrases, plus familiarity with the sounds. That might prejudice the review, but for the money this product costs compared to the competition, take a chance.

Conversational Polish: Learn to Speak and Understand Polish with Pimsleur Language Programs (Instant Conversation) gives an immediately useful and practical method for learning a difficult language. Through listening and repeating, and repeating and listening, I think I may have enough practical language to feel confident speaking and understanding the basics on my upcoming trip to Poland. I've found this the most helpful of the Polish language tools I've tried.

The method is quite amazing. I'm on disc 11 of 16 and I haven't forgotten even ONE thing I've learned! This is the first language I've taken since high school and to my surprise, it's easy and fun.

The beginning of each disc is a little intimidating because you listen to a short polish conversation with new words that you might think you'll never learn how to pronounce, let alone, remember. But by the end of the disc, confidence is back up. It may take two reviews of each lesson to move on to the next, but that is certainly no discouragement. It also does a good job in explaining WHY you say certain things, for instance, why you use a long e sound instead of a short a sound for the word "and," and it provides enough examples for it to make sense.

The conversation is limited to very basic conversation, but this is exactly the intention of this cd. It's a great launch pad to the next level...

The ONLY negative comment I have about this cd is that the majority of the conversation is focused towards a male listener, which I am not. BUT again, this is not that big of a deal, because it does a great job of demonstrating how a polish woman would speak as well. I guess I was just a little offended that Pimsleur would make the assumption/choice to focus towards a male.

Also, one last comment, which I'm sure is pretty obvious considering the media... you may be able to speak what you've learned confidently, but don't expect to be anywhere near ready to read polish. I'd recommend you save that for another time...

Like I said... absolutely NO regrets with the purchase. I have already recommended it to several friends. The method is very effective!

Enjoy and (phonetically) doe-vied-zen-ya (goodbye)!