Customer Reviews

Portuguese (Brazilian) (Instant Conversation Portuguese (Brazillian))

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

 

 

This audio only lanuguage tutorial is highly effective. The course is broken into sixteen 30 minute lessons. Each lesson gets progessivly more advanced moving from learning individual words, to phrases and finally complete sentences. I found the lesson length of 30 minutes ideal for learning on my commute to and from work each day. (It's not a good idea to drive an unfamiliar route while doing this course, you'll miss intersections!!)

In addition to learning and repeating stock phrases you are challenged to put together phrases and sentences from words you have already learnt but in unique combinations not previously tried. This makes you 'think' about what you are going to say rather than repeat by rote. This mirrors what you'll be doing when communicating to someone on your travels. This approach is key to eventually 'thinking' in a foreign language.

The pauses in the audio for you to respond can be rather short for the more unique and thought provoking phrases. As a beginner one still 'translates' before speaking. I'd like to see longer pauses for new material and shorter pauses for material you should know well. Pausing the CD manually is not appropriate while driving or doing some other activity.

This course is a good primer and you will learn just enough to get around as a business visitor or tourist to Brazil. You will learn to count to 79, tell the time, ask basic questions about eating and drinking and locating hotels etc. It will not teach you enough to understand TV or radio or fast conversations. For that you will need to purchase Pimsleurs more extensive language program(s). I wish they had taught one to say 'talk more slowly please' in this course.

This course gets you much further down the road of learning the language than the quick and simple version. I think this one is worth the extra bucks.

I completed the course in about 20 days. At the age of 46 I am somewhat suprised I learnt the language so quickly - I was resigned to the fact that I was probably too old to learn a new language. Someone younger or sharper than I should be able to complete the course in 16 days or less. If I can learn Portuguese from this course so can you!!!

It's a shame that a short phrase book is not included with the program, reading basic words is a requirement when visiting a foreign land. You will need to supplement this course with a phrase book. Note that it's important to complete this course before opening a phrase book. The sounds of the language are so different to what an English speaking person will expect from the written language, looking at the written word too early will encourage you to add a strong accent.

I can thourougly recommend this course to anyone contemplating a trip to Brazil. In addition it's ideal if you are unsure if you want to fork out the money for the full course(s) and want to a trial run with this first. The full course(s) do include sections for reading Portuguese from provided words and phrases.

5 Stars Pimsleur!! It works!!

Unfortunately, in the Instant Conversation CD set the Pimsleur company duplicates the material contained in the Quick & Simple CD set. If you already own the Quick & Simple set, it is largely a waste of money to purchase the Instant Conversation set.

I really didn't think it was at all possible to learn a language in such short amount of time, basically while driving around in my car. But I did and I feel that I'm totally ready for my next trip to Brazil. I think this course is perfect for the vacationer that's traveling to Brazil. The 16-lesson series equips you with enough language to be sufficient for a short visit to Brazil. There is no substitute for hearing the corrrect pronounciation of words in the original dialect and that's one of the benefits of the course.

My only issue with this method of learning is that you don't know how the words you're speaking look, which is important, because many of the words look nothing like they sound. I chose to supplement the CDs with a word and phrase book. With my learning from the combination of the two, I'm more than prepared for my next visit to Brazil.

This language course is very effective. The repetitions make the phrases stick in your head. But, the way the conversation flows makes it most appropriate for an American man trying to pick-up Brazilian women. All of the conversations, (so far) is between the Americano and a Brasileira. A little odd. Otherwise it seems to be pretty effective.