Romanian [Abridged, Audiobook] [Audio CD]

Pimsleur (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0743500210 | ISBN-13: 978-0743500210 | Edition: Abridged

Compact Romanian, a stand-alone 10-lesson (5 hours) program, teaches beginning language strategies for essential communication and traveling needs, plus an introduction to reading.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Dr. Pimsleur devoted his life to language teaching and was one of the world's leading experts in applied linguistics. After obtaining his Ph.D. in French from Columbia University, he taught French Phonetics and Phonemics, and supervised the language laboratory at UCLA. He went on to become Professor of Romance Languages and Language Education, and Director of The Listening Center at Ohio State University; Professor of Education and Romance Languages at the State University of New York at Albany; and a Fulbright lecturer at the University of Heidelberg. Dr. Pimsleur was a member of the American Association of Teachers of French (AATF), American Educational Research Association (AERA), Modern Language Association (MLA), and a founding member of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL). His many books and articles revolutionized theories of language learning and teaching. After years of experience and research, Dr. Pimsleur developed a new method that is based on two key principles: the Principle of Anticipation and a scientific principle of memory that he called Graduated Interval Recall. This program incorporates both of these principles to provide you with the most simple and effective learning method possible.

Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Pimsleur; Abridged edition (July 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743500210
• ISBN-13: 978-0743500210
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 7.9 x 2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,579,173 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dr. Paul Pimsleur (b. 1926, d. 1976) devoted his life to language teaching and testing and was one of the world's leading experts in applied linguistics. He was fluent in French, good in German, and had a working knowledge of Italian, Russian, Modern Greek, and Mandarin Chinese. After obtaining his Ph.D. in French and a Masters in Psychology from Columbia University, he taught French Phonetics and Linguistics at UCLA. He later became Professor of Romance Languages and Language Education, and Director of The Listening Center (a state-wide language lab) at Ohio State University; Professor of Education and Romance Languages at the State University of New York at Albany; and a Fulbright lecturer at the University of Heidelberg. He did research on the psychology of language learning and in 1969 was Section Head of Psychology of Second Language Learning at the International Congress of Applied Linguistics.

Dr. Pimsleur was a member of the American Association of Teachers of French (AATF), American Educational Research Association (AERA), Modern Language Association (MLA), and a founding member of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL).

His many books and articles revolutionized theories of language learning and teaching. After years of experience and research, Dr. Pimsleur developed a new method (The Pimsleur Method) that is based on two key principles: the Principle of Anticipation and a scientific principle of memory training that he called "Graduated Interval Recall." This Method has been applied to the many levels and languages of the "Pimsleur Programs."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Easy to Learn, March 16, 2006

By 

Watership Down (NC, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Romanian: Learn to Speak and Understand Romanian with Pimsleur Language Programs (Simon & Schuster's Pimsleur) (Audio CD)

I recommend this program for anyone who wishes to learn a beginner's amount of Romanian. This is by no means a comprehensive language-learning program. If you want to actually learn Romanian (as in, speak it fluently), this is not the program for you. But if you are going to Romania for a month or two and just want to be able to communicate, I would definitely recommend Pimsleur. Other programs will teach you words and grammar that are not very useful to a traveller (I prefer to know how to say "I don't understand." [Pimsleur] before learning, "The boy is under the airplane." [other programs]) This program is the way to go if you want to learn enough useful Romanian to get around and communicate, but not so much that you are overwhelmed with vocabulary and grammar. Do native Romanians really expect a visiting foreigner to know all the grammatical rules of their language anyway?

This program is easy to use (just listen to the cd and repeat what they say or answer questions in Romanian), and makes it easy to learn and remember. This program is especially good for people like me, who want to learn how to speak the language...not just read or understand it. Many people learned to understand some Spanish (German, French, whatever) during highschool, but couldn't put two words together in speech. You will not have that problem with this program, because Pimsleur focuses on speech instead of vocabulary and writing.

This version of the Pimsleur program (Romanian compact) comes with cds and a tiny reading booklet. I really don't know what the difference is between this Pimsleur Romanian and the other one (which both come with the same number of cds)...except that this one is newer and cheaper.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars 3.5 stars, September 22, 2003

By 

pdxbeautiful "pdxbeautiful" (Oregon United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Romanian (Audio CD)

I didn't purchase this course but found it at the library and decided to try it out...It's a good start that helps you with proper pronunciataion but it's a little slow and repetitive and only a few new words are added with each new unit lesson.

But aside from that....It's a fun way to learn....I did it in my car...it's very easy and quick and the method does work well...it's easy to remember! And it also gives you a lot of time to respond so you don't have to stop the disc or pause...which is very nice...you don't feel like you're rushed...

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good supplement to a traditional textbook, October 27, 2004

By 

Doug (Wilmington, DE USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Romanian (Audio CD)

I completed the Pimsleur course prior to taking a one-week trip to Romania. In addition to the Pimsleur course, I also used the "Colloquial Romanian" course by Gonczol-Davies and Deletant. I found this combination to work very well. While I didn't learn as much grammar or vocab from the Pimsleur course, it reinforced the grammar structures I had studied in the Colloquial course and helped me to use them with confidence. Moreover, it helped my pronunciation greatly - I even received a few compliments on my pronunciation from Romanians. This was my first experience using a Pimsleur course, and overall I was very pleased. Given the dearth of Romanian study materials, I consider this to be a useful resource. I don't know if I would feel comfortable learning a language exclusively through Pimsleur's audio method, but I think it makes a good supplement to more traditional language study. My only complaint is that this is an abridged course; a full-length course would be ideal.