Rosetta Stone Spanish (Latin America) Level 1-5 Set

by Rosetta Stone

• Interactive language software with proprietary speech-recognition technology
• Develop your command of the language--read, write, speak, and understand
• Build vocabulary; negotiate complex situations; share ideas and opinions
• Enhance your learning on-the-go with Rosetta Stone mobile apps for the Kindle Fire HD, iPad and iPhone .  Access included with purchase.
• Language-enhancing games; live online lessons; includes headset with microphone

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: 1617160857
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: September 14, 2010
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (203 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #78 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)
  • #1 in Software > Language & Travel > Foreign Languages > Spanish & Portuguese
  • #1 in Software > Language & Travel > Foreign Languages > Universal Translator
  • #4 in Software > Education & Reference

Product Description

Platform: PC/Mac

Amazon.com

Develop your command of the language. From the simple to the complex, gain the confidence to share your ideas and opinions in your new language. Develop the conversational skills to plan adventures, care for your health and move abroad. Talk about government, work, movies, family, and more. Includes everything you need to learn at home and on the go.

What Will I Learn

 

This level will help you:

• Build your vocabulary and language abilities
• Read, write, speak and understand your new language
• Speak without a script
• Retain what you've learned
• Practice unscripted conversations in your new language
• Negotiate complex situations with confidence and accuracy

Sample topics include:

• The basics, such as age and family relations
• Questions, greetings, introductions
• Telling time, calendar terms, the weather
• Directions, locations, dining out
• Emotions, opinions, ideas
• Political, media, business terms
• Arranging home repairs
• Planning to move abroad
• Discussing the arts and tourism
• Careers and conducting interviews
• Problem-solving and commercial transactions

What Do I Get?

Interactive Software

Our award-wining version, complete with proprietary speech recognition technology.

Audio Companion

For your CD or MP3 player so you can review while on the go.

Headset with Microphone

For use with our state-of- the-art speech-recognition software.

Live Online Lessons

Practice sessions led by native speaking tutors.

Games & Community

Language-enhancing games move you towards real-world proficiency.

Mobile Companion

Learning application for your iPhone or iPod Touch device.

Our Method

Recreate the natural way you learned your first language and reveal skills that you already have using Dynamic Immersion. This award-winning method has been adopted by countless organizations, schools and millions of users around the world.

Learn Naturally: Discover how to speak, read, write, and understand--all without translating or memorizing. Our award-winning solution recreates how you learned your first language, unlocking your natural abilities.

Speak Confidently: Perfect your pronunciation with speech-recognition technology. Gain the confidence in your new voice as you practice with other learners in our exclusive online community and participate in online sessions coached by native tutors.

Immerse Yourself: Be surrounded by your new language. From core lessons to online sessions, Rosetta Stone gets you engaged and interacting with others.

Stay Motivated: Experience accomplishment with each moment of achievement; with dedicated success agents you will never lose sight of your language-learning goals.

Your Natural Ability. Awakened.

Natural Discovery

Learning your first language is as natural as smiling. Effortless. Rewarding. Every step in Rosetta Stone feels like that. Clear, compelling images appear precisely, in juxtaposition, conveying meaning. Intuitively, you just know what it means.

• Our puzzle-like environments--a systematic presentation of sounds, images, and text--help learners absorb meaning intuitively.

Rosetta Stone's award-winning software, where you will interact by speaking, clicking, selecting phrases and writing.

Speech Activation

Rosetta Stone's proprietary speech-recognition technology provides immediate and ongoing feedback.

Build your confidence and polish your pronunciation skills with state-of-the-art speech-recognition technologies and success-filled dialogues.

• Our software provides immediate and ongoing assessments of your speech through Actionable Feedback, which helps you pronounce syllables, words and sentences correctly and easily.

• Based on a collection of literally millions of speech samples, our proprietary speech-recognition algorithms and speech models were engineered with a singular purpose--to help you communicate with accuracy, confidence and ease.

Native Socialization

Language-learning games will keep you motivated along the way.

Practice with native speakers in our live interactive sessions and our online community. Every conversation gives you the confidence to communicate in your new language.

• For many, traditional language-learning fails because it lacks real conversation. With Rosetta Stone you'll play games and chat with native speakers and other learners in our online language community.

• Hundreds of native-speaking tutors trained in the Rosetta Stone method are ready to help reinforce the language you're learning through live, online conversations. From Day One you'll be speaking your new language with confidence and ease.

Product Description

Develop your command of the language. From the simple to the complex, gain the confidence to share your ideas and opinions. Develop conversational skills to plan adventures, care for your health, and move abroad. Talk about government, work, movies, and citizenship. Discuss family and traditions, and celebrate success.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1,045 of 1,066 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A great program for enhancing Spanish fluency. But it still helps to crack a book, conjugate a few verbs, and study... August 23, 2010

By APC Reviews

Platform for Display:PC/Mac|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Will using Rosetta Stone Spanish allow you to say: "Me sorprende que soy capaz de hablar un español fluido después de usar este programa sólo por un par de semanas!" ('I am amazed that I am able to speak fluent Spanish after using this program for only a few weeks')?

Probably not. It is, however, a very useful and well thought out program.

The Rosetta Stone line of language products all share the same basic design and interface. The key to the Rosetta Stone system is the presentation of word and action associations, influenced by context. This simulates the sort of cues that one would parse and process in speaking any language, even your own native language. Normally, you don't think about this as you speak your own language. But it's one of the hardest things to simulate outside of dealing with a second language in its own country and having the chance to deal with real life situations involving speakers of the second language.

Each screen is accompanied by a phrase, spoken out loud by a native speaker in the program, and four slightly different picture scenes that require you to pick the one that the sentence is referring to. Beginning at a very basic level -- such as "the boy is under the tree" (in whatever language) with four pictures of a boy next to, under, in the limbs of and cutting down the tree -- your proficiency improves as you move through these basic cues to more advanced and complex speaking and contexts. By the end of the program you are dealing with fairly complex situations, sentences and associations.

The program also allows you to repeat the phrase and, using the supplied microphone, match and score your own pronunciation against the supplied sample. You can also test your ability to properly write out a second language by spelling out and typing the phrase, although the work arounds for using a US English QWERTY keyboard with the special characters and distinct keyboard layouts used by different languages can be awkward. There are several variations on all the visual, verbal and textual tests.

The most important question one must answer when considering this product is: will it, as the advertising suggests, be a magic gateway to language learning that is all you need? The answers is: sort of.

First, this is an expensive product. Make no mistake, when you pay for a heavily advertised product like this that you are, in part, paying the cost of the extensive advertising that brought it to your attention and put you in a mind to buy it.

Second, although Rosetta Stone is an extremely well thought out and useful system for review, practice, improving reaction times to prompts in other languages, and gaining fluency through exposure to variable contexts, it is not a complete language course.

I have purchased a load of different language courses for languages that I have wanted to study on my own, and I can say, at least for me, that using at least two or more different packages that compliment, reinforce and overlap with each other is always better than trying to learn everything with only the logic and pattern of one single course. Besides, you really do need to learn grammar and other parts of the subject that cannot really be covered by, or communicated well by, a single program, even one as well thought out as Rosetta Stone.

At some point you really do have to crack a book and do some regular studying and learning, even though Rosetta Stone strongly implies that you can be speaking away in a second language with nothing more than some time in front of your laptop.

Conclusion: whatever language you are wanting to study, seriously consider Rosetta Stone. But also seriously consider buying a Pimsleur and a Living Language course to go along with it, and seriously contemplate the very un-Rosetta Stone-ish subject of studying verb conjugation rules, grammar, usage and verb tables.

All together you will stand a much better chance of gaining real fluency, and not just the ability to distinguish if the boy is in, under or besides he tree, or if all of the people, two of the people, the two men or the three women in the picture are eating steak or drinking wine. It's all good, but no one product or course can do it all.

678 of 697 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Good product, could be better January 15, 2011

By Bob Zucker

Platform for Display:PC/Mac

I have completed level 3 in Rosetta Stone Spanish, course 1-5, totale 4. The product has a lot of very good features. They do an excellent job teaching you vocabulary. The online lessons are very useful.

I think many of the reviews that are available on Amazon are from people that only have a brief experience with the product.

This is what I think needs improvement:
1. There needs to be translation into your native language. From the pictures, it is sometimes very difficult to figure out whtat they are trying to express. I wish I could click on the text and read it in English as well as Spanish.

Here's a huge tip. Download the couse content guide for the English version of this course. It's almost the same content and you can read the script in English that cooresponds to your Spanish lessons. You can find the course content guides in the support-download section of the Rosetta Stone web site. The English lesson guide has the content of the core and milestone lessons. It makes a tremendous difference to be able to read the text in English so you know what they are trying to tell you. Also, use google translate.

2. There should be grammar explanations and lessons in your native language as well. They cover grammar by showing you different scenes expressed with different grammar text. It is very difficult at times to figure out why certain grammar is used in certain cases. I think a spanish grammar book would be very useful along with the Rosetta Stone software. My son is studying high school spanish. I looked at his spanish book and it really filled in the blanks on several fuzzy areas that I have at this point with Rosetta Stone.

3. They should give you a spanish-english dictionary of all of the words that are used in the program for reference.

4. Word recognition can be tricky. You can mispronounce a sentence completely and get told the pronuciation was correct, but sometimes single syllable words are practically impossible to score correctly in certain cases.

I feel you can go through the lessons successfully but not really learn how to construct sentences or speak the language in a converation with a spanish speaker.

I am also testing out "Tell Me More-Spanish" level 1-10. It is much more comprehensive. The program does contain grammer as well as English translations. There are over 8600 Spanish words in the program. I've got about 30 hours into this one, it doesn't spoon feed the vocabulary as well as Rosetta Stone. The learning curve is much steeper. I will need more time to make an evaluation on whether I like Tell Me More over Rosetta Stone. Tell Me More claims that by the time you finish their course, you will have total mastery of Spanish. I spoke with their support staff. One person said she was on level 7 of the spanish program and she can now converse fluently with native spanish speakers. That is something you will not have with Rosetta Stone because it is not as comprehensive.

January 2013, I have just ordered Fluenz Spanish 1-5. The reviews that I've read look very promising. They claim to offer detailed explanations of grammar, verb conjugation, and sentence structure in English.

Update: I've put about 15-20 hours into Fluenz and I'm quite impressed. It seems to start out slow, but that's likely because of my previous Spanish experience. They take the opposite approach of Rosetta Stone. Each lesson begins with a conversation (with Spanish and English subtitles). The next exercise breaks it down very thoroughly in English, word by word, and covers grammar and sentence structure. That is followed by several exercises to reinforce the material. My plan is to complete all 5 levels and then go back to Rosetta Stone for further reinforcement and additional vocabulary. I may also consider online tutoring via Skype. There are programs that offer private tutoring with native Spanish teachers for as little as $11 per lesson

360 of 373 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars An amazing program, but not without its frustrations October 10, 2010

By Sheri in Reho TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Platform for Display:PC/Mac|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Without a doubt, Rosetta Stone V4 TOTALe is an amazing product. It is easy to install on your PC and puts a whole world of resources at your disposal to help you learn a new language. If I could have given it 4 1/4 or 4 1/2 stars, I would have, but since I had to decide between 4 or 5, I'm giving it a 4. 5 to me is perfect and my experience with RS was not perfect.

Why? Because using RS can be very frustrating to a new user. This was my first time using RS but not my first time learning a new language. I learned French the "old-fashioned way" in school and taught myself sign language from a book. In both cases, I got to ask questions of the teacher or look up additional information in my NATIVE language to help me understand the nuances of the language and to clear up any points of confusion. But RS provides ZERO assistance to the student in their NATIVE language. I understand that the very basis of Rosetta Stone is total immersion, meaning you are totally immersed in the target language while you're learning it. However, I had hoped that there would be SOME opportunity to get questions answered in English and there is not (or if there is, I haven't found it). When you are in the RS software, there is NO English used (unless, of course, you are using RS to learn English!). When you have your live tutoring sessions with a native speaker (which are, by the way IMMENSELY helpful), the tutors are apparently restricted by their employer from speaking in any language but the target language. This means that, until I am several months into my study, I will not yet have the skills to ask the questions I need to ask in my target language!! Something is wrong with this picture!

Additionally, though I am a smart person, at times I could not figure out what was being asked of me in my RS language lessons. Putting aside the fact that I don't know yet that pelo means hair, I don't even understand what I'm supposed to do. Repeat the question? Give the answer? MUCH of the learning is VERY intuitive. They say hola. I repeat hola. They say adios. I repeat adios. But as the lessons go on, things get more complicated and there were times when I was failing lessons literally because I did not know what was being asked of me--what I was supposed to do. Eventually, I figured it out. Some things I figured out by visiting the Rosetta Stone website. Some by talking to someone I knew online who was also doing RS but in a different language. Some by trial and error. But to a person who is used to grasping most things on the first try and succeeding much more than failing, it was at times a supremely frustrating experience.

Now that I am about to complete the first level (which has taken me about 2 months), I feel much more confident and am having much less frustration with the system. I have had 3 live tutoring sessions and have learned a lot from them. The first was, of course, nerve-wracking, but I am really enjoying them now. In addition, there is Rosetta World, where you can play games to help you learn the language, either alone or with other people from around the world. I am learning Latin American Spanish, and most often play either with other Americans who are also learning Spanish or with native Spanish speakers (usually from South America) who are learning English. They help you, you help them...it is a nice system, and you get to "meet" some nice people and learn about other countries as well.

The system also provides audio CDs so that you can take your lessons with you in your car, on your iPod, etc. I found this less helpful, but it is a nice touch, especially for those who commute to work every day and could use that time productively by reinforcing their lessons during their commute.

I am now a proponent of total immersion, in that I do see a positive difference between how I recall Spanish when I prepare to speak it vs. how I would recall Frensh or sign language when I would prepare to speak or use them. The old way of learning language required us to constantly translate in our heads...translate what someone says to us in another language into English and then translate our response from English back into the other language before we respond. With total immersion, you just THINK in your new language...there is very little translation going on. In other words, instead of thinking "hair = pelo", I might touch my hair and think "pelo" without the literal mental translation of "hair = pelo". I still have issues with the fact that the tutors can't/won't answer questions in my native language, but at least I understand more now why they can't/won't.

Do I recommend this product? Yes, wholeheartedly...BUT with a caveat. Don't expect it to always be easy. Don't expect to never be frustrated. And don't expect to ever see or read or speak your native language while you're learning.