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More than 1 million Michel Thomas programs sold worldwide!
Learn Russian--no passport required!
No books. No writing. No drills. And nothing to memorize--ever! You will go from the basics to proficiency in no time with this complete course. Includes eight 60-minute audio CDs.
Michel Thomas was head of the Michel Thomas Language Centers and taught languages for over fifty years, primarily in New York, Beverly Hills, and London. Over a period of twenty-five years he developed a unique and revolutionary learning system that made him the world's leading language teacher. He has taught celebrities, diplomats, dignitaries, academics, and business executives.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
You will remember what you learned,
This review is from: Speak Russian For Beginners The Michel Thomas Method (8-CD Beginner's Program) (Michel Thomas Series) (Audio CD)
Good points:
1. The pronunciation is slow and clear. 2. Lots of varied reinforcement is given to help you remember. It's hard to forget what you learned! 3. It's fun! 4. Doesn't contain repetitive drills. The material progresses at a nice rate. 5. Some basic grammar is covered. You will get a good feel for guessing whether a noun is masculine, feminine, or neuter. 6. Some longer sentences are taught e.g. "I wonder if it's possible to buy tickets here?" Bad points: 1. The vocabulary is very small. You won't learn how to say "hello" or "goodbye", nor will you learn numbers (so you can't tell the time). You won't learn adjectives, although some adverbs are taught. 2. The vocabulary is spotty. I think the vocab which is relatively easy to remember (based on English words) has been chosen rather than systematically learning normal basic vocab. For example, you'll learn I/me/my, you, we/us, but you won't learn his or her. 3. The accusative case isn't explained (it's explained in the Advanced course). Instead the nouns used as direct objects (apart from "me", "us", "you") are either inanimate masculine, neuter, or plural, so no noun ending changes are required. This isn't pointed out to the listener. 4. Indeclinable nouns aren't pointed out and the gender of nouns ending in the soft sign are not treated. The listener is likely to think that all nouns can easily be classified as either masculine, feminine, or neuter. 5. The teacher points out pronunciation mistakes but just listening to the CDs won't explain how to form the sounds correctly. You might therefore learn an incorrect way to pronounce the sounds. The teacher seems to have difficulty getting the students to pronounce soft sounds (if you have this difficulty try smiling when you pronounce them to force your tongue higher in your mouth). 6. No transcripts are included so you can't become good at reading Russian easily. An English-Russian/Russian-English dictionary would be a good idea to see how the words are spelled and to check your pronunciation. Overall, it's quite a remarkable product, enabling you to rapidly learn some very basic Russian (thanks to the Thomas Michel method). There's no way you'd be able to travel to Russia and get along okay after completing this course so you'll definitely need to continue to the Advanced course after this. Finishing this course can make it easier to start the Pimsleur Russian course.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Michel Thomas Rules,
By
This review is from: Speak Russian For Beginners The Michel Thomas Method (8-CD Beginner's Program) (Michel Thomas Series) (Audio CD)
Michel Thomas works like he says he does and it works very well.
When I bought these cd's I had already worked on a couple beginners books, one was from Berlitz (which was pretty good). Oh, and I did Rosetta Stone for a while. Actually, I like Michel Thomas' method just as much as Rosetta Stone. They're two different methods but I think they're equally good. Plus with Michel Thomas, you can do it in your car. Thomas says you should just be able to throw the cd in and get going, but I would recommend checking out a beginners book first just to get your bearings on the language and the alphabet. Bottom line though, it's one of the best language learning systems out there. It's in the top 2. I mean Rosetta Stone is great, but it didn't really teach grammar. It just immerses you in the language so you're forced to figure it out. (That includes spelling too, which in Russian is no small feat.) There's no one to tell you that you can put certain words pretty much anywhere you want in the sentence. Michel Thomas has two students sitting there asking the teacher pretty much every question you'd be asking if you were there. Thanks to Michel Thomas and a little concentration on my part, ya magoo gavareet pa-russki ochyen harasho.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Get Up and Running,
By
This review is from: Speak Russian For Beginners The Michel Thomas Method (8-CD Beginner's Program) (Michel Thomas Series) (Audio CD)
The Michel Thomas Speak Russian guide presents a different approach to learning Russian than most other language guides present. First, it does not get bogged down into the minutiae detailed nuances of grammar, which (frankly) with Russian can drown you if you are a novice. Instead, it approaches the learning or Russian based on what you already know about your native language. In this way, Russian becomes an extension of your native language. So already, you're set off on firm footing to learning how the language actually works. It is this knowledge that ultimately will get you to really learn a foreign langauge. You can't ignore the details, of course. And the truth is, do we really need to know what, for example, dative or accusative means before we can speak a language? No we do not. To focus exclusively on them, as many other guides do, only tends to overwhelm and discourage you. Not this guide. While the concepts presented are true to the details, they never get mired in them. Instead, you get a wealth of useful terms and expressions and approaches that can be adeptly applied to a variety of situations beyond those presented. The positive results are immediate and long-lasting.
Up until this guide, I had been attempting to abandon my native tongue and to learn a new language as if it were mathematics and as if I knew no other language. But one of the approaches that is powerfully effective with this guide is building off the language we already know. This has actually enabled me to think in terms of the Russian language through what I already know of English, rather than abandoning that. While challenging, it builds a remarkable level of comfort to learning a new language. The complexities of Russian are much less intimidating and have become easier and more natural to figure out, learn, and use. This is an outstanding guide and it works!
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