Customer Reviews

Russian: Level 1: Learn In Your Car

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

 

 

This is an excellent way to start learning Russian, even if you don't spend that much time in your car. I'd give it 5 stars if they included a little information on grammar and corrected the mistakes on the alphabet page (they printed not using a Cyrillic font, the letters are totally incorrect!) Even still, I'm looking forward to buying the second level once I master the material in this course.

I've had these discs for about 8 months, using them in the car about 1 to 4 times a week. They've been a handy way to study in otherwise wasted time. I have noticed that the pronounciation tends to vary a slightly from the Russian speakers I know, especially "d" sounds tending to sound like "z" or "dj" sounds. Lastly, long-term retention seems to be greatly aided by fluency training -- overlearning to the point of being fast and accurate. First, I always rehearse the words aloud, trying to get them out before the Russian speaker on the cd.Then I go over the lesson until I can quickly say all the Russian words in response to the English stimulus word before the Russian speaker on the cd. Lastly, once I reach 90 to 100% accuracy on the cd, I quickly review the lesson playing the English stimuli only, and then the Russian (saying the English myself). Though this takes a little more time each lesson, I've found I retain lessons learned this way at about 80% accuracy months after learning the lesson. (Note: "Fluency Training" is a technique developed in educational and training areas of applied behavior analysis.)

I listen to this almost everyday on my way to work and do find it to be helpful...for the most part. The Russian speaker on the CD pronounces a few words differently than my Russian teacher and Russian-speaking friends. For example, the number "1" is pronounced "azin" on the CD but everyone else I know says "adin". Similarly, the word "where" is pronounced "ga-ze" on the CD, but everyone else says "ga-de". So, the appears the russian "D" is sometimes pronounced with more of a "Z" sound by this particular speaker. Perhaps it's a dialect issue, but my Russian teacher isn't sure.

With respect to the wrong font being used in the accompanying guide, this was apparently a problem with one batch. I sent an e-mail to info@pentonoverseas.com and they were able to send me a corrected version.

My son was getting married the bride is russian her entire family speaks russian I wanted to have something to say I do now
I am having fun with this

I put in the CD and was appalled. Its a long list of words spoken in English then spoken in Russian. That's it. It's like having a Russian-English dictionary on CD. No introduction, no explanations, just word in English then in Russian.

I had just used the Michel Thomas set for Russian and was MUCH happier. The format of 'here is what we are going to learn, this is why it is, here is an example and here is how you can use it with other words' is way more intuitive and intriguing than listening to an endless list of words in two languages.