Customer Reviews

Spanish II

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you liked Comprehensive I, you will like Comprehensive II. Interesting, interactive lessons add new vocabulary while reviewing the old. Conversations are at normal speaking speed. This helps your brain learn to cope with real speech, but if you need to pause and review frequently, it can make the lessons take much more than a half hour.

This set of lessons covers informal usage, the past tense, the conditional tense (could, would), should and must, and ends with the present progressive (am talking, etc.).

The Pimsleur family of language courses is probably the best available in the English-speaking world. However, if you're even considering buying this it means you've probably already finished Pimsleur Spanish I... so you're already familiar with what the product is like and how it works.

The main thing I can say about Pimsleur Spanish II is that when I finished I actually started to feel like a Spanish speaker. Maybe not a fluent speaker, but proficient enough to survive (or perhaps drive a taxi!) in a Spanish-speaking country. It's a much different feeling than completing Spanish I... where I had learned just enough to grasp how much there was yet to learn.

If you haven't done so already, I would also recommend finding some basic grammar book to look over. A Pimsleur principal is that it's more "natural" to pick up grammar rules by osmosis as you listen to conversation. While that may be true, you also have to consider that as a child it took me 10-15 years to master my native tongue's grammar by osmosis... and that was being surrounded by native speakers and taking classes in school! While learning grammar from books alone is counter-productive, I can't count the never of times that something confusing me on the Pimsleur CD's was cleared up INSTANTLY by reading a rule in the grammar book. If you're investing this much time and money into gaining Spanish proficiency, you might as well go the extra few inches and read up on your grammar basics.

Another extra I would recommend is some basic Spanish reader. I don't mean a phrase book... I mean some sort of "Dick and Jane"-style reader where you can learn new words in the context of reading natural text rather than exercises or travel phrases. The reading exercises in Pimsleur courses are the only aspect that I found to be slightly disappointing. There is really NO correlation between the vocabulary in the reading exercises and that which you're learning in the main lessons. Most words you learn will never show up in reading exercises, while allot of words you see in the reading exercises are never taught! I suppose that the idea here is to teach you how to pronounce written Spanish even when seeing unfamiliar words. However, I enjoy learning Spanish by reading natural text as much by hearing natural dialogue... and there are countless readers out there for beginners.

All in all, you can't go wrong with Pimsleur's courses. Once you've finished the "Spanish II", you'll be itching to move on to "Spanish III". These courses may be a more effective (and affordable) option for those more serious learners that would otherwise consider taking night classes.

After working through Pimsleur I and II I can now with confidence have a conversation in Spanish, feeling like I am being not only understood but courteous. This has been useful in my work (legal) and in traveling. The 30 minute lesson length fit my attention span and ability to retain new material. It also, fortunately, fit my commute. Yes, it is relatively expensive, compared to other available books. It is very inexpensive compared to tuition at a local community college, plus it is much more interesting, and I was much more motivated to actually complete the sequence than I would have been had I signed up for a course across town two nights a week. A very fair price for the results obtained, in my opinion. The only downside is that I have not listened to NPR news for the last three months, because I have preferred to listen to these CDs in my car.

The system is great. I get by easily in Mexico after going through blooks 1 and 2. However, the quality of the cassette tapes in my book 2 is TERRIBLE. Very poor audio on most, two tore after several plays. The worst part is the company doesn't appear to stand behind them. I've emailed them and talked to a local dealer and nobody gets back to me.
If you order their product get it on a CD. If you get tapes, copy them to good quality tapes right off. I wish I had done that because their tapes are junk. For what they charge they should pay attention to quality and have some loyalty to their customers. But again, their learning system is very good.

Consider why you want to learn Spanish. If you are looking for a way to communicate in your work and daily life with Spanish speaking people, then you would be making a mistake to not investigate this series. If you are pursuing purely academic interests, then you might want to explore other options.

The Pimsleur programs are the best at home language learning tool you can buy. It breaks up difficult words so you can pronounce them correctly. It also moves along at an easy to learn pace. I do reccomend taking one year of spanish in a classroom along with this, to be able to understand grammer. If your serious about learning Spanish, this is a must.

I seem to be less overwhelmed by the quality of this course than other reviewers. It has both strong and weak points.

POSITIVE POINTS: The segments are skillfully overlapped so that you're not starting from scratch every new lesson. Also, if you repeat the phrases when you're supposed to, you'll get a lot of valuable pronunciation practice. The course requires lots of listening and speaking, which is exactly how it should be.

LESS THAN POSITIVE POINTS: There's too much repetition focused on nonessentials and not enough focus on useful idioms. For example, when a practice dialogue mentions "un cassette con los últimos éxitos" (a cassette of the latest hits), the listener is instructed to translate the following:

"Hits.
Hits.
Latest hits.
The latest hits.
Cassette.
A cassette with the latest hits.
A cassette with the latest hits.
The latest hits.
A cassette with the latest hits."

This degree of repetition is great if you're planning on traveling to Mexico and striking up a conversation about cassettes with the greatest hits. However, if you plan on engaging in normal communication, this will not help you much. In my opinion, misplaced focus is a problem throughout the course. Also, many of the topics of conversation (e.g. several dialogues re: arranging for quick turnaround time at the dry cleaners) are probably not particularly pertinent to people who would be using this course.

Overall I would say the course is helpful, but for this price I think it could be better.

I'm glad I didn't waste my time taking a Spanish class first. If you are disciplined enough to practice every day, this is the best way. I may take a class when I'm done with all 3.