Customer Reviews

Speak in a Week! Flash! French: 1001 Flash Cards

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

 

 

Hi! :) These cards are okay, but not great. The major issues are that some of the major verbs are not even included, and then some of the translations to English are either incomplete or inaccurate. Many of the translations don't capture the nuance of the meaning. Another annoying thing is that several cards might have the exact same French word with a one-word English translation, when there are more than one translations. For example, there might be two different cards that say "jamais", and on the back of one, it might say "never" and on the back of another, it might say "ever". That word can be used in two contexts: "That's the best movie i EVER saw." and "I'm NEVER going to that restaurant again." Another card that comes to mind is "surtout". The real meaning is "especially/crucially", and the only English translation they have is "mostly", which is arguably tangentially related, but certainly not an accurate translation for the spirit of the word. They are cheap, and might be better than nothing, but I wouldn't buy them again.

I bought this as a gift and the person really seemed to like it a lot. Apparently they are indispensable when taking advanced French classes and he was thrilled to not have to make his own.

I just found this box at my son-in-law's in the bookcase and am delighted. The side with the french word has a picture on it to show which meaning the word on the card is meant to convey when it is a noun. After using the side showing the french word asking for the English translation for a while, I am going to reverse the process and use the English side to guess the French word and how to spell it. A little harder I think and an exellent alternate way to use these cards. I intend to order this item as soon as I complete my move and have a permenant address. I am taking a second level class, because the first had already been completed before I knew about the opportunity, and I need to catch up vocabulary fast. In order to get the full advantage of these cards, take a class and use them with a fellow student. How fun! I can't wait to get my own box!

I am making this "comment" here, because many people are too busy to read all reviews, much less comments. I think it only fair that I explain why I rated this item so much higher than the one 3 level review here, which is all I see for this product at the moment.

I think if the person who bought these cards reads the box, he will see that these cards are to build general vocabulary only and are giving the most common usage for a word, not every meaning it can be used for. One would need a thesaures for that. In his cited case of jamais, he did not mention that although it means never, when it is used to express ever, it is used in the negative, not ever, which means the same thing as never. Ex: I would never hurt an animal, I would not ever hurt an animal. I do not think his example of usage was correct, and one who takes a class or speaks the language at all would see that. One cannot expect flash cards to take the place of a class or course in french, but they will speed up enlargement of one's general vocabulary very quickly. I think this review was from one who misunderstands the purpose of flash cards and was much too harsh.