I'm looking for a program to learn a foreign language. What are the best ones available?

Question

Is Rosetta Stone worth the money?

Answer 1

I tried Rosetta Stone for Spanish. It was effective to learn basic words and sentences. It does not have any grammar or conjugation instructions though so it will be very hard to go beyond the basics with it.

My college uses another software called TeLL me More, by Auralog. I found it more complete and less repetitive. It covers not only the basics, but also intermediate or advanced level. My goal was to become fluent so it was perfect for me. It has a lot of different activities: picture/word association, videos, dialogues,..., includes also grammar and conjugation. It has also more content than Rosetta Stone as far as level and number of hours of learning and is cheaper. Their speech recognition is great so you can have a dialogue with the computer. You can check out their website at http://www.auralog.com for a free demo or they can send you one. I found that site of reviews as well http://learn-spanish-software-review.toptenreviews.com/.

The best way to learn a language would be through immersion, visiting these countries. Learning a language will require some time. In addition to software, you can have books which are useful as well. Audio CDs like Pimsleur for instance might help you out but you cannot get any feedback on your pronunciation so I did not like it so much.

Answer 2

It's insanely expensive, but yes, I hear that Rosetta Stone is one of the few out there that can really do the best job if you use the program regularly as they instruct.

I've used it only occasionally for Japanese (provided through my school), and it seems pretty high up there on creating listening comprehsion and, by extension, some speaking comprehension.

If you aren't that serious about learning the language though, or don't think you can dedicate the time to it, I wouldn't invest in Rosetta Stone- it takes self-discipline.

Answer 3

Ive never used Rosetta Stone, but I can highly recommend The Pimsleur Language system. Good luck!

Answer 4

Nope, Rosetta stone ain't worth the money....
I tried Italian on RS & I found it quite ineffective.
It would be better to download a pirated/free version & try it out just for fun.

Answer 5

If you would like to study Chinese, I would recommend you a website http://www.exelchinese.com , which is teaching Chinese live online. It is very useful for you to speak Chinese well.