Is Transparent Language Software good?

[bhv.livejournal.com]

I recently completed the Pimsleur Russian courses, which were a lot of fun and I learned a lot, but now I need to come up with a systematic program of study that will take me from my current level of competence to fluency. I bought (but haven't yet started on) Rosetta Stone Russian. Do any of you have any experience with the Transparent Language Russian software? http://www.transparent.com/

I need to either find or develop some kind of self study plan that I can use every day to improve my Russian. I'm looking forward to your suggestions.

Comments

[ashalynd.livejournal.com]

Rosetta only helps to learn some helpful phrases and broadens your vocabulary, but it would not help you to become fluent. If you are interested in the language, go to Russian websites (especially blogs), read Russian books, listen to Russian radio or watch TV - all this you can find via the internet.

For starters, it would be nice for you to have some opportunity to talk in Russian, so you might consider looking for "real-life" Russian courses. It is very different from listening to canned exercises, and much more efficient if you do your homework, of course.

There are sites with tons of literature in Russian, http://www.lib.ru for example. There are some kids books there, you might want to start with them. I used the same approach for learning Dutch and, now, for French, and for me, it worked.

One other big disadvantage of courses like Rosetta. The phrases they teach you are the same in each and every language. Exactly the same. I understand that it is an idea of such a course... but you do not get acquainted with the culture because of that, only with the language separated from any culture features... Rather boring I'd say...

[yms.livejournal.com]

lib.ru is probably the largest library, but it's also the worst one by text quality. A lot of typos, encoding issues and other errors. I would rather recommend http://feb-web.ru/.

[greenkira.livejournal.com]

I've got the Transparent software, and though I don't actually use it much (or study nearly as much as I should for someone living in Moscow) I think it's great. Not for fluency, but for comprehension - it reads texts (and for the Russian title, it's Russian texts, not standards ones for every language) out loud, and gives you line by line and word by word translations simultaneously. So for comprehension and pronunciation, it's very nice. There are also some games and a pronunciation comparison thing which are okay.

Thanks for the review.

[bhv.livejournal.com]

They have several different products. I downloaded the free demo program from their web site but it seemed to be only a good flashcard program. Do you remember which of their programs you have?

Re: Thanks for the review.

[greenkira.livejournal.com]

I've got two titles by them, which are somewhat older and I'm not sure what they're still printing.

101 Languages, tourist basics of 101 languages of the world - good for getting some polite phrases down before traveling.

Russian - actually doesn't really have the tourist basics, just titles for you to read, as I described above. Not a systematic approach to language learning, but pretty close to immersion on the listening/ reading side. The text is read, out loud, line by line or word by word, with scrolling translation line by line or word by word, and grammar points in a side box. In other words, I think this title is better for studying to improve your language, but not a place to start it. And for that purpose, it's really good.

[litchick.livejournal.com]

I know this may sound funny, but one of my Russian teachers encouraged us to talk to ourselves in Russian, like when you're doing your morning routine or driving in your car. If you talk about what you have to do that day, it will keep that everyday vocab at your fingertips.

Of course, finding a pen-pal, forming a "Russian Club" of sorts with a weekly dinner, and listening to the daily news in Russian would help too, along with the other suggestions above.

[jasontheknight.livejournal.com]

I know this may sound funny, but one of my Russian teachers encouraged us to talk to ourselves in Russian, like when you're doing your morning routine or driving in your car. If you talk about what you have to do that day, it will keep that everyday vocab at your fingertips.

I do that actually, when I'm waiting for a bus or a train or whatever. I then get frustrated when I try and use a word that I don't know, then I look it up when I can and remember it for future reference :)

[bhv.livejournal.com]

I have started a Russian club here in San Diego http://russian.meetup.com/77/, which is lots of fun, (join is if you are in the area) but two meetings a month aren't really enough exposure to the language to grow a decent vocabulary.

I also subscribe to two Russian TV channels on Dish Network, and I find that watching TV is a good way to review words you already know, but not really a fast way to learn more.

The Pimsleur materials were a great systematic way to get to what I call a minimal conversational ability. I spent 40 minutes per day doing a lesson and when I got done with all the lessons I could minimally get by in Russian. The lessons were fun, interesting, easy to do, and they worked.

Now I want to go from my minimal speaking ability to fluency, and I need some kind of structured plan or else in a year I will have only watched a few more Russian movies, but really not be able to speak it any better than I can today.

[sphinges.livejournal.com]

Transparent Language is horrible. I will sell you my CDs for a dollar apiece. Basically what they do is have a 10-page text in Russian (unhelpful dialogue mixed in with paragraphs about Russia and the language) and when you click on an individual word, it will pronounce it for you and show its meaning at the bottom of the screen. It's organised into topics (airport, taxi, restaurant), but not levels of difficulty; the first unit "Meeting and Greeting" is just as difficult as the last unit. I wouldn't even call it "sink or swim", it's just "sink".

Rosetta is excellent, but like some other people said "it's strength is in vocabulary building". It is immersion software, and does not bother with laying down the foundations of grammar (or even bothering to teach you cyrillic). I feel it's just misunderstood. It teaches you as a child would learn a language: you just glean the grammatical rules from what you hear. Which is better because you don't spend 30 minutes trying to remember what rules apply when you formulate Russian sentences.