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Search metadata Search full text of books Search TV captions Search archived web sites Advanced Search. The Money Market Hedge: How It Works UN News Centre – Official site for daily UN news, press releases, statements, briefings and calendar of events. Includes UN radio, video, webcasts, magazines. Reviews of Portuguese language resources and tips and tricks for learning Portuguese. On this page I’ve compiled the resources that I have found to be most useful for those teaching themselves Brazilian Portuguese. These are the best of the best; I.

Language learning on a budget: Great alternatives to Rosetta Stone. When it comes to language learning these days, there’s Rosetta Stone and there’s everything else. Or at least, that’s what Rosetta Stone would like us to think.

They have spent a fortune in advertising trying to convince us that if we just spend enough money, we can have a computer program hold our hands as we move from step A to step B to step C and so on, eventually achieving our dream of being fluent in a new language. Of course, it will cost us a few hundred dollars. Like most luxury items, Rosetta Stone trades on its high price and slick marketing to create a perception of quality. I think Rosetta Stone is a good, well- produced product. But it’s not a magic key. Actual language study is a messy thing, one that requires motivation, a diversity of approaches, and hard work.

Rosetta Stone is well beyond the budget of many people who would like to learn a language, and its one- size- fits- all approach ignores the fact that different people learn in different ways, and at different rates. Rosetta Stone also sells us the idea that achieving fluency can be easy if we just spend enough money and then let a computer program take responsibility for our learning. But achieving fluency is not easy!

It requires dedication, enthusiasm, discipline, and several years of work (a lot of which can be fun). So let’s take a look at some of the alternatives to Rosetta Stone. One of the most popular alternatives is the Pimsleur audio course. I got hooked on Pimsleur early in my Portuguese journey and ended up completing all 9. Pimsleur lessons. I found my increasing ability to say ever more complex things to be completely addictive and it kept me going through the whole course.

Pimsleur worked so well for me that I have a pretty strong bias towards it, as I’ll explain below. But I acknowledge that everyone learns in a different way and may need different tools. I have not gone through the entire Rosetta Stone Portuguese course, but I have used Rosetta Stone French Level I previously and have received feedback from others who did use RS Portuguese. With so many language programs available, it’s worth making a distinction between methods that try to be truly comprehensive versus those that address only one part of the learning process (like learning vocabulary or memorizing common phrases). I think a method that is truly comprehensive should ideally integrate vocabulary learning, grammar practice, and all four modes of language communication: speaking, listening, reading, writing. But in reality, nothing like this exists; every method has strengths and deficiencies in these areas. So it’s necessary to create a well- rounded study regimen that includes a diversity of different resources and activities.

See the Roadmaps page for some suggestions on creating a complete plan. With all that said, let’s take a look at some of the strengths and weaknesses of each product, starting by comparing Rosetta Stone with Pimsleur: Rosetta Stone.

Type: Computer software, online app, supplemental audio, social website. Best for: Reading, listening.

Not so good for: Speaking, writing. Dialects: Brazilian only. Cost: $2. 00- 6. 00. Rosetta Stone comes in two forms, a very expensive software product that you install on your computer, and an online version that is cheaper but requires an internet connection. They also offer supplementary products like audio cds and a social website with access to native tutors (which can bring the bill up to $6.

Street. Smart Brazil instead). Rosetta Stone only offers Brazilian Portuguese, so if you’re learning European Portuguese you may want to go with something else. Here are Rosetta Stone’s strengths compared with Pimsleur: Larger vocabulary. You’ll come out of RS having a significantly larger vocabulary than with Pimsleur (which is limited to about 5. Interactive and engaging.

The interaction and greater variety of activities makes RS a better choice for visual learners, and for those who get bored or are easily distracted. Go at your own pace. Crack For Escape From Paradise 2 Cheats. Pimsleur often doesn’t give you enough time to respond to the prompts, which can be frustrating. Rosetta Stone lets you take as much time as you need. More reading practice.

Since Rosetta Stone is more visual, reading is a part of most activities. Pimsleur offers very little reading practice. More comprehensive. While neither RS nor Pimsleur will get you anywhere near fluency, RS through Level III has enough material to take you farther toward that goal.

The main weakness is that Rosetta Stone emphasizes the receptive modes of communication (reading, listening) over the productive modes (speaking, writing). True, it does have some speech recognition capability to help you with your pronunciation, but from what I’ve seen this doesn’t work as well as I might like. And while it encourages you to repeat words and short phrases, it doesn’t give you much practice producing complete thoughts as you would do in a real conversation. The writing excercises teach you correct spellings but don’t give you much practice doing substantive writing. However, I give RS credit for at least trying to incorporate all four modes, so I think it comes close to being Comprehensive. Type: Audio course, mp. Good for: Speaking and listening.

Not as good for: Reading and writing. Cost: $0 – $1. 80. Dialects: Brazilian and European. Pimsleur is an audio- only method consisting of 9.

In my case, it actually took me 7 months because I ended up not doing them every day and had to repeat them occasionally. Unfortunately, there are a confusing number of different Pimsleur products out there. The only difference between them is how many lessons each product contains – the lessons themselves are identical from product to product.

If you’re planning on doing the whole course of 9. Pimsleur Portuguese (Brazilian), Comprehensive, Revised 2nd edition, Levels I, II and III”. Each level (I, II, or III) contains 3. Make sure the product you’re getting says “Comprehensive” – that’s the only series that has all the lessons. What Pimsleur has going for it is that rather than asking you to just memorize and repeat phrases like so many other courses, it actually prepares you for conversation by training you to quickly turn English thoughts into Portuguese speech.

This means you’re actively involved in remembering the vocabulary that you’ve learned, and you’re engaged in putting the words together in new ways. Everything in Pismleur happens in the context of a mock conversation. During the conversation, the narrator might prompt you in English, “How would you ask the clerk, . You can try the first lesson for free on their website to get a feel for how it works. In each lesson new words are introduced. You are asked to use them in your responses, at first frequently, and then as you move them into long- term memory, less so. Download Adobe Shockwave For Windows 10 more. This is what’s known as spaced repetition, and Dr.

Paul Pimsleur developed it in the 1. This solves a common problem with language programs, which is that when you move on to a new section, you end up forgetting what you’ve learned previously.

Pimsleur doesn’t let you forget, by constantly asking you to recall the words that you learned in previous units. I’ll admit, the prompt- and- response format can definitely be tedious and unexciting for some people. But I would suggest at least trying the first 5 lessons of Pimsleur. If you’re like me, you might find that the thrill of being able to say ever- more- complex things in Portuguese makes you stick with it, even when it gets boring. But it does require some teeth- gritting. So here are the main advantages of Pimsleur over Rosetta Stone: Much better conversational practice. Pimsleur trains you to quickly translate thoughts in English into speech in Portuguese, which is exactly what you’ll be doing during conversation, in the early- intermediate stages of learning at least.

You’ll come out of Pimsleur much more capable and comfortable with carrying on simple conversations.