 A great starter |
| Review Date: June 7, 2006 |
| Reviewer: Colin McLarty, Chardon, OH USA |
Obviously the course you chose should depend on what you want as well as how you learn. This Pimsleur course offers conversational Mandarin, not reading or writing. In fact that is what I want right now. It proceeds almost entirely by immersion with very little discussion of grammar or pronunciation. That is not perfect for me, though it might be for you. I will come back to it. This Pimsleur course is entirely audio and so is very well suited to learning as you drive or walk or whatever.
This is very convenient but there is another reason for it: Pimsleur has theory that if you look at written Mandarin (or any language) too early then you will have trouble acquiring a native accent, because you will pronounce the written Mandarin with an American accent (supposing you are American...). This may be exactly right, if Mandarin is only your second language. If you have already learned several languages with reasonably correct accents then maybe you will have less tendency to make that mistake.
The problem with immersion-only Mandarin for me is that this is an intimidating language for Americans. The musical tone of each vowel changes the meaning of a word and the tones are hard for me to learn.
So I am going to cheat on Pimsleur by also using Chinesepod downloads (mp3) and their written supplements. Sometimes I really can't be sure if a syllable on the Pimsleur CD begins with b or d. I can't always tell if a tone is rising or falling (although the narrator often steps in to help with that). So I will look it up. If Mandarin is your first foreign language maybe you should start with straight Pimsleur for just the reasons they give. Mandarin, even more than most European languages, is useless if you do not have a good accent.
The other course I tried was Living Language Ultimate Mandarin. That course is not only conversation. It comes with a very nice textbook. And it requires that you spend considerable time working with the book in front of you, and so not driving or otherwise "on the go." They said their course was the equivalent of 2 years of college courses and that may be true. It aims at all around mastery of spoken and written Mandarin including the simplified character writing used on the Mainland and exposure to the traditional characters used on Taiwan and in Hong Kong. I do not expect to ever reach that level, and anyway I would probably start with Pimsleur and Chinesepod.
Pimsleur courses are reliably very good.
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Impossible Language Made Possible
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| Review Date: January 11, 2007 |
| Reviewer: Ceil F. Holland, |
| This is the best audio language program I have used for a very challenging language. Unlike other audio programs that cram in much vocabulary and too little response time, Pimsleur Mandarin limits the vocabulary but teaches the beginner how to organize sentences. They do this through repetition and substitution. It was so subtle that I didn't realize how much grammar I learned. Used in combination with a book that provides Pinyin spelling and tones, it is even more useful for continuing at the intermediate levels. My only complaint is with how Simon and Shuster markets the set. I thought this was the complete Mandarin I course. It is only the first 16 lessons. To complete Mandarin I, you will need to purchase another set with 14 more lessons. The price is $175 or more depending on coupons and discounts. The problem is, this set includes the first 16 lessons that you already own and you have already mastered. This makes it redundant and expensive. I completed Mandarin I by finding a complete set on cassette(not CD as I preferred) at the library. Now, I just bought Pimsleur Mandarin II in CD and hope it is complete. None of this should detract from the fact that the curriculum is highly effective. |
Absolutely worth it.
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| Review Date: July 9, 2006 |
| Reviewer: H. Swift, Ithaca, New York United States |
| This is a fantastic resource for beginners. I purchased it two weeks prior to a symposium on the future of China-US relations that my department at Cornell was hosting. I felt that it was imperative to have some Madarin before our Chinese delegates arrived from Beida. When the delegates arrived, not only could I understand much of the basic conversation, but they (and my supervisors) were pleasantly surprised at how perfect my Manadrin was! This is not an in depth cousre, but a jumping off point to subsequent learning. I found it very helpful that suggestions and explanations of the language and culture were offered along the way. A great resource. |
delivers exactly what it promises
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| Review Date: February 20, 2006 |
| Reviewer: A. LeDonne, Issaquah, WA United States |
| I've used these CDs (on my iPod) for several weeks now. Pimsleur delivers exactly what it promises: Instant Conversation. It's not in depth Mandarin, but that's not why I bought this. I'm planning on going to China in a few months, mostly because I want to try out my new skills. |
Amaze your friends!
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| Review Date: February 14, 2008 |
| Reviewer: Sophie, Alexandria, VA |
Upfront notice: This package offers the same first 15 lessons as in Pimsleur's Mandarin I. (Wish I'd known, because I bought them all over again, in order to continue with just the next 15 lessons!)
I like learning languages and have used all kinds of tapes / CDs to practice in the car. Used in that way, this program is tops! (A friend from mainland China was astonished at how, in just a few weeks, I started speaking in fluent sentences, with a near-perfect accent -- and using current, idiomatic expressions.)
With Pimsleur, you won't progress through many topics or an extensive vocabulary -- but what you encounter, you'll learn well. (The program repeats concepts over and over, configured in different ways to avoid monotony and to embed them into your head.) And--as far as it goes--the material is all high-value, immediate-use.
To really learn Mandarin, you'll also need to take up other resources about the written characters and grammar, and to build vocabulary. And be aware: this program proceeds at a fairly sedate pace. If you want to go zero-to-60 in Mandarin for a trip to Beijing in 2 weeks, you need to find a different approach. For me, this is a way not to waste time in the car--and I go through about one lesson per week until I know the content cold! But Pimsleur has been an incredibly effective kick-off to what clearly will be a lifetime of effort . . . like losing 10 pounds, the first week of a diet.
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