My partner and I are planning to undergo some extensive worldwide travel and know that we cannot just rely on speaking English to get us by. I already have a basic grasp of French and know a few bits of Japanese, while she is relatively proficient at Cantonese. But that’s not going to be enough, so we’ve decided to take some online courses to upskill where we feel the need.
I have scrutinized a number of Conversational Language products and will be talking about what I believe is the best series of programs based on a value for money criteria.
Firstly I wanted a consistent approach to learning to speak a number of languages and therefore was looking for a product that offers a large range of language choices. Secondly I wanted a product that was easy to use, produced excellent results quickly and has a support system in case I got stuck. Value for money was a key criteria and the product that I eventually chose even has a choice of downloadable files or a physical package options.
Lastly the product needed to be recognized by a suitable authority and I was also keen try a free sample of the product before deciding to commit to purchasing it.
It was for these reasons that I chose the Rocket Languages product range which offers 10 language choices, physical or download versions, free trial software and full support – Oh and also a fantastic 60 day – money back guarantee.
How the Program Works
Rocket Languages is a multimedia e-learning program that comprises audio lessons, textual lessons and game programs.
You listen to the audio lesson which has two or more “native” speakers of the language and you verbalize along with them. There is also a written transcript of the conversation for you to familiarize yourself with.
The Textual lessons build your knowledge of grammar, building sentences and writing the language while enhancing your understanding of the written script.
The games are a program that you interact with and these test your memory of the words, grammar, sounds etc. These games are great fun and designed to be both stimulating and motivational.
You will find yourself enjoying while you learn at your own pace, and skill retention is absolutely superb.
I think the best way to use the course is to undertake two lessons per day if you have time – this involves doing a quick review of yesterday’s lesson before moving onto the new lesson. I think this works best because the learning process is incremental so you need to continually reinforce your previous knowledge.
Anyone from beginner to advanced can use these programs, with a steady improvement in speaking skills evident in as little as 4-6 weeks. As your confidence grows, so too does your inspiration so that you quickly move to becoming accomplished at easy conversational language.
On the less than positive side of things, I would like to see a Chinese Cantonese option since that is what I thought I should learn next. Also I found that the software worked better on my home PC with XP than it did on my laptop which had Vista –I expect that these issues may have been solved recently because nobody else has mentioned this to me lately.
I believe that the Rocket language programs are indeed designed to rocket you to speaking success and they are a very comprehensive resource at a very affordable price.
The range of products currently is French, Chinese (Mandarin), Spanish, German, Italian, Arabic, Korean, Japanese, Hindi and Sign language (American).
Support is provided by way of newsletters (although these can also be found on the site) and there are forums for each language so that you can converse with other students and the teachers.
One thing about these courses is very evident though, they require your participation and enthusiasm for you to be successful. I personally recommend selecting one of the 6 day mini courses to try for free just so you can try the system for yourself and decide if this is right choice for you.
The website I referred to for these courses is listed below.
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