Is Pimsleur Effective

[Takako Dito]

UPDATEFor a much more comprehensive audio course alternative to the Pimsleur series (and more affordable), I recommend the Rocket Language series. The dialogues and pronunciation are higher quality, a wider range of content and topics are covered in detail and all the audio is 100% downloadable (see my review here).

Just listening to Pimsleur Korean, Russian, Egyptian and Eastern Arabic, I noticed the excessively formal and polite language used in the dialogues (for example polite verb forms in Korean and plural вы pronoun in Russian).

The difference between Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur though is that Rosetta Stone makes the absurd mistake of having older people address younger people and people who are friends and family addressing each other using polite forms (which is almost always not the case in reality speaking from experience living in these places).

Each language series only introduces a few hundred new words in total. The exact amount depends on how many levels there are since some languages have only one level and others have three, four or five.

Effective communication in any language depends on mastery of a relatively limited number of words and structures. Trying to learn too much at once substantially slows the process, and many people quickly become discouraged.

One of the biggest selling points of Pimsleur is that you only need 30 minutes a day to become proficient in a language. As someone who has learned many languages (and failed some), I can attest that this definitely not true.

After 1 month of learning Pimsleur Level 1, I visited Hannover in Niedersachsen and amazed some of the locals with my pronunciation and vocabulary. they thought I had been learning for at least a year lol. I was even able to read signs and menus etc thanks to spending an additional 30 mins a day challenging myself with the flashcards and word association challenges.

To this day I can remember the uru amd seimhu from hearing the Pimsleur audio: Tuigim, An dtuigeann, Ni thuigim. Like the reviewer, I am a strong visual/spatial person, but this was exactly what I needed to stimulate my audio center and link it to the rest of my brain.

Pimsleur is my favorite method because it is not the standard memorization and dissection of sentences. That has never worked for me. I like to get a good feel for how a language works and learn some vocabulary along the way in context. That works for me.

I also find that 30 minutes a day is sufficient for the beginner. Down the road, you may want to pursue other methods or resources to expand your knowledge and acquire more words. However, this audio only method that engages you to constantly respond from day one is probably the best way to start off (in my opinion). It gets you past the hump of being able to have simple conversations, which I believe is when you are able to learn and retain new words, concepts and expressions in context.

I know this because I bought Spanish I & 2 Latin America in 2012. Last year, I decided to pull them out and finally go through the lessons. I wanted to download the reading booklets and tried to get them on the website, but the web sight for pimsleurapproach.com was now automatically redirected to pimsleaur.com. After searching that site, I called and I was told that the company licensed to sell the product as pimsleurapproach.com was no longer in business and the booklets for Pimsleur Approach Gold Edition were no longer available.

Great article. You should note however that Pimsluer now offers a monthly fee access at $15/mo. It gives me access to the app and Spanish courses 1 through 5 at that price. I had never tried it before because it was so cost prohibitive. As someone who uses duolingo and rosetta stone I must say im making mich better progress with pronunciation with Pimsluer. My daughter in law is a native spanish speaker and she agrees.

Now, i know this is not an easy answer, but i need to know this because, the main reason im gonna study french is to apply for a visa in montreal, and one the requeriments its to take a french test, now i dont remember what level is minimun requirement, but i guess it would be B2-C1.

I want to learn Castilian Spanish and had Pimsleur recommended to me. Your review suggests Rocket Spanish but they only do Latin American. Pimsleur is $230 so not the crazy $1000. With those factors in mind, which do you think would suit my goals best?

I love Pimsleur Language Programs! I think they are the best to start learning a language, at least the speaking and listening parts. For writing and reading you need to find a different program. But, the hardest part of learning a language is speaking, and Pimsleur is awesome. I currently live in the USA where they have really good public libraries. When I have the money I invest in some reduced price Pimsleur programs or I just get them from the library. I have tried French, Italian, Portuguese, and Japanese.

I would like to suggest a small update. Pimsleur Approach is no longer a licensed reseller of the Pimsleur product. I picked up Level 1 at a used bookstore the other day and liked it very much. It was only when I went to the official Pimsleur website that I learned the reseller status. That said, I called the company and they said it is Pimsleur but only as up to date as the packaging indicated. End result, I was able to go on Amazon and find Level 1-5 for an exceptionally affordable price. Approach may have started as a rip off but can be a way to beat sticker shock now.

If you are interested in Pimsleur Japanese, they now have Japanese Level 5 as a download or CDs. Use code LEVEL5 for a 10% discount until 9 Nov 2017. Also, Russian level 4 is now available as of October 2017. The discount of Russian Level 4 has expired.

I really like the Pimsleur method for teaching spoken Russian. I had some Russian in college but learned to speak very little; this is slow going for me until I come upon something I actually learned in college, at which time I feel very smart and speed along.

I used Pimsleur as my 1st step to learning Brazilian Portuguese -- at the time, there were only 3 levels available. I found Pimsleur to be a great stepping stone that I could listen to in the car to and from work.

Hi Ryan, I am going to Indonesia in a few months and I want to learn it better. I have lived there before and know basic stuff and my pronunciation is correct, but I just want to be able to speak it more confidently. Is the 99 dollar pimselur training worth it, and if not , do they accept refunds?

* ... for practicing Korean.

Incidentally, if you download the popular open-source Audacity, or the limited free version of Wavepad, you can load any language-course audio file into it and construct your own back-chaining sequences using the loop-function. With Wavepad you can even keep dragging the left-side of the selection left-ward in real time over more and more segments and keeps on looping with the new elements. You can just keep listening until it sinks in, or start repeating when you feel confident.

At times the man and woman speakers say the same word in a different way. For example the female says Hiểu and when the man speaks it sounds like Hiễu and Ở đu sounds nothing like the female speaker who says it correctly.

There are many good things about the program, and it would be great if they offered a written supplement when you get stuck on understanding what is being said. I would not recommend it as the only learning program, but it is a great supplement.

It is important to understand that Pimsleur alone will only get you so far. My approach to language learning is work through several courses at once: Pimsleur, Assimil, Teach Yourself, Made Simple books, Easy Reader, grammar books. It reinforces learning to come across the same word, expression or grammatical rule in multiple places.

Pimsleur is great to listen to when walking or doing housework. For road safety reasons, I recommend not doing it when driving the car. Pimsleur requires a high level of concentration and distracts too much from the driving task.

Bottom line for me is that if I am serious about learning a non Mid Eastern or Asian language, Pimsleur is a great base for my language learning and can easily be supplemented with Duolingo, Rosetta Stone, Rocket Languages, etc. etc., with the time saved by only spending 30 minutes a day on Pimsleur. Multiple methods would result in a few hours per day of exposure to the language, just as the doctor prescribed.

I tried my hand at several languages and several different methods to learn them. I prefer the kind that has you listening and repeating since it is much faster than learning to write a new language (and in some cases an entire alphabet) at the same time.

Another thing I could mention (from my own experience), Pimsleur works okay for me, I do the lessons on the computer while cleaning the house, or on the bus when going somewhere but I do find that after several lessons I have a great need for a native speaker to have a conversation with.

First to ask if I am actually pronouncing several words right, because even with the breaking down to syllables it can be hard to know if you hear and say it correctly, but also to have a bit of a distraction from the same routine.

People who are interested in only one (or maybe two) languages will not have this problem, but I myself like to try and learn as many different ones as I can and find myself easily mixing up languages, because with the same routine (same words you learn in the same order and the exact same conversations in each and every one) you tend to memorize the correct response to what you hear and that can be very tricky.

Pimsleur has been great for me when getting started with a new language. I have used several now: Spanish, Mandarin, Hindi, and Armenian. I received nice compliments from speakers in each language saying that my pronounciation was good.

I have found that if I am using a vocabulary acquisition tool like Memrise or Anki, these boost up my vocabulary so by the time I hear those words on Pimseur, I already know their meaning. It makes the Pimsleur lessons a bit easier for me the first time I hear them.

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