Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

General discussion about learning languages
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Random Review
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby Random Review » Thu Jul 23, 2015 2:29 pm

No, I am not a native, or even an advanced Spanish speaker. I did have the privilege of living in Spain recently and asked natives about some of the sentences that seemed wrong to me. I have also seen natives deride the product as full of errors online.

The most common type of error she makes is to completely misunderstand the English and give a Spanish translation of what she wrongly thinks it means. There are other kinds of errors, though, and lots of sentences that aren't wrong but sound very strange to Spanish ears.
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issemiyaki
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby issemiyaki » Fri Jul 24, 2015 3:04 am

@Random Review - I just purchased the product for French and German.

I would be interested if you posted some of the translations (along with the English version) so that I could see them.

I'm wondering if people are just splitting hairs. The more I use the program, the more astounded I am by it.

But let's see the translations your talking about, where it seems that the translator didn't quite understand the English text.
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby aabram » Fri Jul 24, 2015 8:41 am

issemiyaki wrote:I just purchased the product for French and German.


So how does buying from them work? They give you download with MP3s and PDFs? Or is there an app or program you have to use with licence key or something?
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issemiyaki
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby issemiyaki » Fri Jul 24, 2015 10:12 am

@aabram

After you have purchased the program, you are e-mailed a link and then you can download the material.
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby Expugnator » Sat Jul 25, 2015 11:19 pm

I'd only try Glossika for a language with less resources, so, in my case, Georgian or Estonian. There are many more ways to activate my German or Mandarin.
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby vm_nm » Tue Aug 04, 2015 11:45 am

I've purchased a custom package with German (my native language) as source.

I went through the first ~100 sentences in the PDF and it looks good enough to recommend it, even though it's not 100% perfect. Example for imperfections: They translated "I'm a taxi driver" as "Ich bin ein Taxifahrer" which sounds translated; "Ich bin Taxifahrer" would have been better. Interestingly, they got it right in the next sentence "My sister is a nurse" - "Meine Schwester ist Krankenschwester". If you use it as a complementary resource, you should be fine.

The audio for my package is still being produced so I could only listen to the samples they provide on the website. It's neutral/colloquial language, didn't spot anything overly formal or stilted. In the demo recordings, there was one sentence in between that sounded like it was recorded by a non-native speaker. (The pronunciation was still correct.)
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby issemiyaki » Tue Aug 04, 2015 12:19 pm

@vm_nm - Thanks for the feedback.

I'm using it for French currently, and it's okay.

Now that I've gotten to know Glossika a bit more, I do have some reservations. It uses English as a point of reference, which runs of the risk of depriving language learners of the most AUTHENTIC-sounding phrases in the language.

Say you want to learn German. 9 times out of 10, the best language programs are going to come from Germany, and the program will be made by Germans. Take Langenscheidt for example (pardon the spelling). Each language attacks certain concepts differently. So that's one concern.

The other concern has to do with the "translation mistakes." I have the German version and even contacted the guy who did the translations. While very nice, he seemed to chalk up the translation discrepancies as stylistic ones. (I also think he has been living in Taiwan for many years - which could be a problem given that problems start to creep up when one doesn't speak his/her mother tongue often enough.) I'm generally not a stickler for typos and things like that, but when dealing with a language-learning program, it's impossible for me not to be a stickler. It's even more egregious when you think about the way Glossika operates ... it drills the sentence into your brain, and for it to drill into your brain grammatically INCORRECT sentences ... well, that's just tough for me to swallow. And I understand the difference between formal and informal speech. But even informal speech has its rules.

With all that being said, what one can gain with Glossika is unprecedented in language-learning software, which is why so many, like myself, have begrudgingly overlooked the "mistakes." No other program, other than FSI, if I'm not mistaken, forces you to respond in such a short period of time. Then with the knowledge you learn, you're supposed to be able to move on and produce your own sentences.

So, do I use Glossika exclusively? Absolutely NOT! I also use Assimil and some other products.

Just my two cents.
Last edited by issemiyaki on Sun Aug 16, 2015 1:23 am, edited 5 times in total.
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Speakeasy
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby Speakeasy » Tue Aug 04, 2015 6:04 pm

@ vm_nm,
@ issemiyaki

Thank you both for confirming my experiences with Glossika German. As to the existence of the occasional poor translation, I am not particularly concerned the possibility of internalizing errors. I find that the benefits of Glossika German out-weigh the few isolated problems. While it is an excellent programme, but one must learn to accept its imperfections.

As to the matter of the translator having, perhaps, lost contact with his mother-tongue, I know the feeling. For almost 30 years now, I have simply ceased speaking English. On those occasions when I do speak English with my relatives, at times, they tell me that I sound as if I’m translating from another language. Often they express this phenomenon in terms such as “We understand what you’re saying and, grammatically, you’re not making any errors. However, WE wouldn’t say THAT, THAT WAY”.
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby Ericounet » Mon Aug 17, 2015 7:43 am

hi,

did you try : https://gloss.dliflc.edu/ ?

there are there tons of material, and free to use.
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Re: Glossika - Yes? No? Maybe?

Postby Speakeasy » Tue Aug 18, 2015 12:31 pm

Hello all,

Just a quick note to say that Glossika have cleaned up their website and it is now much easier to search for materials.

Ciao for now!
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