Pimsleur IV & V?

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iguanamon
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby iguanamon » Wed Feb 03, 2016 9:19 pm

James, I downloaded the DLI French Basic Course just in case. I've had a look at all the volumes. It is very similarly designed to the Portuguese Basic Course which I did. If you do an hour a day of it, daily. It should take you about six months. What I like about it is that very little English is used in it, just enough for understanding. There are plenty of drills. Each lesson starts with pattern drills followed by a dialog . There are three audio versions of the dialog including the ability in the audio to play both speakers parts, like a sort of conversation with the audio. Each dialog starts with a cartoon rendering of it hitting the key points, then an English translation, then the TL then cultural explanations followed by moire drills based on the dialog vocabulary and grammar.Then there's a reading, followed by comprehension questions and it ends with a grammar section explaining grammar points in English. Lastly each lesson is followed by a TL - English glossary. Each volume has 10 lessons. At the end of each volume is a glossary for the whole volume. Each fifth lesson is a review. I also did the DLI Haitian Creole Basic Course which has audio issues and it was structured similarly. If I ever decide to learn French, DLI will be my main course.

The course dates back to 1969, but that wasn't a problem for me. Personally, I thought the DLI Portuguese Basic Course was the most thorough and useful course I have ever done for any language. DLI French Basic Course costs nothing to download, so why not download a volume- say Volume 5 and have a look for yourself. The whole thing with the audio (click "books" and "audio") can be found here. You'd be a trailblazer. No one here has done it yet, that I know of at least.
Last edited by iguanamon on Wed Feb 03, 2016 9:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby Speakeasy » Wed Feb 03, 2016 9:25 pm

James29 wrote:Would DLI be able to be finished faster than FSI?

From the materials that are now generally available to the public, I get the impression that, at times, the DLI spread their language courses across several levels such as: Basic, Refresher, Intermediate, and Advanced and also offered specialized courses dealing with aspects of particular interest to members of the armed forces. In contrast, based on the materials available, the FSI seems to have provided instruction in one intensive phase as the FSI Basic course which might have been preceded by the use of preparatory materials such as FSI Programmatic. With the exception of FSI Italian FAST course, generally speaking, the FSI FAST courses represented a departure in philosophy and they are all rather elementary.

For the languages that I have studied and for which FSI Basic courses are available, I have the distinct impression that these are more in-depth than the corresponding DLI Basic courses. Furthermore, it seems that the DLI allocated less classroom time to the delivery of their basic courses than did the FSI for the same language. So, working under the assumption that the two sets of courses are not quite equivalent, I suspect that one could complete the DLI Basic French course in less time than it would be required to complete the FSI Basic French course.

I would add that my French and English are, for all practical purposes, equivalent and that consequently, while I have "collected" the FSI Basic, DLI Basic, Assimil, Living Language Ultimate, and the Linguaphone courses, I have never actually studied them. Rather, I have reviewed them in depth and have found them all to be truly excellent for bringing an independent learner to somewhere within the B1-B2 range depending on the student's application to his studies.

Anyone who actually completes the FSI Basic French course deserves the "Legion of Honour" accompanied by an irrevocable certificate of French citizenship, whereas anyone who completes the DLI Basic French course, deserves the "National Order of Merit" and an evening at the opera with Sophie Marceau. Dans de telles circonstances, lequel choisir ???
Last edited by Speakeasy on Thu Feb 04, 2016 2:29 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby Speakeasy » Thu Feb 04, 2016 2:03 am

Content Deleted and Reclassified
Earlier this week, there was a temporary technical problem that affected the availability of this forum. During that brief period, I was in the process of submitting comments to another discussion thread and, when the forum became once again available, I posted my comments, in error, in this series. I have just realized my error and have reclassified my comments to the separate discussion thread "Perfectionnement Italien or similar." As additional comments have been added to this discussion thread, subsequent to my own, I cannot delete this post. Since the content of my post was related to an entirely separate discussion, I have deleted the content and left this post as an explanatory note. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea culpa!
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Last edited by Speakeasy on Sat Feb 06, 2016 6:11 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Fortheo
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby Fortheo » Thu Feb 04, 2016 10:55 am

Speakeasy wrote:
James29 wrote:Would Pimsleur French 1-5 be an adequate substitute for FSI?



If you're finding FSI Basic French a bit of a drudge, you might consider DLI Basic French as an alternative. Although it, too, employs the audio-lingual method, the exercises seem to provide closer support to the dialogues and narratives. In addition, the audio recordings are clearer, the cadence of speech is slightly slower, and the student notes (which could be replaced by the use of a simple grammar) are much more supportive of the dialogues and narratives. The only minor irritation that I have found with the DLI courses is the sheer volume of printed materials that could have been very easily condensed had they chosen to do so ... "autre temps, autres moeurs" quoi?

EDITED: For content and typographical errors.


I just listened to some of the tapes from DLI French Basic course and I thought they were substantially worse quality than the FSI recordings. I'm curious if maybe you're thinking of a different DLI course, or maybe you somehow found cleaned up audio files, or perhaps my ears are just shit?
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby Speakeasy » Thu Feb 04, 2016 11:32 am

Fortheo wrote: ... or perhaps my ears are just shit?

Uh, beauty is in the ear of the beholder? To me, the FSI French tapes sound "muffled" whereas the DLI French tapes are clearer. Sh*t you say? I am quite literally deaf in one ear and I have reduced hearing in the other. So, I guess you win!
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iguanamon
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby iguanamon » Thu Feb 04, 2016 11:49 am

Fortheo wrote:I just listened to some of the tapes from DLI French Basic course and I thought they were substantially worse quality than the FSI recordings. I'm curious if maybe you're thinking of a different DLI course, or maybe you somehow found cleaned up audio files, or perhaps my ears are just shit?


If I had audio as good as the DLI FRench Basic Course in my Haitian course, I would've been over the moon thrilled. You've got to keep in mind that the course is 47 years old, the audio was transferred from tapes. Today we mostly use digital recording, so there are no quality issues. Before the internet was what it is today, I used to listen to shortwave broadcasts to hear Spanish audio. There was static, buzzing, fading in and out, I had to really pay attention and it made my ability to listen better.

I just sampled the audio from a lesson of each volume and, while far from perfect, it is very listenable. You get used to it. Here's a sample from Volume 3 lesson 21 of the French Basic Course:
I agree that the audio isn't perfect, but in comparison to what I had to put up with in the DLI Haitian Creole Basic Course, these are listenable and comparable to the DLI Portuguese Basic Course I used successfully. If you want perfect, any modern course will have better, clearer audio, but it won't have the thoroughness, the completeness and the drills that DLI has. For me, I'll take that over less complete, less thorough and few to no drills any day. I'll put up with the audio and thank it later when I am to understand clear speech because I was forced to struggle a bit with less than perfect audio. But, to each his (or her) own. After having done two of these courses, I value them a lot, despite their problems. When I win the lottery, I'll have new digital recordings made. :)
Edit: Cross posted with Speakeasy.
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Fortheo
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby Fortheo » Thu Feb 04, 2016 12:05 pm

Speakeasy wrote:
Fortheo wrote: ... or perhaps my ears are just shit?

Uh, beauty is in the ear of the beholder? To me, the FSI French tapes sound "muffled" whereas the DLI French tapes are clearer. Sh*t you say? I am quite literally deaf in one ear and I have reduced hearing in the other. So, I guess you win!


We must just have different preferences. I found FSI tapes to be a lot clearer and with a lot less background static. I didn't mean to come off negative by the way; I was just excited to look at the course, and then I was slightly dissappointed when the audio quality wasn't (in my opinion) as good as the FSI recordings, which as you pointed out, aren't that great themselves. I'm still going to go through some of the course though because it looks promising.


Thanks for your reply too iguamon! It definitely seems like a useful course!


Back on topic to the new pimsleur courses: I used french 4 and 5 and you can expect to review the grammatical functions that you learned in the first three volumes, while also touching upon things like the plus que parfait, conditional, past conditional, future, future perfect, and the subjunctive. While it does have all those grammatical functions in it, I wouldn't recommend learning them from pimsleur; instead I think it would be better if you've already had experience with those tenses, that way you can merely uses pimsleur as a way to test and activate your knowledge.
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby PeterMollenburg » Tue Feb 09, 2016 11:13 pm

back off topic...

....Dammit! I'm seriously tempted to add DLI French to my to do list now right before I do FSI and just after FIA. For now though it's Assimil all the way baby. I'll drop back here in the winter of the 2048 to share my review- if I'm still libingk (aka 'living').

And back on topic...
BTW, Have done Pimsleur French 1 to 4. 5 is ready and waiting for me to finish another run through of 'Rocket French Platinum', which btw I've found way tougher than Pimsleur 4. I'm expectecting Pimsleur French 5 to be a relative walk in the park and a step down, but Pimsleur is great for pronunciation and building early speaking confidence. I can broadly assume how Pimsleur French 5 will be based on the previous 4 levels and on the whole highly recommend all 5 levels for those who drive a lot. Follow with Rocket French Premium Plus then Rocket French Platinum if you want audio courses that up the ante. I'm not affiliated with any of these courses. And I also agree that Pimsleur French 1-5 = ~ 1/2 of Assimil NFWE if that (maybe even 1/3).
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Re: Pimsleur IV & V?

Postby GodZillasEar » Tue Jun 16, 2020 6:42 pm

PimsIleur German (Gold) I - V
Spanish (SD version) I - IV
Japanese (Gold) I

Pimsleur is almost totally focused on conversational language, and almost totally on more-or-less everyday speech. If you are a visual-learner (understand things best when written-down), the course will be somewhat-to-very frustrating because you don't have any written material to refer back to, or the mental images of the words or phrases. HOWEVER, the repetition and the PHASED repetition greatly improve retention. If you are an oral-learner; that is, one who primarily "hears" things, and expresses oneself orally, it should be much easier, and may be why you're interested as language is the primary learning vehicle of oral learners.

Overall, the Pimsleur courses are very good, esp. if you do a lot of driving when you can listen for extended periods, although they recommend 30 daily sessions. Pimsleur recommends NOT proceeding with another lesson until you've achieved 80% comprehension on the current lesson. But, I always repeat a lesson even IF I've grasped and fully vocalized the lesson. Even with the advanced approach Pimsleur takes, you need to generate a comfort level with whatever material you are working on. In addition, it takes the brain several days to completely absorb what it has learned and integrate with previous material (true of ANY topic or subject - not just language).

As to grammar & vocabulary, Pimsleur only occasionally expressly teaches grammar since it's incorporated into progressively more complex phrases and timing (eg simple past, past indefinite, etc.), but will call your attention to a new important grammatical or idiomatic issue. For example, "I go" in both Spanish and German (and probably French) mean I'm going right now, or up to several days or weeks into the future ... very idiomatic. But when it's a specific time in the future - eg this coming Friday, or exactly in two weeks - you have to use the future tense. They don't make a big deal out of it as they would in a formal language class.

Learning anyone else's language is very, very difficult, esp. if you are a visual-learner (70-80% of the population is; only 20-25% is oral) and need to see things to understand and absorb them. Many language courses talk about "learning the way a child learns ...". Few adults have the time (all waking hours), attention span or the willingness to be constantly corrected (like a child) on the way to mastering their mother-tongue (and how many ever really do, English speakers included?). So ... bravo for starting and keep Kung Fu Tse's (Confucious) famous saying in the back of your head: journey of 10,000 miles begins with but a single step. But, YOU have to take that step.
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