I really enjoyed this and I believe it helped me with my German tremendously. That being said, if you partner this program with another program that tends to focus more on the informal you (like Duolingo), this evens out and you get practice with both. Several times I wanted to say something but could only say it formally. This was a bit frustrating as the informal you is not introduced in any of the lessons in Level 1 and is introduced about a 1/3 of the way through Level 2. For me, I am mostly practicing my German with my partner and so I mostly needed the informal expressions. Caveat 2: This is really targeted for businesses and travel dealings and less for personal relationships. The program's reading portion is very weak and the writing portion is nonexistent, so pairing with a program that is stronger in that areas helps as well. It also sometimes helped to see the word written, which isn’t really done in this program. I feel they do a good job (better than most programs) but just having different programs also introducing those words helped a lot to improve my pronunciation as there were just more different voices pronouncing something. There are only two German speakers in the course so some new words that are introduced are difficult to understand the correct pronunciation. I do not think I would have been very successful if this was the only program I was using. Caveat 1: I would not recommend it as a standalone product to learn German. This was immensely beneficial to me as I often would still be struggling with things the first run through. I would do five lessons in a row (Monday morning through Wednesday morning) and then go back and repeat the same five lessons (Wednesday evening through Friday evening). I usually get one lesson in the morning commute and one lesson in the afternoon commute.
I have been doing Duolingo every day (Memrise and Rosetta Stone some days if I have extra time) in addition to doing this on my commute to and from work each day. I have been using several different methods and programs to help my German and I do believe that this program has helped me the most in getting my German speaking to a higher level. This worked very well for me, so I am going to rate it highly. Note: I am half way through German 2, so this review is really for all thirty lessons in German 1 and not just for lessons 1-5. Sometimes the pronunciation between the two speakers varies a little ("nicht" for example) but I think that exposes listeners to natural variations between dialects.
#Pimsleur german lessons how to#
It's difficult to read German even after learning how to speak German without knowing the spelling. "Verstehen" sounds like it has an F at the beginning, and "Wol" sounds like "vol" to the English speaker. As with both books, Pimsler never tells you how to spell anything! I constantly have to go to Google Translate to learn the spelling. I suppose that helps prepare listeners for a fluent German conversation, but it leaves beginners in the dust. In comparison, Paul Noble's book starts with words that sound similar to English, like "I can camp" or "ich kann campen." The Pimsler course also presents everything in a quick conversational tone, and rarely slows down to exaggerate pronunciation. Pimsler starts with one of the trickiest words in German - "excuse me" or "entshuldigen sie," which is a mouthful and doesn't sound like English. However, I'm glad I did Paul Noble's book first, otherwise I would be lost with the Pimsler course.
The Pimsler course is already expanding my vocabulary within the first few lessons. I got the Pimsler course after listening to Paul Noble's Learn German all the way through. I'm glad it wasn't my first German lesson
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