Michel Thomas Method: Russian Foundation Course (Michel Thomas Series)

First up, this is not the Michel Thomas Method -- it is an approximation of it, and not a particularly good one.

1) When the students on the CD get the stress wrong in a word or sentence. Natasha says "yes", or "very good", or "that's right", before saying it correctly. She presumably believes that they'll get better just by hearing it said right. Thomas never did. When she eventually gives in and starts correcting them, they're confused by it. Why is what was right earlier wrong now? Their confidence goes causing them to start asking questions they should already know the answers to.

2) Natasha tells us that an unstressed "au" is "ah" in Russian. She pronounces every unstressed "au" clearly as "ah". Then in CD 5 she mentions in passing that they are slightly different. She immediately goes back to pronouncing them the same. In doing this, she fails to teach a distinction that is vitally important (this can mean the difference between calling something feminine and calling it neuter) and now I know I'm going to have to do a lot of work to undo this bad teaching.

3) Michel Thomas only asked his students to guess things when he had a reasonable expectation that they'd get it right first time -- Natasha doesn't. There are many cognates and loan words in the course, but there is no reliable pattern regarding changes in word stress. This means that our first exposure to a new word is wrong in about 50% of all cases. Not good.

4) Natasha falls into the old teacher habit of "answer in sentences". Thomas rarely asked you to answer anything, because answering in sentences is unnatural in any language. The Michel Thomas method means you don't have to answer, so why introduce this unnatural language?

5) The course wastes a lot of time on "A man says?... And a woman says?" If she had used "he" and "she" more than "I", we could have learnt the gender system without nearly as much repetition.

6) The course wastes a lot of time teaching fairly random words of very limited us (luggage, newspaper, etc). MT taught the most common words and words that formed a pattern.

Don't get me wrong -- this is better than most courses out there, but it's only half as good as a genuine "Michel Thomas" course, so why is it the same price?

For a wholesome intro to Russian, this is the way to go! (8/8 people found this helpful)

The teacher here has found novel ways of interpreting Russian words as vivid images which stick in your mind. The learning process comes naturally as if uncovering a Russian tongue you never knew you had. References to Russian culture as well as etymology of certain words further aid the memory.

Having taken a few Russian classes for beginners some years ago, these CDs were a very useful refresher for me and I wish they'd been made earlier! I found the pace comfortable as you're constantly learning and practicing what you learn at each stage. You're encouraged to revisit words and constructions already learnt by building them into new sentences.

To the extent that your mistakes are similar to the 2 students, you learn from their mistakes as if you yourself are being corrected. Common pitfalls are pointed out and gentle reminders flag points to watch yourself on.

As a native English speaker, I didn't appreciate the importance of tone and pitch in spoken Russian at first. You learn how stress can affect the meaning of a sentence or word depending on where it falls. Through examples and repetition you become accustomed to this as well as the subtleties of "hard" versus "soft" sounds. I found sounds much easier to distinguish by listening to the CDs than I did learning in the classroom.

Although primarily a spoken course, it also touches on how to read the Russian Cyrillic script and the small booklet has a vocab list along with the alphabet. Grammar is explained in lay man's terms to make it easy to use. You learn to use all three tenses with ease which is a pretty remarkable for a short course.

The course is fun and really facilitates learning. It's less demanding than real classes in that you're free from homework and have no time/place commitment. That being said, you can't treat it lightly: it's not something to listen to in your sleep or while cooking a new recipe. It deserves more attention so needs uninterrupted time. You have to focus on what you're listening to and picture yourself sitting at a table with the teacher and two other students. I used the 30 min commute to work to listen to this and it worked well although my vocal practice was somewhat limited!

Overall, it's a superb introduction to Russian and achieves what is stated on the box with great success. For me personally it only served as a boost to my existing knowledge as it covered familiar territory. I'm left wanting more and am eagerly awaiting delivery of the advanced course so I can follow up and learn more Russian using this amazing technique!

You can even learn Russian at 70 with Michel Thomas (11/11 people found this helpful)

I first heard about the Michel Thomas method when I found myself in the car picking up the Italian my wife was learning by his method. I wanted to learn Russian but at 70 years the last two years have been a dispiriting slog. Then I saw that there was a Russian course by the Michel Thomas method. The years have dropped away and I'm galloping along. Many, many thanks.

Still good, even after Michel Thomas (13/13 people found this helpful)

As with the other Michel Thomas courses (only this time without him) this is an excellent language learning tool. You very quickly find yourself able to express quite complex ideas in Russian.
The course easily gets to grips with the strangeness (to an English ear) of the Russian emphases in pronunciation, of intonation in questions (utterly different to the English), and of the soft sound.
Sometimes you might feel like shouting at the two students Natasha Bershadski is working with - but that all adds to the fun!
My only regret is that we are going to have to wait so long for the Advanced course (scheduled for March 2008 I think).

Michel Thomas Method: Russian Foundation Course (Michel Thomas Series)

Natasha Bershadski

Reader Reviews:

You learn quickly, but at what cost...? (3/3 people found this helpful)

For a wholesome intro to Russian, this is the way to go! (8/8 people found this helpful)

You can even learn Russian at 70 with Michel Thomas (11/11 people found this helpful)

Still good, even after Michel Thomas (13/13 people found this helpful)

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