Rosetta Stone V3: Arabic, Level 1, 2 & 3
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List Price: $499.00
Our Price: 0
Your Save: $ 499.00 ( 100% )
Availability:
Manufacturer: Rosetta Stone
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Average Customer Rating:   
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Binding: CD-ROM
Brand: Rosetta Stone
EAN: 0794678321986
Format: CD-ROM
Label: Rosetta Stone
Platform: Windows Vista
Publisher: Rosetta Stone
Release Date: 2007-08-28
Studio: Rosetta Stone
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Features
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Rosetta Stone helps you understand everyday language through our proficiency-based listening and reading activities
You will pronounce words correctly after practicing with our proprietary speech recognition and analysis tools
In no time you will speak without a script, Rosetta Stone's Contextual Formation™ makes sure you have the confidence and the cues you need to get the words out on the spot
With Rosetta Stone Milestone activities you quickly gain confidence to engage in real-life conversations in a foreign language.
Track your progress to reinforce your new foreign language strengths and revisit needs with our Adaptive Recall™ language feature.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: A language instructor gives this program a D- and wants a refund.
Comment: I am an ESL/ELL and Spanish teacher with two graduate degrees and I've been studying Chinese for almost a decade now. I have an older version of Chinese level 2 and Spanish level 3. I have some complaints about both of thEM, but I'd have to an exponent to my complaints about this Arabic version! I am still stuck in unit 1.
1. A word about "dynamic immersion": ROSETTA STONE'S BRAND OF IMMERSION IS LIKE BEING DROPPED IN THE OCEAN WHILE TIED TO A CONCRETE SLAB! The brain of a two-year-old is VERY different from that of a 22-year-old! A toddler's brain expands faster than at any other stage of development. Plus a two-year-old is not "immersed" with out a life preserver and a two-year-old in a healthy environment has a myriad of stimuli that no computer could duplicate. This program provides no scaffolding/life-preserver. By the way, most toddlers are NOT very articulate, nor do they have the same communication needs as adults. One of the advantages of being an over-the-hill hardwired adult is that most, after a decent high school or college education, have acquired the academic skill sets for learning a foreign language. It is not realistic to expect an adult to develop the accent and colloquial fluidity of a native speaker, but it is very possible to become fluent in reading and listening. In other words, the "toddler" method isn't appropriate for adults.
2.THERE ARE NO INSTRUCTIONS FOR THIS PROGRAM! At times it was very difficult to figure out what the learner was supposed to do. Rosetta Stone should realize that toddlers need instructions.
There are bugs/glitches, or just poor planning, in the software. The speaking part is rigged. There were several times when I very badly mispronounced the answer and the program graded it as correct, and others where it beeped wrong before I even spoke or continued to beep incorrect when I got it correct. There is also a very predictable answer pattern for some of the exercises: ABAB and ABBA.
3. There are no translations or even transliterations. One complaint I have had about Chinese language learning programs is that they pander to the American easy path of instant gratification and treat the characters as an unnecessary burden transliterating everything. The Rosetta Stone Arabic goes to the opposite extreme by bombarding the nascent learner with random bunches of Arabic letters and no explanation of how they function. There also doesn't appear to be any rhyme or reason as to how they set it up. The Arabic alphabet has more letters than English, each letter has four forms, some of which connect and some don't, the vowels are very different, and there are a half-a-dozen sounds that do not exist in the English language. In other words, I'll say the likelihood of someone mastering the Arabic script with this program is slim, unless he/she is doing a ten-year+ prison sentence, alone in a cell with only Rosetta Stone company.
4. Gradual steps? There are places where this program takes leaps and bounds. There are places where, with no transliteration or prompts, the learner is expected to formulate complex questions based a few models. I can't explain what they are because I don't understand the Arabic and there are no translations. Remember, I'm still stuck in unit one, and expected to be able to spell out, on a microscopic keyboard, Arabic words from memory
5. To my knowledge there is NO WAY TO CONTROL THE SPEED OF THE SPEAKER.
6. NO WAY TO ENLARGE TEXT: For women it starts in the late 30s, for men in the mid 40s, but eventually we all need bifocals. Reading just becomes more difficult. IN PLACES THE ROSETTA STONE ARABIC FONT IS ABSOLUTELY TREACHEROUS! I would have trouble reading it in English, but to the untrained eye Arabic looks like squiggly lines and dots. In one of the tables the print was actually gray instead of black! I FINALLY DECIDED IT WASN'T WORTH GETTING A SPLITTING HEADACHE TRYING TO READ IT!
7. THE CONTENT IS SO BUSY AS TO BE DISTRACTING: It's like a warped version of Gardner's Multiple Intelligences, all it needs to be complete is some obnoxious music. They try to accommodate every aspect of language learning, but with a paucity of content. It's like a multi-tasking overkill. There is also no discernible common denominator, hence no mnemonic device, as colors, animals, food, etc. are lumped together. The photos are not always clear as some of the people look androgynous and sometimes it's difficult to tell what they are doing.
8. NO REGIONAL NOTES OR CULTURAL CONSIDERATIONS: There are several different types of Arabic and I've been told the Egyptian dialect is the most easily understood. I have no idea which region this dialect is from. Moreover, there doesn't appear to be any cultural sensitivity, i.e. Islam is very much engrained in the language, but this appear to have been secularized.
9. MY ADVICE TO ARABIC LEARNERS: Even for academic nerds language is social. Get involved in your local Arabic community. Offer to exchange English for Arabic lessons. Use this program as a complement, not a primary source. This program might actually have some merit with an Arabic speaker to walk the learner through it. This strategy worked well for me with Chinese. I use my Rosetta Stone Chinese as a drill.
10. SOME FEEDBACK FOR ROSETTA STONE: A) Have a modicum of consideration for learners over 40: MAKE THE TEXT BIG ENOUGH TO READ! B) Get organized! Add more content and mnemonic devices. C) Go back to the drilling method as a mainstay. Somewhere, amid the political correct and paradigm shift to extremes, rote learning and drilling got a bad rap. I have found the computer to be very effective in this respect due to speed and audio-visual stimuli. D) LOWER THE PRICE!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Helped LOADS with learning to READ Arabic
Comment: I have been doing Pimsleur Egyptian Arabic for the past few months to pick up on phrases. It has been working well and I've been able to chat with people BUT when I picked up "My first 100 words in Arabic" ... I struggled. Similarly, I struggled attempting to comprehend the squiggles, dots and dashes in my English-Arabic dictionary and I struggled attempting to understand the supposedly phonetic transliteration.
Rosetta Stone is a little different. It has you associate general photos with words. You hear them, and eventually you can see them too. You are able to go to their alphabet and click on letters to hear them and see them in different areas. This is important in Arabic because the letters change depending on their location in a word (beginning/middle/end). I am slowly learning to sound out words. I also tried a few freebie ways... like youtube-ing the arabic alphabet... I found a few overly boring videos... or various alphabet songs who were by authors who obviously couldn't agree on how to arrange the last few letters and would speed through the bunch leaving me baffled. The alphabet alone in this program is FABULOUS.
In comparison to my Pimsleur Arabic... words aren't really sticking. After I've learned to select the right picture, all of the words in the selection quickly disappear. It's nice being able to SEE the word wile hearing it because if I'm not sure on a sound, I can recognize the word pattern and attempt to listen for the slight distinction. Also, I can repeat loads of times, which is nice.
Lastly.. here's the other thing... I am reviewing the online version... using Windows Vista, my own headset, and on a computer with a weak wireless internet signal. I have had no trouble repeating words in the mic... and the program loads fast. In the beginning, I had some difficulties deciding how to start the program, but aside from that, no major problems. I made this decision because I felt it would provide me with more flexibility. A lot of people said when you install, you can only put it on one computer. So.. because I have the online version, I can use the computer in my room... the computer at work while taking a break.. etc. I can go to my boyfriends house and practice.
That being said... it DID NOT work well on my computer that's nearing it's 6th birthday. It's an old computer that was upgraded to windows XP. It was slow anyway. The program kept freezing on the web... and then it crashed.... So, that's something to keep in mind for old users.
Also, I consider myself to be an intermediate/advanced spanish learner. I do not believe this program would be useful for my spanish. I am kind of bummed because there are no demos of each language individually to see a class outline or something of each level separately. I have not seen anything regarding tenses early on. I am learning to say the basics. The girl is eating, the woman is eating, the man is eating, the boy is eating... And I'm learning to do the same with drinking and groups of people after Lesson 1. I can pick the right picture... But I can't remember how to say it-- and I never had a chance to write it down because the image disappears after clicking so quickly.
But as for this Arabic version, I might purchase the CDs themselves after my year subscription is up. It's a great program... kind of expensive, but useful for serious learners. My only concern with spending so much on a computer program is ... computers get old. I still have my Living Language CDs that were made for Windows 98. I loved them... but they are very much NOT compatible with Windows XP or Vista. Computers tend to "improve" a lot faster than oh say.. your DVD or MP3 players that recently upgraded from VHS and walkmen/discmen.
**UPDATE: THIS IS FORMAL ARABIC. I ATTEMPTED TO USE IT TO PEOPLE FROM VARIOUS ARABIC SPEAKING COUNTRIES (EGYPT... IRAQ... SAUDI ARABIA...) THEY ~KNEW~ WHAT I WAS SAYING... BUT SAID THERE WERE BETTER WAYS TO SAY IT. THIS PROGRAM IS ONLY GOOD FOR LEARNING TO READ ARABIC SCRIPT**
Customer Rating:
Summary: version 3 is way too self-important
Comment: I have been Rosetta Stone user for at least a decade and this new version seems overly complicated and top-heavy, what my son would call "bloatware". This is one of those programs that has sacrificed elegant simplicity for graphic bells and whistles. It's much harder to navigate than the first two versions. Underneath, of course, it's still the same language-learning approach, one I've always supplemented with a printed dictionary and grammar, but which is basically very fine and effective. The bossy self-satisfied feeling of the current version is a bit exasperating though.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Definitely Room for Improvement
Comment: PROS:
-The concept of Rosetta Stone is great as it does put you in actual learning as you did as a child.
-Software is nicely laid out, better than I have seen in other software
CONS:
-There are many (besides the cost)
-For Arabic or any other language software that does not rely on the Roman Alphabet, you need to have perfect hearing (which I do not) to understand what they are saying and your speakers should be top quality.
-The first lesson throws you right into the verbiage using the Arabic alphabet. Therefore, I am left going is he saying it with an 'N' sound or an 'M' sound?
-There is no dictionary(online, software or hardcopy) to suppliment these lessons which would also help the previous issue.
-It is memory intensive. Older computers may choke on the load time of this.
Overall Thoughts:
If you can...sit in a classroom, if possible. It will be more worth the money than this software. If you are made of money...use Rosetta Stone as a supplimentary or a refresher guide.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Hard to set up
Comment: I have a Linux based system and this has been hard to set this product up on my laptop.
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Editorial Reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: A language instructor gives this program a D- and wants a refund.
Comment: I am an ESL/ELL and Spanish teacher with two graduate degrees and I've been studying Chinese for almost a decade now. I have an older version of Chinese level 2 and Spanish level 3. I have some complaints about both of thEM, but I'd have to an exponent to my complaints about this Arabic version! I am still stuck in unit 1.
1. A word about "dynamic immersion": ROSETTA STONE'S BRAND OF IMMERSION IS LIKE BEING DROPPED IN THE OCEAN WHILE TIED TO A CONCRETE SLAB! The brain of a two-year-old is VERY different from that of a 22-year-old! A toddler's brain expands faster than at any other stage of development. Plus a two-year-old is not "immersed" with out a life preserver and a two-year-old in a healthy environment has a myriad of stimuli that no computer could duplicate. This program provides no scaffolding/life-preserver. By the way, most toddlers are NOT very articulate, nor do they have the same communication needs as adults. One of the advantages of being an over-the-hill hardwired adult is that most, after a decent high school or college education, have acquired the academic skill sets for learning a foreign language. It is not realistic to expect an adult to develop the accent and colloquial fluidity of a native speaker, but it is very possible to become fluent in reading and listening. In other words, the "toddler" method isn't appropriate for adults.
2.THERE ARE NO INSTRUCTIONS FOR THIS PROGRAM! At times it was very difficult to figure out what the learner was supposed to do. Rosetta Stone should realize that toddlers need instructions.
There are bugs/glitches, or just poor planning, in the software. The speaking part is rigged. There were several times when I very badly mispronounced the answer and the program graded it as correct, and others where it beeped wrong before I even spoke or continued to beep incorrect when I got it correct. There is also a very predictable answer pattern for some of the exercises: ABAB and ABBA.
3. There are no translations or even transliterations. One complaint I have had about Chinese language learning programs is that they pander to the American easy path of instant gratification and treat the characters as an unnecessary burden transliterating everything. The Rosetta Stone Arabic goes to the opposite extreme by bombarding the nascent learner with random bunches of Arabic letters and no explanation of how they function. There also doesn't appear to be any rhyme or reason as to how they set it up. The Arabic alphabet has more letters than English, each letter has four forms, some of which connect and some don't, the vowels are very different, and there are a half-a-dozen sounds that do not exist in the English language. In other words, I'll say the likelihood of someone mastering the Arabic script with this program is slim, unless he/she is doing a ten-year+ prison sentence, alone in a cell with only Rosetta Stone company.
4. Gradual steps? There are places where this program takes leaps and bounds. There are places where, with no transliteration or prompts, the learner is expected to formulate complex questions based a few models. I can't explain what they are because I don't understand the Arabic and there are no translations. Remember, I'm still stuck in unit one, and expected to be able to spell out, on a microscopic keyboard, Arabic words from memory
5. To my knowledge there is NO WAY TO CONTROL THE SPEED OF THE SPEAKER.
6. NO WAY TO ENLARGE TEXT: For women it starts in the late 30s, for men in the mid 40s, but eventually we all need bifocals. Reading just becomes more difficult. IN PLACES THE ROSETTA STONE ARABIC FONT IS ABSOLUTELY TREACHEROUS! I would have trouble reading it in English, but to the untrained eye Arabic looks like squiggly lines and dots. In one of the tables the print was actually gray instead of black! I FINALLY DECIDED IT WASN'T WORTH GETTING A SPLITTING HEADACHE TRYING TO READ IT!
7. THE CONTENT IS SO BUSY AS TO BE DISTRACTING: It's like a warped version of Gardner's Multiple Intelligences, all it needs to be complete is some obnoxious music. They try to accommodate every aspect of language learning, but with a paucity of content. It's like a multi-tasking overkill. There is also no discernible common denominator, hence no mnemonic device, as colors, animals, food, etc. are lumped together. The photos are not always clear as some of the people look androgynous and sometimes it's difficult to tell what they are doing.
8. NO REGIONAL NOTES OR CULTURAL CONSIDERATIONS: There are several different types of Arabic and I've been told the Egyptian dialect is the most easily understood. I have no idea which region this dialect is from. Moreover, there doesn't appear to be any cultural sensitivity, i.e. Islam is very much engrained in the language, but this appear to have been secularized.
9. MY ADVICE TO ARABIC LEARNERS: Even for academic nerds language is social. Get involved in your local Arabic community. Offer to exchange English for Arabic lessons. Use this program as a complement, not a primary source. This program might actually have some merit with an Arabic speaker to walk the learner through it. This strategy worked well for me with Chinese. I use my Rosetta Stone Chinese as a drill.
10. SOME FEEDBACK FOR ROSETTA STONE: A) Have a modicum of consideration for learners over 40: MAKE THE TEXT BIG ENOUGH TO READ! B) Get organized! Add more content and mnemonic devices. C) Go back to the drilling method as a mainstay. Somewhere, amid the political correct and paradigm shift to extremes, rote learning and drilling got a bad rap. I have found the computer to be very effective in this respect due to speed and audio-visual stimuli. D) LOWER THE PRICE!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Helped LOADS with learning to READ Arabic
Comment: I have been doing Pimsleur Egyptian Arabic for the past few months to pick up on phrases. It has been working well and I've been able to chat with people BUT when I picked up "My first 100 words in Arabic" ... I struggled. Similarly, I struggled attempting to comprehend the squiggles, dots and dashes in my English-Arabic dictionary and I struggled attempting to understand the supposedly phonetic transliteration.
Rosetta Stone is a little different. It has you associate general photos with words. You hear them, and eventually you can see them too. You are able to go to their alphabet and click on letters to hear them and see them in different areas. This is important in Arabic because the letters change depending on their location in a word (beginning/middle/end). I am slowly learning to sound out words. I also tried a few freebie ways... like youtube-ing the arabic alphabet... I found a few overly boring videos... or various alphabet songs who were by authors who obviously couldn't agree on how to arrange the last few letters and would speed through the bunch leaving me baffled. The alphabet alone in this program is FABULOUS.
In comparison to my Pimsleur Arabic... words aren't really sticking. After I've learned to select the right picture, all of the words in the selection quickly disappear. It's nice being able to SEE the word wile hearing it because if I'm not sure on a sound, I can recognize the word pattern and attempt to listen for the slight distinction. Also, I can repeat loads of times, which is nice.
Lastly.. here's the other thing... I am reviewing the online version... using Windows Vista, my own headset, and on a computer with a weak wireless internet signal. I have had no trouble repeating words in the mic... and the program loads fast. In the beginning, I had some difficulties deciding how to start the program, but aside from that, no major problems. I made this decision because I felt it would provide me with more flexibility. A lot of people said when you install, you can only put it on one computer. So.. because I have the online version, I can use the computer in my room... the computer at work while taking a break.. etc. I can go to my boyfriends house and practice.
That being said... it DID NOT work well on my computer that's nearing it's 6th birthday. It's an old computer that was upgraded to windows XP. It was slow anyway. The program kept freezing on the web... and then it crashed.... So, that's something to keep in mind for old users.
Also, I consider myself to be an intermediate/advanced spanish learner. I do not believe this program would be useful for my spanish. I am kind of bummed because there are no demos of each language individually to see a class outline or something of each level separately. I have not seen anything regarding tenses early on. I am learning to say the basics. The girl is eating, the woman is eating, the man is eating, the boy is eating... And I'm learning to do the same with drinking and groups of people after Lesson 1. I can pick the right picture... But I can't remember how to say it-- and I never had a chance to write it down because the image disappears after clicking so quickly.
But as for this Arabic version, I might purchase the CDs themselves after my year subscription is up. It's a great program... kind of expensive, but useful for serious learners. My only concern with spending so much on a computer program is ... computers get old. I still have my Living Language CDs that were made for Windows 98. I loved them... but they are very much NOT compatible with Windows XP or Vista. Computers tend to "improve" a lot faster than oh say.. your DVD or MP3 players that recently upgraded from VHS and walkmen/discmen.
**UPDATE: THIS IS FORMAL ARABIC. I ATTEMPTED TO USE IT TO PEOPLE FROM VARIOUS ARABIC SPEAKING COUNTRIES (EGYPT... IRAQ... SAUDI ARABIA...) THEY ~KNEW~ WHAT I WAS SAYING... BUT SAID THERE WERE BETTER WAYS TO SAY IT. THIS PROGRAM IS ONLY GOOD FOR LEARNING TO READ ARABIC SCRIPT**
Customer Rating:
Summary: version 3 is way too self-important
Comment: I have been Rosetta Stone user for at least a decade and this new version seems overly complicated and top-heavy, what my son would call "bloatware". This is one of those programs that has sacrificed elegant simplicity for graphic bells and whistles. It's much harder to navigate than the first two versions. Underneath, of course, it's still the same language-learning approach, one I've always supplemented with a printed dictionary and grammar, but which is basically very fine and effective. The bossy self-satisfied feeling of the current version is a bit exasperating though.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Definitely Room for Improvement
Comment: PROS:
-The concept of Rosetta Stone is great as it does put you in actual learning as you did as a child.
-Software is nicely laid out, better than I have seen in other software
CONS:
-There are many (besides the cost)
-For Arabic or any other language software that does not rely on the Roman Alphabet, you need to have perfect hearing (which I do not) to understand what they are saying and your speakers should be top quality.
-The first lesson throws you right into the verbiage using the Arabic alphabet. Therefore, I am left going is he saying it with an 'N' sound or an 'M' sound?
-There is no dictionary(online, software or hardcopy) to suppliment these lessons which would also help the previous issue.
-It is memory intensive. Older computers may choke on the load time of this.
Overall Thoughts:
If you can...sit in a classroom, if possible. It will be more worth the money than this software. If you are made of money...use Rosetta Stone as a supplimentary or a refresher guide.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Hard to set up
Comment: I have a Linux based system and this has been hard to set this product up on my laptop.
Learn Arabic Foreign Language learning with Arabic Level 1,2&3 you connect with the world around you. Build a foundation of fundamental vocabulary and essential language structure. Quickly gain the confidence to enjoy social interactions such as greetings and introductions, travel, dining out, giving and getting directions, shopping and other recreational activities. Learn to share your ideas and opinions, express your feelings and talk about everyday life, your work, your interests, current events, and much more.
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