Tell me more about Rosetta Stone

[JennifersLost]

It seems like people have had good experiences with it. Can you tell me more? What did you like/not like?

 

What languages have people tried?

[Ibbygirl]

It seems like people have had good experiences with it. Can you tell me more? What did you like/not like?

 

What languages have people tried?

 

 

I have used it with my daughter. I use it strictly as a suplement though because she gets bored just sitting there clicking pictures for too long. I think it is a good tool to have in the tool box, but there should be other things as well. Fortunately my public library has it so it was free to use. :) Your library might have it as well. :) Good luck to you. :)

[hollyhillhomeschool]

We have been using Rosetta Stone since my kids were in 4th or 5th grade. They are now going to home school hs. Mine like the change from books/print/audio stuff to Rosetta Stone on the computer. It is very easy, painless for them. We set a time limit of 20-30 minutes per day. So I don't make them finish a specific lesson. It is done by time (to help not be in front of the computer all the time and because it DOES sometimes seem way too repetitious.) For a long time I was more lenient on the time....3x/wk for 20 minutes, etc. and we did not make much progress. So if you want to pursue and finish high school level, you might need to bump it up.

 

I have the homeschool version, which has a teacher software, that records all the work my kids have done....all in a spreadsheet. It records all their "homework" scores automatically and "test" scores. You can set the rigor of the work, per student, which cuts down on the repetition in the exercises. I discovered that after a few years of doing it without reading the manual. :tongue_smilie: But it is still somewhat repetitious...and that is why it is effective.

 

There are 5 settings that are exposed to the student....after they have shown you a picture, said the word phrase and shown you the written, and done this several times....mixing up the visuals, you become immersed inthe correct link between visual and word...

 

 

 

listening and reading....and picking the right picture

reading...and picking the right picture

listening alone...and picking the right picture

you have to type the phrase that corresponds to the picture

you have a phrase that needs to be properly word-ordered, corresponding to the picture

You also have a speaking component, where you speak into your microphone and are graded on intervals with how correct your pronunciation is.

 

There is a student textbook (could be improved, personally...but the emphasis is on immersion...)

 

There is a student workbook, where you write out the exercises with pen and paper.....good practice for any foreign language exam...

 

Minimal teaching time required. Good checking up and accountability.

 

We did pay $100's to $1000's of dollars ---yikes---for foreign language tutors when we lived abroad---and for us, it was a huge waste. Not enough accountability. Really dependent on the tutor.....but even good ones not fantastic....not as organized and systematic...for us. Perhaps others have had better experiences...

 

No curriculum is perfect, but for us, Rosetta Stone works. Home school version is best to hold them accountable, though!

 

Also, you can choose really fun languages like Swahili, Mandarin, etc.....If he likes computers, he might like the logic of German or Russian.....I am very left-brained and I found these great for a logical mind....

 

We personally are taking Spanish...but I would consider switching to another language, since we have been studying it for awhile now.

 

You can use RS for Latin or Greek as well...

 

I don't think I would do 2 languages both with Rosetta Stone...system/brain overload, IMO.

 

Hope this helps! Hope you find a curriculum that works well for you and your family!

[Leanna Tomlinson]

I used Rosetta Stone in my home, and then we tried to incorporate it in our co-op. We wanted all of the students to have daily exposure to the language, so we would work on the same sections at home and then have class once a week where students could use their vocabulary with a native Spanish speaker.

 

When my kids used it at home they were 5th and 7th grade. It worked well for us, and my kids were excellently prepared when they started taking Spanish classes outside of the home 2 years later. They also have some of the best accents in their class.

 

However:

IMHO-Rosetta Stone frustrates high school students. The high-school level co-op students who had never had any Spanish before did not do well with RS. The older students want to make the connections immediately. They got very frustrated clicking on the pictures and hearing phrases. They want to pull the language apart and understand the grammar immediately. Rosetta Stone presents things in a way that seems to work backwards for the Logic/Rhetoric stage kids in our co-op.

 

Our Spanish teacher in our co-op moved to two other programs with more success and retention for the older kids. We used Visual Link and Mango. Mango was free from our local library, and we were able to find an older version of Visual Link that was being sold at Half-Price Books for $15. These are both computer programs, so the students were still able to hear the language each day.

 

I am not a Spanish teacher, so most of what I share here is the opinion of my own kids and the Spanish teacher at our co-op.

 

HTH,

Leanna

[Peela]

I have had a frustrating time trying to get my kids to learn French. Mainly my dd14. She learned with a tutor online for a while- abysmal failure. We tried to do it together with French Prep. It was the first thing to drop off the list when things got busy, so without consistent work, it just felt like a waste of time. We also had a friend in real life teach us for a while, and that was probably best, but pretty slow, and eventually she stopped.

So, I asked Dd how she would like to learn French and she said, Rosetta Stone- she had played with the demo CDRom from the library many times. I wasnt going to spend $500 Au for it, so I hunted 2nd hand and someone sold me one cheap, thankfully. Dd does it every day and it seems to work for her quite well. Recently I was wondering if she wanted to drop French- I allowed ds13 to drop it- and she said no, she would like to keep doing it. So, she does.

She won't be doing exams, it's not something she needs for anything else.....she is just learning French because she wants to, and Rosetta Stone seems to work fairly well for a self motivated learner, up to a point. I dont think its ideal- I think a real life tutor or class would be better- but as far as computer programs go, its good.

[Harrison_B]

Hi,

 

I used it for Latin when my sons were in 6th & 7th grades. They enjoyed it and it wasn't a hassle for them to use. My older son learned enough Latin to opt-out from a Beginner's Latin class to an Intermediate Latin class this year (instructor taught). Next year, we are using Cambridge I for Latin. I would see if you can obtain a demo to see if your son would like it. If there's a curriculum sale near you, sometimes a Rosetta Stone vendor is there to show how the software works. That's how we were first introduced to it.