Rosetta Stone - Success Stories

[Lucy Robertson]

I can only say I wish we had started using Rosetta Stone sooner. We did not make that initial purchase, but waited a few years. We have not ruined our kids in doing this, but I can see its value now.

The authors David and Marie Hazell have many language programs in their home that they have tried out and have found that for learning to really think in another language, Rosetta Stone has won hands down.

Here are some other reasons that they chose this product for their home and as the MFW recommendation:

1. Because it uses the immersion method (no native language used to teach; only the target language is used), it is ideal for learning to think in that language as a native speaker would.

2. Since it can be used to introduce the language in the early years, when a student reaches high school, usually they can move through it more rapidly because of the previous years of beginning to think in the language over a long period of time.

3. You do not need to keep buying different programs each year. It really is suitable for early elementary and adults, too. This helps to make it a bit more cost effective.

[cbollin]

Time for my plug for Rosetta Stone. I think you should check out the demo. Here are things I'd point out to you and your dh if you were at my house.

Some of the things that I really like about Rosetta Stone have to do with the variety of activities that are involved with RS. It is not just listening to words and matching a picture on a computer screen. You have opportunity to write words and sentences in the language (either with pull down menus or just at the keyboard). So there is a lot in RS. As Lucy pointed out about the cost, each level covers high school level lessons.

Rosetta Stone is not only for homeschoolers. It was originally designed for the business world to be able to go to another country and function in business travel.

Rosetta Stone has a demo to try out. Get it and try the demo. You'll see the variety of activities ranging from listening and seeing the word, to just hearing the word, to just seeing the word, and then even writing exercises.

Each level has many units. At first, you go through these units just to identify basic vocabulary. But then it slowly kicks up a notch. After you learn boy, girl, man, woman, table, and so on..... you then will get a sentence such as
The boy is UNDER the table.
(now of course it is not in English, but in whatever language you are studying.)
then you are given 4 pictures.
You'll have one that has neither a boy nor a table
One with a boy Under a table
one with a boy and a dog
one with boy ON a table.

They build up on each other. It is just like the progression of learning a native language. It is way more than just a vocabulary matching game for computer. Those are important parts of learning how to communicate in a language.

By the end of the units, you begin to hear at least 2 different native speakers talking to each other. So there is a lot of training your ear to hear conversations.


What's missing from Rosetta Stone?
* person to person practice. You will need to do that.
* words, phrases and terminology specific to a religious conversation.
* probably other stuff. I'm not an expert on it.

Here are some ideas that are listed on the MFW High School Electives page that may be helpful:
http://www.mfwbooks.com/highschool.html

Hope that might help your husband a bit to look at some of what his goals are. Get the demo or play around with it on their website.

--crystal

[JenniferF]

Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 4:54 pm

I don't know when we will be adding it. What I CAN tell you is that I sat and played with it at the MFW display at the St Louis Convention yesterday for a good while and I am sold on Rosetta Stone now!! I liked how it went through pictures and told what they were, then it said the word and you have to click on the correct picture. I played with a few of the languages on it.

We will be using ECC in the fall so my plan is to get various books, CD's or internet sites to find words in the various languages and see which ones my children are interested in learning. Hopefully with ECC we will find a language she really wants to learn.

Oh- and just a fun story- when I lived in Germany there was a family where the wife was from Finland, husband from Sweden. They had two young children at the time (around 2 and 4 years old) They each spoke their native language to their children. The germans would speak German, the couple would usually speak to one another in English. And any americans who were visiting (like me) were to speak to the children in English. These boys knew 4 languages fairly well at such a young age!!

They always say it is easier to learn language when they are young....it's just hard to decide which to learn!

[Lucy]

Please give examples of how you use Rosetta Stone and how much time per day.

Posted: Thu Sep 06, 2007 2:43 pm

For those in the elementary the expectation is only 15 minutes a day or less depending on the child for 4 days a week. The most recent versions of all the MFW manuals have a good description of how to use it for this age student. If your manual does not have that information in the front of the manual let me know and I will be glad to share it with you. It is a very flexible program and can be used at each child's own pace.

For high school Marie explains how to do this in order for it to count for what they think would be high school credit.

You can start using the workbooks earlier than high school but usually not before 7th grade. I have personally waited so that I can count it as high school credit. Some states will allow you to count foreign languages for credit before high school so check with your stated IF you think your child is ready.

When counting credit for high school courses the average time it should take a student to complete a course is 150 hours. This includes both instructional time as well as "homework" for that course. MFW feels that to really make your foreign language count toward high school you should do the following. Use Rosetta Stone for 45 minutes a day 4 days a week. Then for another 1 hour and 10 minutes(if you do the math this is the exact amount of time) during the week you will have your student interact with the language by listening to easy books in the language, watching a simple movie with the subtitles, meeting with a native speaker once a week for conversation practice and then sometime in the year have them study some cultural aspect of a country that uses this language. These activities will make a complete course in foreign language for a high schooler. My husband who has taught high school Spanish says this is very similar to the other activities that he added to his program. Understand that your high schooler may take a little less time or a little more time to complete the years work, but the average of all students should be 150 hours.

Your student may be able to move through level 1 more easily if they have already been familiar with it from earlier in elementary school. So you can use the Student Management System if you like but be aware that your student may not need as much practice especially in the beginning of the course if they have used Rosetta Stone already at some time before entering high school. You can modify the SMS for this but I am not very good at helping with that.

I hope that helps you to get started. Let me know if you need more info.. Others will chime in with their experiences too hopefully.
Lucy

[cbollin]

Posted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 1:30 pm
In version 3 the graphics are different and the homeschool teacher sees the grammar quicker :) But grammar is in version 2 of Rosetta Stone. Use the Written Module in RS and you'll understand. That's the section with the pull down words :) it you don't have the grammar just right, it lets you know. It has the grammar for learning punctuation, capitals, plurals/singular, subject verb agreements --- all of that stuff is in Version 2. And that's before you even get to the workbooks.

It is still through an immersion method. For example when your toddler learns to talk you don't sit there with flashcards and worksheets "doing grammar". With RS's immersion method of learning language, you approach all of that grammar the same way. Version 3 just adds in these extra graphics to help you even more.

I don't think I did a good job explaining that. But after spending about 20 minutes just now using V. 2 of Russian level 1, and learning quite a bit of grammar in there.... (plurals and subject/verb agreement and not forgetting my commas in a series of words......) I needed to say it out loud on this thread.

-crystal

[MJP]

Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2008 11:35 am

Rosetta Stone wins hands down to anything we have tried at our house. We can actually put together Spanish sentences, and read quite a bit of it. We tried Power Glide and Speedy Spanish without success. The kids even enjoy it! The handbook does have some grammar in it. It is definately a high school level course.

[dhudson]

Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 11:30 am

I have been impressed with Rosetta Stone - as a family we went to Mexico on a mission trip and my oldest could speak enough to play with the kids and was complimented on his accent. We're going again in November and I am excited to see what the twins have learned as well. Now I have to get on the ball and do it so I can speak as well as they do!

[cbollin]

My oldest is using RS, Russian, level 1, for high school credit using the MFW lesson plans for high school credit. In the plans is an idea to listen to TV/radio in the target language. A link is suggested for finding international TV online. so.....

My daughter just watched and understood parts of Olympic coverage from a TV station somewhere in Russia.
She came downstairs and said "are the 2014 winter olympics being held in Russia near the Black Sea? They were talking about building an island or something like that?"

sure enough --- we google it and yep.... then she got all excited saying the news cast said something about island park. 2014 and some city name she hadn't heard before.

Whatever Russian she is learning, she is learning from Rosetta Stone and learning enough to follow current sports news coverage. Not bad! She's able to hold short quick dialogues with a man at our church who speaks Russian too.

When I took French I in high school -- I don't think I was able to do that (watch TV and get it)

-crystal

[705emily]

Thanks Crystal!

We're enjoying RS German, and it's so exciting to hear my oldest be able to communicate with her great aunt who lives in Germany!