Spanish II, 3rd Ed. (Compr.) [CD]

Level II will double your vocabulary and grammatical structures while increasing your spoken proficiency exponentially. Upon completion of a Level II, you will be able to:

* engage in fuller conversations involving yourself, your family, daily activities, interests and personal preferences,

* combine known elements into increasingly longer sentences and strings of sentences,

* create with language and function in informal situations,

* deal with concrete topics in the past, present, and future,

* meet social demands and limited job requirements,

* begin reading for meaning.

Note: In order for the Pimsleur Method to work correctly, you must first complete the Level I language program before proceeding to the Level II language program.

Pimsleur's level two Spanish lessons continue the excellence of level one. Each lesson begins with a dialogue in Spanish to sharpen your listening comprehension. Then it proceeds to a combination of techniques. You are given a sentence in English to recite in Spanish, or instructed in Spanish to say something in Spanish, changing the verbs to fit your response. When new words or phrases are introduced, they are repeated and used in different contexts so you can remember them. The tapes give you time to repeat out loud to fix the words, sentences or phrases in your mind. The pauses aren't long enough for you to translate from English to Spanish in your mind; you have to respond somewhat quickly in Spanish, as you would in a conversation with a Spanish speaker.

These lessons make adroit use of repetition. If a word or phrase is introduced at the beginning of a lesson, it will pop up again toward the end. Grammatical points and vocabulary introduced in earlier lessons will come up again in later lessons, to give you a chance to recall them. These techniques make Pimsleur superior to other language self-study programs.

This is a wonderful program, and I highly recommend it.


Don't buy it, rent it   February 12, 2004
 43 out of 48 found this review helpful

You can rent the cassette or CD at recordedbooks dot-com for less than a tenth of the purchase price.


Excellent series!   August 28, 2005
 27 out of 32 found this review helpful

As a resident of Florida, I desire very much to become acquainted with the language, histories, and cultures of my Spanish-speaking neighbors and co-workers. I studied French in high school but as of today cannot speak or understand it.

Because of my work schedule, at this time attending night school or living in a Spanish-speaking country is not practical. I am attempting to learn Spanish on my own. I have bought all three levels of Pimsleur and have no regrets. For anyone who may balk at the price, you should consider that the tuition at a university or a community college may exceed the cost of one level of Pimsleur.

Pimsleur is an excellent start for a beginning Spanish student. Pimsleur effectively teaches you the technique of listening to a sentence in English, translating out loud in Spanish, hearing the phrase in Spanish, and repeating it. The pauses between the sentences are long enough to translate out loud in Spanish. You may have to repeat a lesson several times so that you translate accurately and quickly enough during the pauses. However, the lessons are never dull, and the sound in audio CDs is clear and easy to understand.

I use supplemental grammar materials to read and write Spanish and to learn grammar. But the Pimsleur CDs teach you to speak useful and interesting words, sentences, and phrases for real-life situations - ordering in a restaurant, asking for street directions, asking about one's family and health, and discussing the weather. These CDs are never boring.

In addition, if I have an especially busy day and do not have time or energy to do a reading or writing lesson, I can still find 30 minutes in a day to do a Pimsleur lesson.

Even with the three levels of Pimsleur, you will not be fluent in Spanish. I am starting the FSI Spanish series once I complete Pimsleur. I recommend that for those who are serious about achieving fluency Spanish, they take the multitrack approach - watch Univision, listen to Spanish radio, practice speaking with native speakers, etc.

But for those new to Spanish, I wholeheartedly endorse the Pimsleur series.



Pimsleur Method Has its Flaws   November 9, 2004
 26 out of 40 found this review helpful

I agree with the reviewer that said the Pimsleur method is flawed. I did Pimsleur I and II (I almost finished with III now), I am disappointed with the amount of vocabulary that I have learned. At work, when I try to assist people, very often I find myself standing there looking dumbfounded while searching for the right words to say in Spanish when communicating with Latinos. In part, I blame this on Pimsleur's method which did not provide text with the audio which would have enabled me to remember more vocabulary. I also blame it on the fact that Pimsleur simply does not give you enough vocabulary.

I also agree with the other reviewer and believe that FSI Programmatic Spanish is a better course than Pimsluer because they give you the written word to go with the audio lessons. If FSI Programmatic Spanish is good enough for the U.S. Department of State to use to teach diplomats how to speak Spanish, then it's good enough for me. The bad part about FSI is that it's about as expensive as Pimsleur.

Since everyone else seems to be doing that new Spanish course, Learning Spanish Like Crazy, and making progress with it, a couple of days ago, I decided to buy it as well. I was very pleased to find out that both FSI Programmatic Spanish I and II come as bonus gifts with the Learning Spanish Like Crazy lessons.

I have one more complaint about Pimsleur. It just scratches the surface on the topic of the subjunctive verb tense. The subjunctive verb tense is perhaps the most difficult verb tense for English speakers learning Spanish. It should be covered very thoroughly in any "comprehensive" Spanish course. In my opinion, that's something that Pimsleur fails to do. FSI Programmatic Spanish spends nearly the whole Level Two teaching the subjunctive, and it does an excellent job covering the subjunctive.




a bit pricey you say?   February 1, 2006
 15 out of 18 found this review helpful

Other reviewers have already adequately listed the reasons for using the Pimsleur method. I did all three levels of Italian and have a excellent proficiency in the language (especially pronunciation).

However, the price for these CDs is a bit high in my opinion. Pimsleur could actually make more $ by lowering the price because many more people would then buy it. I think it's an exorbitant price and a ridiculous burden on a poor little consumer who's trying to become bilingual. Anyway.

Definitely use Pimsleur, it is great! -- my only suggestion is that you check your local library before forking out the cash. I live in a pretty big city and was able through circulation request to obtain all 3 levels on CD. I then burned all 27 or so discs onto my computer into mp3s and listened to them on a portable device. Thus learning Italiano for free ;)

If you're computer proficient and really cheap like me also try a file-sharing network like Limewire - many people share Pimsleur language audio tracks (or the whole program as one file) just like music. Just a suggestion...