Michel Thomas Method: Dutch Foundation Course |
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Author:
Cobie Adkins-de Jong,
Els Van Geyte
By Hodder Arnold
Average Customer Rating:  
List Price: £68.51
Our Price: £39.87
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 9780340971697
Format: Audiobook
ISBN: 034097169X
Label: Hodder Arnold
Manufacturer: Hodder Arnold
Publication Date: 2008-07-25
Publisher: Hodder Arnold
Studio: Hodder Arnold |
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A wonderful course!, 2008-12-23
I had no intention of learning Dutch when I began listening to this course but as I have completed many of the Michel Thomas programmes I thought that it would be a shame not to give the Dutch course a try. I'm glad I did as I love almost everything about it.
The teacher, Cobie, is calm and clear in her explanations to the two students and also has a wonderful speaking voice, which I greatly enjoyed listening to . The course moves at a nice pace, not too fast or too slow. I do know a little German and sometimes this crept into my answers (and, occasionally, into those of both the students on the CD). Later on though I found myself doing this less and less and so did the other students.
The course seems to have used Michel Thomas' German programme as a template but I believe that the co-authors have done something that many would not consider possible, they have improved on that template to write a course which is in many ways better than that recorded by Michel Thomas himself. I know that some people will consider me saying this as almost sacriledge but I believe it to be true.
I would recommend this course to any beginner interested in learning Dutch or who wishes to have a better awareness of the Teutonic languages in general. The CD's would also be useful to non-beginners who might have a great deal of Dutch vocabulary but who aren't so strong on Dutch grammar.This Foundation course teaches the grammar (structure- to use the term preferred by MT) of Dutch in a very relaxed way. Relatively little vocabulary is taught, probably only around 200 words but this is its strength as one is concentrating on learning how Dutch works rather than repeating lots of words which are soon be forgotten, as happens with most language courses. If you follow my recommendation to buy you will also find, as I did, that the vocabulary and structure really does stick with you.
I am now eager to continue studying Dutch and am looking forward to the forthcoming publication of the Advanced course in 2009.
Warm thanks to both authors for introducing me to Dutch.
 Solid introduction, 2008-10-07
This course is a solid introduction to the Dutch language, and covers the bases well. The user is also introduced to short cuts, and words which help you to memorise important items of Dutch vocabulary. The teacher has a friendly, relaxed tone and this significantly helps the learning process.
I have lived and worked in a Dutch speaking country before, so the course was more of a "catch up", but I still found it very useful for anchoring useful phrases and concepts in my memory, as well as touching on simple but effective introductions to tidying up my Dutch grammar. I eagerly await the advanced course being released.
Dutch courage, 2008-10-18
I'm a bit of a fan of the Michel Thomas method and have done his excellent audio courses in German and Italian. This is the first one I've tried which used a different teacher - she's actually better, the real Michel Thomas was often quite grumpy! -, but the method is the same. Each of the eight one-hour lessons comprises a teacher and two students. The teacher introduces phrases and the student repeats them. The difference with normal audio courses, though is that the focus is not just on memorising holiday phrases and lists of words but on practicing simple grammatical `units' that can re-used to build quite sophisticated conversational constructions. To me this mimics how people 'naturally' speak second (and probably first) languages. This I think is why people have a feeling of breakthrough and confidence after a MT course. In this case I had studied Dutch for a year but felt I couldn't speak it. After doing this course I feel I can, at least to some extent. The MT claim that the student doesn't have to work to learn the language is of course total nonsense though. There is just not enough vocabulary in a MT foundation course to survive, and I really have to listen to each course three or four times before it sticks. That said, if you do a MT alongside a conventional course to pick up more conventional vocabulary and phrases, they work brilliantly. As a pretty experienced language learner, I'd say if you want to learn to speak Dutch and don't have a native Nederlander to hand, do this course. Then do the Advanced one when it comes out!
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