200 Words a Day! Language Learning Blog

The 200 Words a Day! Language Learning Blog is where we post periodic, sporadic random notes about accelerated language learning.

You can add comments too, through the Blog Contact form, or ask questions.

14 June 2007

Received last week ...

"Hi 200 Words a Day!

I love the course.

I was using the French in Action video w/ the workbooks and audio and I finished the first half and realized that I was making good progress but I had a tiny vocabulary. I made flashcards as I went along but I never got around to reviewing them.

So I put that on hold to learn some vocabulary...I found that I liked electronic flashcads better than the paper...but still I wasn't acquiring a large vocabulary. That is when you sent me your wonderful program.

I have completed the first 35 lessons and tests w/ maybe 27 weekly tests finished as well...so I am about a third of the way through. I recently picked up an easy reader book and found that I could read at that very basic level. A lot of the words I understood ONLY because of your program. Sometimes I'd repeat the "mental hook" that the program had given me and then the meaning pops into my head. For other words the mental hook has faded but the meaning remains.

There are days when time only permits me to do just a few lessons or tests but sometimes I can do up to 8 in a day.

I have caught a few errors in the program. The one that comes to mind is on one of the tests it asks for the meaning of "what?" twice..the lesson had given 2 different answers "quoi?" and "qu'est-ce que?" but on the test it didn't give a clue as to whether it was asking for the adv. or pronoun. (1)

But other than that I find this program to be outstanding. It is leaps and bounds ahead of anything commercial and I think the reason is that it was created by people who care about what they do are passionate about linguistics and have seriously thought about how best to create a learning device.

The controls are intuitive and easy to use, the cartoons are fantastic...there must be some very creative minds working for you gals/guys. Oh and thank you for NOT being so sanatized that you don't use all the available mental hooks we think of when we hear certain phrases. I'll always remember that "outside is where the whores are - dehors". And I have no problem remembering poussiere now...thank you very much. I confess I've falling in love with the female voices (no I'm not a perv I have a very healthy relationship w/ a wonderful girl). I appreciate the vareity of voice inflection in the male voices. I still remember certain words based on the tone and how emphatic the voice was.

I appreciate the "My Worst Words" lesson. I do that one sometimes. I haven't created my own lessons yet though. I really love the notes often included with the words. I always stop to read them when doing a lesson. It reminds me of other forms and uses of the word or phrase. It is great that you have included them...

I do think that the classical music helps relax my mind while I do the program. You've sold me on that one. I'm not crazy about the breathing one though. I usually ignore it when it is used in a lesson review. (2)

I'm sorry I can't give a complete review yet...these are just a few of my thoughts. I will continue to use it to great advantage. I now understand that when I have 2000 or so words learned that my ear will be free to pick up on other aspects of the conversations I hear. In other words there will be a lot more familiar to me when I read and converse leaving me free to focus on words or grammer points I am not familiar with.

Thank you again ... I'll recommend your program to everyone I know ...."

M.M. AZ, U.S.A.

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Thanks very much Michael, for your honest and constructive appraisal.

Regarding points:

(1) To avoid confusion in the testing, the word description (ie. noun, adverb, adjective, etc) does, in fact, appear below the picture as a reference.

(2) Additional features such as Kinethestic Mode; Background Music; Excel-breathing may be switched on or off at any time during lessons and tests, according to individual learning styles and preferences.

We are constantly revising and upgrading the courses where possible based on feedback received as above. In addition we are working hard to build additional sentence, grammar and other courses in other languages ...

We look forward to hearing from you!

The 200 Words a Day! team.

06 June 2007

Learn the word ... learn to use it!

Just released, our new

FRENCH SENTENCE COURSES 1 & 2

... to complement our 200 Words a Day! vocabulary courses.

Now you can learn the word, then click on the picture to see and hear the word in a practice sentence.

Great for more vocabulary, more useful phrases, grammar, intonation ... extra listening, reading and spelling practice!

Check it out here! NEW! French Sentences

200 Words a Day! Software on Apple Mac?

While in the long term we would like to write the Mac coding, I am wondering if there is anyone out there that has tried the software on a Windows PC Emulator.

If anyone has done so, please let us know by clicking the 'Submit a Comment' link below and filling in the details.

Submit a Comment

Proverbs Courses release for Spanish and French.

We've released two new PC courses that plug in to your existing Spanish or French courses.

1. 101 Spanish Proverbs
2. 101 French Proverbs

These allow you to:

1. Learn a bunch of proverbs
2. Consolidate some of the words that you have learned
3. Learn some of the things that are said in real French or Spanish conversation
4. Learn 101 real sentences that combine loads of the words already learned
5. Learn a whole lot more French or Spanish vocab

The courses can be 'stand-alone' i.e. you don't need to have Course #1 or Course #2, or any course for that matter.... but if you have done one or both of those courses you will recognize the pictures, because the pics come from one of the main words in the Memory Trigger©.

To remind yourself of the word, or the Memory Trigger©, you can simply click on the picture itself and it will run the Memory Trigger again.