Instant Immersion French Levels 1, 2 & 3 [Old Version]

I bought the French Instant Immersion program from Costco. Level 1 disk 1 and 2 are OK. Now when I inserted the Level 2 Disk 1 and 2, they come as though the program is intended for Chinese speakers who would like to learn French. A total disaster because I intended to Learn more French as I am an advanced student. I think I would go for a higher end program such as Rosetta Stone. I would spend more money but will not be dealing with this kind of nuisance. I would not even place a claim or return it since I bought the program more than 30 days ago.

I bought this product as a refresher for French learned in high school and college. It worked great for that. I popped the mp3 CD into the car stereo and finished all of the lessons before I even realized it. With the reasonably paced review, the French I once spoke came rushing back after many years of not using it. Counter to some other reviewers complaints, I had no problems with the discs in my PC and also easily copied the MP3s onto my portable player. Likewise I have my own computer headset/mic (I dont expect software to come with hardware like some of the reviewers apparently do), so had no problems there either. As to language courses in general, I learned French in the classroom and needed this product as a worthwhile review. Its well worth the money. I learned German on my own by being immersed while living in Germany and am fluent. Lesson learned: if you are serious about learning a language, get away from your computer/stereo and interact with real native speakers. This product will give you a valuable, reasonably priced intro until you can make that happen. For those not sure what to do but want to get started, I suggest you try this product first. If it works well for you, you can always go for the much more expensive Rosetta Stone after. (If youre able to pay the high cost of RS, you wont notice the little bit youve spent on Instant Immersion.) If this doesnt work for you, at least youre only out $30 instead of $500+.

Excellent cds

This is not a coherent language course. Rather it is a collection of random bits of old software, some dating back as far as 1996, thrown into a box. Not all of the disks work on my mac. The ones that do work seem to offer little more than vocabulary lists and quizzes. I didnt try all the disks because the ones that I did try seemed to be pretty much a waste of time. (To study vocabulary I would rather read a book than plod through clunky old software.) And the package as a whole seems to be a waste of money. There are much better french learning resources available for free online. Im giving it two stars instead of one because there might be something useful on some of the disks that I didnt try after giving up.

This program isnt cohesive at all; it seems to be a bunch of programs packaged together without an overall plan. I really dont think anyone could actually learn a language from this.

I absolutely detested this course. The most annoying thing was watching the characters on the screen move their mouths completely out of sync with the words being spoken. It was like watching that 80s character, Max Headroom. I like Max, but I dont want him trying to teach me French.

There is obviously nothing better than actuall in-country immersion for learning a language. This package, however, is the next best thing. Clear and easy to understand (and navigate), I find Topics language learning software ideal and recommend it to my students.