I’ve got a review of Rocket Spanish on the website, and now I’m starting a series of more detailed articles about this popular program. In a nutshell, it’s mainly an mp3 program for learning to speak Spanish, designed to give travelers a good foundation.
The other day I rode the bus from where I live, by Mexico’s Lake Chapala, into one of the shopping areas of Guadalajara.
With waiting times, it was almost an hour and a half each way. I took along my mp3 player, and listened to six lessons in that time. Well, on the way home in the late afternoon, I did doze a bit, but I don’t think I missed much!
I wanted to know several things:
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How thoroughly would Rocket Spanish prepare someone for a trip to a Spanish-speaking country?
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Would it be good for business travelers as well as tourists?
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What vocabulary did they start out with?
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Did the program give give clear explanations?
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Would it be suitable for teenagers or older children as well as adults?
After six or the thirty-one lessons, I have a good sense of the program. Maybe that is why the Rocket Spanish people give away a mini-series of these lessons free, so you can have a good sense of their product and if it would suit you.
Rocket Spanish consists of mp3 files you can listen to, with additional PDF files that are useful but not essential to the lessons. So it can be an on-the-go sort of program, as I discovered on the bus. They tell you right off that their purpose is to help you learn to understand spoken Spanish AND to be able to speak some yourself. There are lots of helpful tips to help you get the gist of a conversation in Spanish without necessarily catching it all. I liked this approach. Even now, I miss plenty when the Mexicans go fast!
Each lesson has a dialogue between Mauricio, a Chilean, and Amy, an American. Then they go through it bit by bit and explain not just the dialogue, but related words that come up.
There is lots of pronunciation practice, where Mauricio says a word or phrase and you repeat it. That’s to be expected, and it’s very useful. Amy points out subtleties, like how the Spanish word no is pronounced a little differently than ours.
By the end of six lessons, you have learned some common greetings and conversation, how to tell people you need things – from help to a cup of coffee – and the ever-important politeness words like thank you and please. You get started with numbers and telling time.
I thought they had introduced quite a good amount of vocabulary, including several basic verbs and a bit about the difference between the two verbs in Spanish for "to be" – ser and estar. They teach this by example, which is really the only way to master it in my mind.
Each lesson has a short review of some of the words you have learned previously, which is important for getting those words into long-term memory. I also liked how the program asks you questions which you then need to answer by putting together the words you have learned in slightly different ways. No mp3 file is the same as actually chatting in Spanish, but this does evoke it.
To find out more about Rocket Spanish:
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Read my review,
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Go right to their website… it’s chatty, informative, and enthusiastic…
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Or sign up for their free e-course in learning Spanish, from the left sidebar.
