Spanish with Michel Thomas--Complete Course 8 CD Set [Audiobook] (Audio CD)

The mainstream approach of many of these beginner audio guides is to play repeatedly recorded situations of spanish speakers in various situations; catching a train, ordering food, finding your way around emergency situations, etc. However the great downfall of this approach is that, even if you do manage to memorise all of the sentences used during these situations, you are not left with a means to understand those speaking in reply to you, or adapting that language to express what you want in any foreseeable situation.

Michel's approach from the start seeks to try and make you construct your own sentences, instead of impassively listening to pre-recorded conversations. This 'fleshes out' the language in such a way that your understanding of sentence construction - and this is what the course concentrates on - is much more comprehensive, and the more you go over the material, the more you discover for yourself the inner mechanics of the language. This gives you the means to adapt your spanish speaking to the varying situations you will be exposed to if you go on holiday to spain (or any other spanish speaking country).

Highly recommended for its efficient, effective, and comprehensive approach to spanish learning.

Bad points - The description of this course as a 'complete course' can be misleading. The course itself makes no such claim. Michel Thomas himself refers to the course as 'an introductory course to the language'. Don't expect to cover everything in 8 hours, e.g., the subjunctive, compound tenses (apart from the perfect tense), active and passive voice, and comparatives are not covered. However, this 8 hour course does pack in a great deal and hopefully a further course covering the above will be available in the future.

Good points - Michel Thomas focuses on the importance of structure, phonetics and stress in communicating in the Spanish language.

Learning by this method is relaxing and enjoyable. It's true - no notes, memorising or homework are necessary. His method pursues learning through understanding and Michael Thomas is excellent at conveying understanding. Patient yet persistent, he conveys his knowledge, stimulating memory through a series of word chains that structure the language, and memory hooks, which make retrieval easy for those of us with even the most fog bound of memories.

I have learned a great deal more in 8 hours, than in almost a year's study in various language schools. This course is able to convey learning without pain. If you have ever been intimidated by the large number of seemingly irregular Spanish verbs try this course. Michel explains the reasons for the irregular verbs; be it their roots or simple phonetics, once you understand they no longer seem so irregular.

If you are about to embark on a Spanish course this is a very good foundation to build on. It will prevent you from picking up bad habits!

If you are at an intermediate level this course will provide good revision, deeper understanding and make you aware of the bad habits you have picked up!

This course was enjoyable, I covered the 8 hour course within 4 days. I have studied French for years but have ordered the 8 hour French course too (it's sold out at the the moment - a good sign).

G. Burrough.

Admittedly the 8 CDs can not teach you everything, and you will only become fluent in spanish through years of practice and immersion, but the confidence and understanding, combined with the ability to construct sentences and deconstruct what you hear is a better start than you will get anywhere else. I have since bought some spanish audio books and a couple of novels in spanish and, though the going is quite slow, the progression is SO satisfying!