Customer Reviews
Manage your expectations
I went through Arabic level one with the online version, and I found it fairly useful. After reading other reviews, I would caution shoppers to be realistic about their expectations... Rosetta Stone uses learning techniques similar to those used by a child learning their first language, so it's a good idea to remember how that actually went. It's pretty likely that your first "formal" education in your native language started at about age 5... after you had been immersed in the language EVERY DAY for FIVE YEARS. If you expect to reach a similar level of proficiency in a language with a completely different alphabet and different sentence constructions after taking an entry-level immersion course, you are going to be disappointed. ^M
Useless on its own, powerful if used with other material
If you don't understand the Arabic alphabet, this will be useless. But if you get a dictionary and learn the alphabet, this is the best software you can get.
Good when in conjuction with other materials
The Rosetta Stone software can be very useful to the learning and study of arabic as long as you use it in conjuction with other materials. Rosetta Stone Arabic teaches Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), which is a more academic and universal form of arabic as it is based on the written language. This differs from colloquial dialects which are rarely written and can differ greatly n different regions. The materials I used, and in fact are still using, are the Rosetta Stone software along with The Arabic Alphabet, by Nicholas Awde and Arabic for Dummies, by Amine Bouchentouf. These materials cover all the general subjects required for the learning of MSA. The Arabic Alphabet covers the alphabet and does an excellent job and should be covered before the use of the Rosetta Stone software. The Rosetta Stone software itself is essential to the building up of a vocabulary. It starts with basic nouns and then building on them and then forming sentences by adding verbs and adjectives.Through this method you begin to understand the structure and grammar of the language, however without further instruction it can be hard to define exactly what the grammatical structure is. The software, however, is weak on the fact that it does not teach the alphabet, it only shows it in conjuction with the media which it is teaching through. It also does not cover conversational abilities. You may be able to say, "The small boy kicked a black and white ball inside a large house and broke a window", but you won't be able to say "Hello, my name is x". Luckily the other two materials cover these apects. Arabic for Dummies provides an excellent introduction to MSA along with having a simple yet informative coverage of arabic grammar. Arabic for Dummies also supplies the converasational aspect as it includes 17 chapters covering most everyday situations. However this book avoids using the arabic alphabet although it gives a brief introduction of it. Because of this I recommend that this book come first as it provides a solid introduction and shows you exactly what your getting into.
