Rocket French Reviews

I enjoy the course work and information so far. The voice voice recognition sucks. Had a French speaking friend speak as a test and she had the same experience. If this program tells a woman from Montreal that she's wrong or can't register her speech, then it just frustrates the learner and makes for a bad design.

Overall the course has some good points and some not so good,

The good is the audio course, I am not sure how far it can get you towards fluency but every little helps and the course does present information well. I found the banter a tad annoying at first but its grown on me and I have come accross stuff that i havent seen elsewhere. My feeling is that it will get you no further than basic communication and that michel thomas method is far better, as is pimsleur and paul noble. I think their methods get you speaking and understanding more effectively and more quickly; that said this is a good supplement to other learning systems.

The bad for me is the grammer section. It is basically just explanations that could have come from any text book but without excersises that support the material very well. I think for what they are doing here a textbook is a better option, its cheaper and you will get better reinforcement of the lessons. In fact the quizes attached seem completely irrelevant and are just vocab memorization.

The quizzes for the most part are just dull to be honest.

Read More

Look, I understand that the French speak fast, but, you can't slow it down for people who are new to the language and are trying to learn? Let us understand the correct pronunciation and then we can increase the speed. I had to go to another source to grasp the correct pronunciation. Because of this, I strongly discourage anyone new to the French language from wasting their time on Rocket Languages.

I cannot tell you how frustrating it is to try to use this program. The program has so much trouble hearing what I'm repeating back to it. The company's FAQ says to use headsets; I am. Then it says it's because they have it tuned to "native speakers." Well, what good does that do a person who is not native? I don't think native speakers are using RF! I'm not new to the French language so my pronunciation is not bad. I can only imagine how annoyed someone completely new to this would be feeling right now. If it's anything close to how I feel, it's not very good.

Rocket Languages is an excellent way to learn a language . It opens you up to how you can pronounce the language through following the tutor. I enjoy the bit where you have to write because it is a good practice to know the words and how to pronounce them. I also like the flash cards because they enable you to pronounce and get to hear if you are doing it properly. My favorite is the quiz because it gives me the opportunity to show that I understand what I have been learning. I like Rocket Languages to an extend that I will not hesitate to recommend it to anyone willing to try it. I enjoy it when it also corrects spelling to show you where you went wrong right away.

I was very happy with the program until the new format. The functionality when using an iPad has significantly deteriorated. In particular, I am unhappy with now being unable to replay pronunciation in order to compare with the speaker. My voice recordings are frequently cut off in mid-phrase. Basically, the program is no longer user friendly for people owning iPads. I no longer will recommend this program to my friends. In fact I am traveling to Europe this summer with some friends and I have told them to find another program. We are going to brush up on different languages prior to traveling.

Disappointed with not being able to download on android, windows, or apple platforms. This defeats the purpose of my purchase - wanted to listen during work drive. Also app not allowing the voice option. Why browser version only?

Not able to take quiz on android app.

Overall a good course - perhaps a few too many bells and whistles. In the French course the instructor needs to speak MUCH more slowly and enunciate more clearly. Speaking too fast, especially in the early stages, does NOT provide the student with proper pronunciation. It may be the way many French people speak day to day, but you need to learn the proper way to say things before speaking rapidly. I speak some French and what I'm hearing is not clear for a new student to learn properly.

Overall, I think the Rocket French folks have developed a pretty good system to learn French, so I won't go into detail about the things that I like. The big downside, however, is how their system tracks how far you've progressed in each module. For example, I just finished module 3.9, and the icons have changed from no color to the following colors and comments:

FLASHCARDS = ORANGE (GOOD)
HEAR-IT = ORANGE (GOOD)
WRITE-IT = ORANGE (GOOD)
KNOW-IT = ORANGE (GOOD)
QUIZ = GREEN (EASY)

That is not sufficient. What I want (and need) to know is how often I have reviewed each module and how I have done each time. So I have created an offline spreadsheet that shows the following for each section that I have studied. For example here is how I have tracked section 3.4 that I have reviewed several times and self-graded:

11/8/22 = D, 11/9/22 = C, 11/20/22 = C, 11/23/22 = B

You can see that first studied this module on 11/8/22, and then reviewed is subsequently three times, and my self-grade has improved from the initial D to a B. And, instead of a self-grade, I would much prefer to see the percentage of answers I got right.

Read More

I am taking the French course but I find the man talks way too much in English with annoying 'jokes'. Sorry but listening to him makes it difficult for me to continue and I loose interest. Over half the lessons are in translated English or him talking.The price for the course is good and I haven't had to use customer service to comment.