Rocket Languages Reviews

Very poor experience regarding the numerous simple spelling mistakes and inconsistent and sometimes just plain wrong translations. I expected much more from a paid for language learning tool.

I just started the advanced course and I find the conversation very difficult to follow. It is hard to
Understand because the speech is fast and slurred not clearly spoken. Especially when new words and phrases are used..
The first two courses don’t prepare you well enough with verb conjugation either.

First of all, In the middle of exercises (as I'm trying to speak a German phrase) I get annoying popup windows asking me to write a review of Rocket German. I think that's pretty indicative of how much Rocket cares about me actually learning, an how much it just wants more business. In fact, just above this box where I'm typing, Rocket has a link to some "example reviews" which are glowing reports of how when you buy RG, all your wildest fantasies will come true. Since RG insists, though, here is my review...***

Right after I paid $250 dollars for the three German courses (the first of which I didn't even want, but you have no option to remove it from the bundle) I get directed to another page telling me I should really also buy another add-on course that normally costs $50, but they're going to give it to me for $30. Classic used-car salesman tactic. I decline. I'm directed to another page saying "Ok, we'll give it to you for $20, but only if you buy it right now. No kidding, this is your last chance!" Does it get any more sleazy than that?***

The German course was clearly written by native German speakers, which is good, but not really checked by a native English speaker for the quality of the English dialogue.

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The more I go through the course, the more frustrating it gets. Instead of learning and practicing individual words, I'm supposed to memorize incredibly complex sentences without understanding the meaning of how all the words work together in the sentence. There is no logical progression from learning words to forming sentences. As a result, I forget everything immediately and feel demotivated. And I stumble over the pronunciation because I have to say ten new words at a time. There is no daily reinforcement of previous lessons, which makes the course meaningless over time.

Very monotonous and hard to follow material. I can't keep engaged in the material. Super boring content.

So much potential….but the play buttons in the app work sporadically. Records just fine and voice recognition is great. But I Have to reboot my iPad Air quite often to clear the issue. Note that The coin is flipped on the web site - which I tried hoping to address the play buttons in the app not working. Well - the play buttons work fine on the web site - but the voice record says “having trouble” on every single item. And I am, per the instructions, using safari and the red microphone is on (not crossed out or greyed out). As such - this tool can’t really be used. Will try tomorrow - maybe a server issue. Ready to request full refund if issue(s) persist. Exasperating experience. May resort to old fashioned Pimsleur CDs to prepare for vacation to france in a few months.

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.

its such a hard program that you can not learn from

I've been looking for an interactive program to teach me Spanish... and Rocket Languages fits the bill! It's easy to use, cheaper than the competition and fits my learning style. Can't ask for more!

My overall impression of the level 1 program is that, with the exception of vocabulary, and the present tense, Rocket Italian Level 1 is very weak on teaching the student Italian grammar. An example of this is the use of prepositions. These seem to pop up everywhere with no explanation as to the rules governing their use (like the use of "di" which has at least 15 different meanings!), Level 1 aggravates this problem by frequently giving you lengthy Italian phrases in th flash cards & the "Know It" section to memorize. These contain grammatical structures that are never addressed in the course. Also, it makes no provision for different responses that the student may have translated correctly even though it is different from the translation in the course.

I would suggest they introduce a grammatical rule give some examples, & and then drills on that rule. The drills would also incorporate review of a verb tense. This would reinforce the latter and help us master both until they become second nature.

Instead, we waste enormous amounts of time memorizing lengthy sentences with no idea of the grammatical rules which govern the sentences. These are sentences which we will never use and quickly forget.