Learn Polish Now! 9.0

The section on survival phrases will be of much use to those who have already reached a basic level. There are several practice dialogues based on common situations--in the hotel, the bar, the airport, etc.--with some examples that demonstrate a wicked sense of humour. Although some of the advice borders on the infantile ("When you decide to travel outside the USA, you will probably need a passport"), much of it is useful and rounds out a well-composed package for someone starting out on the road to using the language overseas. --Toby Green

I have given this 4 stars on the strength of it's pronunciation guide alone. There is nothing better than hearing the words you are learning spoken by a native speaker and then being able to repeat it (using the microphone included) and having the two pronunciations compared. I have found this has improved my pronunciation massively, especially as my present contact with Poles is limited.

The content of the course itself is poorly structured and starts off by introducing conversations and phrases that on the whole I felt I would never use in real life situations. Where a beginner simply wants to start with the basics such as 'Hello', 'Goodbye', 'How are you' etc, this title starts off with phrases and conversations which cannot be easily adapted to any situation.

Finding words and grammar information is a task in itself. I found myself sitting searching through the software for a while to find the basic words I wanted to know..including days of the week and numbers. As a person who likes to understand the grammar of verb endings I found the information provided a little tiresome to locate and understand. (All this info is in the help files!)

It's not all bad...when you have managed to learn some words and phrases from various sources, the games and tests make for interesting and informative diversions and can give you a decent indication of what you actually know.

My advice, if you want to learn Polish, get the Hugo - Learn Polish in 30 days book and use Learn Polish Now as a valuable pronunciation tool. Don't expect to find studying with this title alone and easy task!


NOT recorded by native speakers!   October 11, 2007
A. M. Henderson (Wales)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful

The title of my review says it all. One of the voices is not a native speaker, but an American (?) struggling with Polish consonant groups, such as: sz, cz, chrz etc.
I have bought it for my husband, only to discover that the interface is confusing, to say the least; grammar non-existent; and pronunciation -faulty.
I am a native speaker, in case anyone wonders....
Not recommended!


Poor   June 29, 2004
Dr T (London)
11 out of 13 found this review helpful

As a writer of e-learning I found the interface very clunky with large fonts, old faded photos, navigation that is not intuitive and largely lacking in imagination. The training is very confusing and far too advanced for beginners, it seems to ignore the basics such as the Polish alphabet and pronunciation. There are some good ideas here but as a leaning tool I would strongly recommend that you do not buy - I would value the CD at about a fiver not the 35 quid I paid.


Learn Polish Now! 9   June 29, 2004
Dr T (London)
13 out of 16 found this review helpful

Wow! As a writer of e-learning myself I've seen some poor training tools in my time - I wasn't quite prepared for this. It's relatively expensive so I expected something a bit special. First of all it's very confusing and not at all intuitive, you have to go to Help to work out how to use the training -WRONG! It feels ancient to use with clipart, faded digicam photos and large clunky text, all placed unimaginatively on the screen. The traning appears to consist of four "Titles" and five groups of activities for each. The first title, first activity presents confounding pages of Polish with no attempt to discuss pronunciation or the Polish alphabet. The next "Title" "Survival Phrases" starts with random phrases such as "SPOTKANIE POWITANIE segment 15" - there is no explanation on the screen as to what these words mean, what segment 15 means and how to use the training to learn what they mean. I can't help thinking that "Good Morning" "How are you?" "Please" and "Thank you" could perhaps be a slightly more useful start for the Survival phrases section - clearly this is too traditional an approach to learning a language :-). And so it goes on. Maybe after a few days I might understand what is going on here. I am lucky in that I have a Polish partner and have travelled in Poland and understand a fair amount already, for anyone new to the language it would be extemely difficult to get anything from this. Perhaps the other language versions deserve their 4 star rating - this one does not. PLEASE DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY!! - you might as well buy a Polish dictionery.