Product Description

From Cantonese to Thai, Gaelic to Modern Persian, learning the languages of the world is attainable for any beginning student. Learners can use the Teach Yourself Complete Language Courses at their own pace or as a supplement to formal courses.

All Teach Yourself Complete Language Courses include:

• Up-to-date, graded interactive dialogues
• Graded units of culture notes, grammar, and exercises
• Step-by-step guides to pronunciation
• Practical vocabulary
• Regular and irregular verb tables
• A bilingual glossary
• A clear, uncluttered, and user-friendly layout
• Self-assessment quizzes to test progress
• Fully updated audio recordings on CD for easy access and review

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #42380 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-18
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 2
• Binding: Audio CD
• 371 pages

About the Author

Terttu Leney

has taught Finnish to adults and teachers of Finnish for over 20 years.

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Customer Reviews

Good value, but still...
This was the first book I bought when I decided to independently teach myself Finnish. It is a good introduction for someone who has no previous knowledge, I guess, because you have to start somewhere. HOWEVER, I found that you can't really just work your way through it without spending a LOT of time on each chapter. There is too much vocabulary at once and it seems like they expect you to just memorize everything the first time they say it.
The CDs were very useful, but there is no way you could use them by themselves. They REALLY help with the pronunciation. The native speakers speak very slowly and clearly, and there is a good variety of voices.
There are not nearly enough exercises in this book, and next to NO grammar! Although, I know that this is mostly due to the fact that Finnish is a very tough language and the grammar is crazy. Most people say that it is better to learn Finnish (at least at first) by just memorizing words and phrases.
Anyways, my point is, This book is alright. The CDs are handy. I suggest it to learn the correct pronunciation. It's not the GREATEST, but there aren't too many Finnish books out there to begin with...and it's really good value for the price.

"Completely" disrespectful to the learner
On page 8, the dipthongs are listed in one order and then not in that order when they are used in sample words. Then, on page 13, the phrases are said super fast and only once. You have no time to process the phrases or even practice them yourself. For the alphabet on page 14, same thing. The speaker literally races through the alphabet. You have no time to say anything yourself. That was only the introduction! It appears they want you to have one hand on the book and one on the pause button. If you want to go over or refer back to material that you would like to hear or practice again, even just a few seconds back, it is not possible; you have to start the entire section over. For a point of reference about these critical comments, I am multilingual, have studied languages from diverse language families and have taught a foreign language. This item belongs in the category of the worst instructional material I've ever seen. Based on this, I would not try any other languages in the series. The only other "complete" thing about this package was that it was a complete waste of money. It is, at best, a supplemental review for non-beginning Finnish language learners.

Great Start
This is a great starter product for those who want to learn the basics but who also want to expand on their chosen language. The only flaw with the book are the CD's, they go pretty fast but that's no problem. The information in the book is very helpful as they pretty much break it down for you. All in All i would learn another language with this product.