Product Description

Works has the essential software any Home PC user needs: word processor, spreadsheet, database, calendar, email, and internet tools. Create professional-looking documents and more! Microsoft Works 9 now includes a Dictionary and a PowerPoint Viewer.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19681 in Books
• Published on: 2003-04-08
• Platform: Windows
• Format: CD
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 2
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

About the Author

Joan Russell

has worked in Kenya and Tanzania, and taught Swahili for many years at the university level.

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Customer Reviews

very thorough!
i liked this book. it wasn't quite as "simple" as the info suggested- but it was very thorough and i found myself learning swahili despite being more complicated than i had anticipated. it was broken up into easy to follow sections and there are lessons at the end of each section to do with answers in the back and that was helpful, too. the CD was nice for pronunciation clarification.

Sooooo confusing
I have studied 5 languages before this (Latin, Greek, French, Spanish and Italian) and I have been continually perplexed at the layout of this book. Swahili is fairly complicated, but the approach in this book makes it overwhelming. New concepts are introduced willy-nilly and in such a manner that as soon as you feel you are grasping something, they throw in an anomoly or a new concept. I never felt that I was able to close a chapter, confident that I had everything down. They also introduce concepts without explaining them until many chapters later... The dialogues at the beginning of each chapter are never translated and these anomolies become really frustrating - you try to translate something only to find that you haven't learned it yet (wish I'd known that one before I spent 20 minutes trying to look it up). Verb tenses are not introduced as such (past, present, future, past perfect) and they are not introduced in the infinitive which is possibly the most perplexing thing. You can't say much without a verb/tense. The CDs are useful for hearing Swahili, but once again, if you never get the translation, it is pretty hard to learn without sitting in front of the CD player with the book and your finger on the pause button (not useful in the car!) I would most definitely not recommend this series, although I definitely recommend learning Swahili. It is a really fun language to speak and anyone else who can speak it will be happy to chat with you whether in the US or Africa. (As a matter of interest, I was reading this book in a coffee shop the other day and someone who had studied the same book approached me. She agreed on everything I've said here - prompting me to spread the word).

Swahili
This course is excellent. From the very outset it was teaching me vital communication skills for Swahili, and my Swahili friends are impressed how well I am speaking their language already. For the price, this course is excellent!