Learning Swedish with Instant Immersion is Fun!

I can't believe how hard it is to find a program out there to teach me Swedish. We finally decided to break down and buy the one software package out there: Instant Immersion 33 Languages Lab by Topics Entertainment (Windows Version.)

First off, what Instant Immersion is, is a set of 33 discs, each with a different language to learn. One of them is Swedish. He wants to brush up on his English too, so it's handy that another of the discs is just that. I won't list them all, but in addition to the usual French, Italian, Spanish, and German... you get such things as Hungarian, Arabic, Dutch, Thai, Japanese, Tagalog, Hebrew... let's just say if you want to learn it, it's probably included.

Not only can you learn these languages with Instant Immersion , but you can learn any of them from any other of them. Huh? What I mean to say is that each disc can be set to your own native language. IE, Lars set his English disc to Swedish. It talks to him in Swedish, and then translates to English for him. Yeah ok that could be worded better but hopefully you see what I'm getting at here.

Instant Immersion is a very basic tutor. If you are fairly fluent, this will only serve as a refresher. For beginners like me, it's wonderful.

To start off, once you load the disc you input your name. Several folks can use the same disc to learn by inputting their own names. It remembers where each name was when they closed down last time. This will be handy when we both decide to move on to a different language together. We plan to go through them all.

Once you have it loaded and set to your name, there will be a screen where you can learn the basic words (such as please, bathroom, etc.), Shopping (hairbrush, shorts, batteries), money, colors, numbers, Food, Common Phrases (what is your name), Time, and Countries. Like I said, the basics.

In each set listed above, you have 5 options.

The first thing to do is listen to the list spoken by both a male and a female for you so you can hear the pronunciations. These words are also printed on screen in both languages, accompanied by pictures.

Next, go to the option to try the words yourself. Here it will list the words again. You can have it repeated by the 'hosts' and then if you have your microphone turned on you can repeat the words and play it all back to see how close you really are.

Next are two little games/quizzes where you get to test what you've learned so far. The easy one will show several pictures, the spelling of a word, and says the name of the items in the language you're learning. Then it says the name of the one you need to pick. You then click on the picture corresponding to the word. Easy.

The other game is harder. It shows a group of pictures while the host says the word and you pick the right picture. You get a total of 50 points for each of these games, so a total of 100 points when you finish a subsection.

There is a little glitch with some of the Instant Immersion discs that you should be aware of. Some load up just fine and play immediately. Others, such as my Swedish disc (of course...) will not auto-load when the disc in inserted and I have to find it and open it myself. Slightly annoying, but not a major problem. It does put an icon in your thingies for you.

The voices of the hosts are very clear and concise. As you probably already know, nobody speaks that precisely so it's a good idea to have a native-born to bounce the words off of. I mean you'll be understood once you learn these, but you may get giggled at a bit.

The Instant Immersion games make it a lot of fun to learn the words. Every day I go back through the quizzes for the sets I've completed to cement the words further, and then go through and learn a new set. I like this set very much, but I can see needing a more advanced set very soon. We've had this less than a week and I'm pretty much ready for the next level, if I can find one.

I mean, how fast you go through these lessons is really dependant upon your own predisposition to languages in general. I'm not a wizkid by any means, but am highly motivated to learn so it's going rapidly. Your mileage may vary. We paid about $39. I think that's a bargain to learn the basics of 33 languages. I just wish it went a bit more advanced.

For The Geeks
System Requirements: PC: Windows 95 and higher, including XP, 486 processor or better, 16 MB RAM, VGA display (256 colors), 4X CD-ROM drive, Sound card, Mouse, Microphone (recommended), Printer (optional), Internet Access (optional)