Turkish in Three Months (Hugo's Simplified System)

For background purposes, I purchased this book along with Teach Yourself Turkish. I speak English and Spanish fluently now and I have never tried to teach myself a new language before--especially not as an adult. I learned both English and Spanish growing up.

I found this book and the cassettes have helped me to learn Turkish faster than if I read through the book by itself. There are several reasons for this (1) time (2) uncertainty about pronunciation without a Turkish tutor (3) I learn more with both hearing and reading the words

I listen to the cassettes every day while I am stuck in 1 hour traffic on the way to work and 1 hour on the way home. The audio cassettes are in Turkish and in English. They say the word in Turkish twice, pause for 2 seconds to allow you time to repeat it, and then they say the English tranlastion and repeat the same word in Turkish a third time.

The cassette alone is also not enough. Some areas on the cassettes are only in Turkish to save time as there is so much to cover on 4 cassettes but the translation is in the book. So I listen during my ride and browse through the text while at work or at home.

I am on my second week and I am on my 2nd cassette (there are 4). I listened to the first cassette over and over again for a whole week and I think I have gotten a very good grasp in only 1 week.

What is missing are tests (they have short paragraph exercises for you to translate what you learned in previous chapters). I would have liked fill-in-the-blank lessons and finish these statement tests so that I could could benefit from the written method of learning.

If you buy the book from Amazon, you won't get the cassettes because I believe they stopped making them. I recommend you take the risk and buy it used. I bought mine used but it came brand new, still in an unopened package. They should keep selling the cassettes with the book.

Comparisons and Opinions?

The FSI course is massive, and the only way to describe it is to pretend that you are a 2 month old baby, who hears over and over again something that they very slowly begin to understand... and master rapidly.

The Hugo Course is comparable to a high school course. It comes fast... perhaps too fast, and overwhelms. However, when you 'crack the book' and actually "study"... it is all there. But you need to invest 2-3 hours per day to really master the material. My wife says that it is simpler , more logical, and ultimately easier than the FSI course. But she says the FSI course is very good, because it has the bulk to allow multiple repitions and incremental mastery. She also feels that the speakers on the FSI cassette are more varied and easier to understand than the Hugo course.

For 6 months, 3 hours/day she has been studying.That's her opinion.

For me? I didn't have the time to invest.I found the LV Thomas grammar book, a small Eng-TK/TK-Eng pocket dictionary , a Turkish co-worker, and a lot of listening to my wife's inane questions in Turkish, which she insisted I answer, helped me to achieve the comfort level that I wanted.

She loves the Hugo course, and that book is what she plans to take to Turkey. However...this is the 4th language she has learned. And she that she intends to continue learning it. And says that she would consider spending shelling out for the FSI Level II course when the time comes.

p.s. Don't let the negative reviews of people who don't seem to be able to put in the effort to learn something put you off! Turkish is no harder than any other language to learn.