The Standard Deviants - Learn Advanced Spanish - Verbs

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Starring: Standard Deviants
Rated: NR (Not Rated)
Type: DVD
Studio: Cerebellum Corporation
Release Date: 2002-06-18
Get ready to explore one of the most dynamic, festive, and wondrous parts of speech, in Spanish or any other language the fabulous verb! In the course of this DVD, the award-winning Standard Deviants will teach you all about modal and reflexive verbs, and expose you to a bunch of new tenses that are going to help you express yourself in the distant past, the future, and all the points in between. They ll also introduce you to the concept of mood, the subjunctive, and even show you how to boss people around! By the end of this DVD, you'll have learned SIXTY-FOUR new verbs.

Learn Spanish
Seller advertised the product and its condition exactly as the product arrived to me. I feel based only on this purchase you can trust this seller.

Ahhh the 'Subjunctive Tenses' ! Finally presented and understood!
This dvd teaches you the very important verb tenses, subjunctives, that are used literally all the time in the spoken language. But students are exhausted after learning the all the others, present, past, etc. Did you ever wonder why you often recognize verbs but are confused by there spelling and usage which seem to stray from what you have been taught all these years? This dvd teaches all the verb tenses, including the elusive but frequently used Subjunctive Tense. This alone has allowed me to break through my learning barriers of speaking like a student or tourist all the time. Now I can understand all those weird uses like, " Yo quiero que tu estudies". I want you to study. Notice the spelling of estudies,,, it is not the well known 2rd person spelling, 'estudias'. In your mind, you reason that estudies really means estudias, but you are wrong. I found this dvd to be a treasure of learning for me personally. And of course, you can not fully appreciate the Subjunctive Tense without also further understanding even more about the world of pronouns, hence, even more light is taught on those many forms and usages also. For example, in "Yo quiero que tu estudies." , the pronoun tu seems to be used incorrectly to a student because you might translate that to mean "... study yours, study yourself, etc". and none of those make sense. So buy this dvd and break thought your old set of pronoun usage and enter the everday world of the subjunctives.

Too much rote instruction, not enough practice
I learned Spanish for the first time when I was 14 (I'm much older now), and so perhaps may not be the customer for this title. I memorized, learned, and drilled the verb conjugations repeatedly throughout my courses. This is what the DVD attempts to do. I guess I was expecting a little more practice and illustration of use of the conjugations in real like settings (e.g., banks, stores, sports conversations, employment interactions) instead of in obscure settings like the jungle and gardening (which the DVD does: how many people use the verb "plow" in their daily conversations?). I was also really disappointed and quite surprised that none of the actors has mastered a Spanish accent. Indeed, through impersonation I acquired my Spanish accent (as well as a Chinese accent, a Portuguese accent and a Greek accent). Certainly, actors of all people know more about impersonation than the general public; and you don't need to know the language very well to acquire the accent. The actors even misplace many orthographic accents on words (e.g., the command pongan is pronounced with the accent on the gan). In some instances, you can get an entirely different word with misplacement.

Students will get rote instruction in formal courses. DVD courses should make up for the dearth of practical conversation experience in classroom settings by providing illustrations of when and how the language is used in these settings. I have yet to purchase a video that does this, but I really want one.

Understand Standard Deviants Teaching Style
It seems to me that most of the reviewers have no idea about the teaching style of Standard Deviants programs. These were originally designed as broadcast programs for educational television and within classrooms. The instructional videos came later. The style is intentionally filled with humor and some silliness. The idea is that enjoying the program will bring one to pay more attention to it and to learn better, sometimes in spite of oneself. The programs state that they are no substitute for the regular classroom instruction. My child and I have both learned a great deal from the Standard Deviants programs, the language DVD's as well as math, science, grammar and literature. They are very enjoyable and educational as well.

sham products - crap for profit by misleading public
These Standard Deviant products are shams. The producers hire a bunch of theater students who know nothing about the subjects taught (I unwittingly purchased SD Physics and Spanish at the same time). These actors read scripts with the most innane material, try to be funny and cute (but they are bad actors to begin with and not funny). I suspect they are hired based on whether they are attractive, and I wonder if they are even paid for their efforts. Anyway, SD products do not teach well or entertain. The material is taken directly from textbooks and read verbatim by "aspiring actors" with grossly inadequate explanation. One of the worst products I've ever happened upon.